You only live twice — Codename Cygnus Reactivated!

Glancing Back

As of August 31st, it was four years to the day since the big debut of interactive audio drama. At PAX Prime 2013 in Seattle, as part of one of the first Indie Minibooths, a small company of scrappy devs and visionary writers called Reactive Studios released the first-ever voice operated interactive audio drama: Codename Cygnus. With the support of hundreds of Kickstarter backers and devoted fans, we first learned of the huge untapped potential for the new medium of interactive audio titles.

Today, the team at Earplay is thrilled to announce that Cygnus Mission 1 has made it onto Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant, as of its four year anniversary on August 31st. This is the first long form interactive audio to reach these voice services, and the first of many more to come, marking a great moment in the long and bright future of voice-first entertainment.

Leaping Forward

You may be wondering why there was no fanfare on the 31st, and why we waited until now to make public announcements about our first big project. We have been testing multiple features in beta as we prepare to roll out more premium stories and content. For Cygnus, we’ve added in-app support for account registration, and an account linking wall in front of additional content.

While this means you’ll have to link your main Earplay account to each new Earplay story you’d like to play, it allows us to live-update each title with new chapters and features without delay, or having to re-certify with Google or Alexa — that means you get better content, both faster and more secure!

The platform change is better for everybody, as this story is not just a direct port of the Cygnus mobile app. For Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant, we’ve revised and re-recorded prompts to ensure that our content evolves with the times and technology, and to create a more natural and immersive interactive experience!

Thanks To You

As these voice devices become more common in households across America, the UK, and across the world, more and more people will turn to speech as the most natural way to interface with their technology — and as one of the top earners in the Alexa skill market, we are thrilled to be here on the forefront of the audio revolution.

We’d like to give special thanks to Troy Whitlock for his help in tweaking the script, and our returning Cygnus voiceactors for getting back to the studio to record with us. And of course, we could never have made it this far without the support of the original Cygnus Kickstarter backers and fans.

You can view the app page and link your Earplay account to Codename Cygnus for either Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant. If you enjoy being a secret agent, consider giving us a solid rating and review on our Facebook and the Cygnus skill page! It will help us reach more audience members like you, and to bring immersive audio adventures to the wider world!