What do you get when you cross Philip K. Dick with the Tibetan Book of the Dead? Broken Saints, a brooding piece of Web noir for people high on transcendental meditation instead of amphetamines. The Flash animation epic (www.brokensaints.com) has won a cultlike following and picked up the Viewers Award at this year's Sundance Online Film Festival. But now creator Brooke Burgess is bringing the cyberpunk saga to a close. The final chapter, "Truth," goes live July 14. For those looking to get religion in a hurry, here's Saints in capsule form.
The Plot: Technocalypse Now
A hardcore hacker, a Muslim soldier, a Shinto priest, and mystery girl Shandala are drawn together by apocalyptic visions. Their nemesis: a biocommunications megacorp using satellites to transmit extremely low-frequency signals that affect people's minds. That's not all - Biocom's arsenal includes everything from chip implants to weather control. When Shandala is kidnapped, our heroes head to Biocom HQ for a showdown.
What Is the Frequency?
For Broken Saints, the medium - and the message - is all about revelation, not instant gratification. So like any good global conspiracy, this epic takes its own sweet time: Chapter 24, told in five acts, clocks in at about an hour. To underscore its grand theme of spiritual reckoning, the finale incorporates historical footage of Hiroshima, Vietnam, and other low points in human evolution. The result is a mesmerizing trip into the dark heart of technology.
The Men Behind the Curtain
Burgess, a former game guru at Electronic Arts, is Broken Saints' writer-director and mastermind. Art maestro Andrew West takes advantage of Painter 7's versatility to create a mix of anime and classical styles. Tech director Ian Kirby uses Toon Boom to provide cinematic camera motion and the illusion of 3-D, while Flash MX allows him to import and embed video. The haunting music, by Tobias Tinker, is Blade Runner by way of Cirque du Soleil.
PLAY
Soldiers of Fortune
Heart and Soul in the Machine
What's on Your iPod?
Call Upgrading
Keiboard Gets the Thumbs Up
The Microsoft IQ Test
Ultimate Truth
Sick Bastard
Time Warp
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Bot
reviews
Fetish
Doomsday Devices
Muscle Cards
Needle in a Hard Drive
Shopping Cart
