slides: Party Report: Robin Lopez, GRIMM Cast, & Famous Authors At Mayday App Launch

Friday, January 09, 2015

Byron Beck, GoLocalPDX Features Editor

Daniel Wilson and Robin Lopez

Daniel H. Wilson and Robin Lopez at launch party for MayDay! app. Photo by Byron Beck.

Party Report: The Blazer's Robin Lopez, stars of GRIMM and best-selling authors, like Chuck Palahniuk and Chelsea Cain, showed up at a party to support their friend Daniel H. Wilson, the creator of a new “playable story” app called Mayday! Deep Space.

A New York Times best-selling author (Robopocalypse, Robogenesis) and one of GoLocalPDX's 25 new cool people, Wilson was also the mastermind behind one heck of launch party for MayDay!'s release, which happened on Tuesday.

“My goal for Mayday! was simple: create a story that you can play,” says Robotics engineer Wilson.

And play is exactly what those who attended his Mayday! launch party did. Hosted by Daniel and his wife Anna in their beautiful Southwest Hills home it was a chance for an incredible group of people to gather in support of Wilson and the MayDay! app.

Much like "the party" the Mayday! Deep Space launch event attracted an eclectic group of artists, writers, musicians, songwriters, programmers, scientists, actors, comedians and verbal linguists. It was really quite the group who sipped on wine from Oso Market and supped on meatballs and sandwiches.

"I just invited everyone I knew," said the somewhat shy Daniel when asked how he gathered this particularly awesome group together.

And yes, that was Blazer Robin Lopez, who is almost off the injured list, giving good face to Pink Martini's China Forbes. And yes, that was pretty much the entire cast of GRIMM including David Giuntoli and his gal pal both on the off the show Bitsie Tulloch, Claire Coffee (with her hubby, Nickel Creek's Scott Thile), Slias Weir Mitchell and Bree Turner hanging out with the Osric Chau from Supernatural. And yes that was Oregon authors Chelsea Cain and Chuck Palahniuk and Lois Leeven all gathered near the fireplace. And yes that was the guy from "Wild"....well....you get the idea. It was a great party.

See Slides Below: Robin Lopez, GRIMM Cast, & Famous Authors At Mayday App Launch

As for the Mayday! Deep Space app itself? It has the player answer a mayday call from a survivor stranded on a deserted spaceship. Voice commands are used throughout the game to save the survivor from virus-infected crew members. Plenty of twists and turns will ensue as players discover what the heck happened to the crew of the USS Appaloosa.

“My favorite part is the twist at the end,” says Wilson. “You can just hear the wonder in Claire Coffee’s voice and then it’s like boom and the credits roll.”

Osric Chau, voices the main character. Chau and Wilson met at Comic Con during an Entertainment Weekly party. “I’m a pretty shy guy, and I was staring at this foosball table trying to avoid all the celebrities” admits Wilson. “Chao saw me and we ended up having a good time playing foosball.”

Wilson collaborated with local development studio Mountain Machine that coded the app. The Mountain Machine team received support from the Oregon Story Board accelerator program and from leaders in the Portland digital storytelling ecosystem.

And, by the way, those tech guys sure know how to party. Who knew?

To download the MayDay! Deep Space app go here.

Related Slideshow: Robin Lopez, GRIMM Cast, & Famous Oregon Authors At Mayday App Launch

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Anna, Robin and Daniel

Anna and Daniel H. Wilson with Blazer Robin Lopez at the Mayday! Deep Space launch party in Southwest Portland.