How did this idea come about?
Funny story. It didn’t actually start out as a graphic novel…
It all started in the Shanghai offices of Sokaris. Vasily, Adon, Jericho and Stephan had gathered there to discuss a pitch we could submit in response to a Request For Proposal from one of the world’s largest travel services providers: Ctrip.com, now known as Trip.com. The RFP was quite mad, but its unusually massive scope provided us with the leeway to imagine the amazing world we were to conceive.
Ctrip had shown us, as reference, images of the top interactive art exhibitions in the world at the time. Installations, exhibits, projects. Paris, Tokyo, New York. Crazy, conceptual, interactive creme-de-la-creme where art intersects with technology and human will. Ctrip said something like “Imagine there was no limit to the budget. What would you propose?”
“Unlimited budget!!??” We all thought, incredulously.
Jericho’s immediate response to this was “cyberpunk!” With all of us being huge cyberpunk fans, we loved the direction and were all immediately on board! Jericho proposed that we physically create a whole street belonging to a cyberpunk city of our invention, modelled after a promotional event for Blade Runner 2049.
We set about creating our interactive city and the experiences you’d have. The questionnaire you’d have to fill out before your PSDI (Potential Social Deviancy Index) assessment. The ways AI would interact with your information and weave you into the life of the city.
As we sought to create the context for an immersive experience, we created characters like The Derelicte; a threatening super hacker; an unassailable FingerCat Unity that keeps humanity as pets (with our thanks!); the house in the sky; a shrine to the “AI God;” and a whole series of crazy interactive moments people could enjoy. Finally, we made up eight different world-ending events to use as pretence to evacuate the crowd so we could let the next bunch of people in.
Ctrip loved it and awarded Sokaris Studio the contract, but, as it turns out, the real project we were auditioning for was something quite different. What Ctrip actually wanted Sokaris to build was something more akin to a high-tech tourism information booth with interactive art elements.
So, our mandate from Ctrip was no longer to build an interactive cyberpunk city. Nevertheless, the seed of a greater idea had taken its root. Obviously, the dream financing scenario of an “unlimited budget” Ctrip earlier teased was never more than a hook. But it was good that we bit. Obviously, financing such a tremendously complicated and technologically-advanced interactive theme park would take serious money. But, as every child knows, love trumps money every time. And we seriously love our story! So we resolved to find some way to tell it.
Time went on. Ideas continued to percolate. Scenes continued to incept. Until, finally, a complete story and family of characters emerged, becoming The God That Died.
The God That Died begins in e-comic form out of necessity more than anything. The cheapest, fastest proof-of-concept we can rig together. The God That Died could be a film or two (don’t forget the prequel!), episodic television, a video game; hell—FingerCats could even become a successful dating app!
Hopefully, it’ll become all of these, and then, one day when fanfare and finance make it possible, The God That Died will finally actualize into the form conceived at the moment of genesis—an interactive cyberpunk city you can experience in the flesh.
One day, if the stars align just right, we might just get the chance to build us a little slice of Refuge One, and we’ll be able to invite you all to the party! If the fates are kind, and it ends up we do, your first drinks at Passion House are on us!
The God That Died Team
Jericho Yang, Adon Lee, Vasily Betin, Stephan Luc Larose
The God That Died 