Netflix, watch your back (again!). If you think the video streaming service has a monopoly on groundbreaking interactive projects, YouTube would beg to differ. They released the first trailer of an upcoming choose-your-own-adventure type of video special called A Heist With Markiplier. If you ask “What the heck is a Markiplier?” then you haven’t spent a lot of time on YouTube probably since he’s one of the most popular personalities on the platform and now he’s getting a “fiction” show coming out this October 30.
A Heist with Markiplier is YouTube’s first attempt at having an interactive event where they give control to viewers on what the outcome will be. Markiplier and some friends go on a heist and you get to make choices for them to see what direction it goes. There are sixty one videos for the project and it can lead to almost three dozen different conclusions depending on the choices that you make. This is of course part of the YouTube Original programming.
Based on the trailer, the video plays out on a first-person perspective which makes it look like you’re playing a video game, but using live action videos. It doesn’t really show how it would look like with you making choices and all so we don’t know how that will work. But watching it on a mobile device will probably make it easier for users to make choices and all. It may be even more fun watching it on a VR device.
Unlike a lot of the YouTube shows you see, Google probably spent a lot of production money on this as it looks almost “legitimately” a movie or a TV show. It will also be a sort of different page for Markiplier whose channel is mostly about him playing games and having some sort of animated clips when talking about games and other pop culture stuff. A Heist feels like a “real” production with effects and explosions and other actors acting beside him and all.
The interactive video will start streaming on October 30. We don’t know yet if it will be exclusive for YouTube Premium or YouTube TV subscribers or if it will be released just on YouTube so anyone can watch it.
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