If you mention 'multiple touchpoints' to a bunch of advertisers, their eyeballs will roll back and they'll start to salivate like Homer Simpson. It's the holy grail of money-making: get your property out there to as many people in as many ways as possible and you'll see the results in your bottom line. It's been the boon to the web's widget industry and to social networks like Facebook.
We've seen this in games - witness the enormous market in console game ports from one machine to another. But to date, there's been no relationship between the different versions. The closest the industry has got to the 'multiple touchpoint' ideal is the ever-innovative Sega Dreamcast's Virtual Memory Unit, or VMU for short. That little gadget allowed the player to continue whichever game was saved on the unit while away from the console. It was primitive, but proved that it could be done.
We've talked about a similar concept in gaming on the blog before, the notion of a pan-gaming identity which can be taken from one property to another with transferred skills. But the prospect of interacting with a game on the move, of progressing when away from the primary touchpoint, is on the way thanks to the realisation of virtual world Second Life on a mobile phone. In the interest of full disclosure, I'm currently contracting with Linden Lab as a research analyst, but have nothing to do with the mobile phone implementation.
But which other games would suit multiple touchpoints, and which technologies - from mobile phones to GPSs would they translate best on?
