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June 30, 2005
The Art of the H3ist Wrap-up and Review
June 29, 2005 marked the Relaunch Event for Tatum Think as well as the finale for the Audi sponsored Alternate Reality Game The Art of the H3ist. Players gathered at The Viceroy in Santa Monica as well as on the web to watch the live event play out.
The beginning of the end started 36 hours in advance with one of the lead characters, Ian Yarbrough, breaking into his rival Virgil Tatum’s house. While Ian found the incriminating evidence he was looking for, he also managed to get himself caught red-handed by Virgil and his two goons and was promptly captured.
Ian’s capture led to one of the more surprising twists in the game. A member of the Coachella 5, HitsHerMark was enlisted by our heroine, Nisha Roberts, to track Ian down. Although HHM was able to send in a video of Ian being tied up and carried away, she herself was kidnapped and was found tragically murdered the next morning.
While HitsHerMark was keeping her date with destiny, Nisha was tracking down a lead to discover the real identify of Arclight, the mastermind of the Uffizi heist. Arclight wasn’t in his warehouse in San Diego, but his goons were. With a little convincing, Roger informs Nisha that Arclight is none other than Virgil Tatum. She also gets the bad news that Virgil has Ian locked up somewhere so that he can turn Ian over to the police during his grand party.
Unfortunately, this identification was put into question with a discovery in the files that Ian managed to send out before his abduction. Hidden in a passworded file was the late Gunter’s insurance policy – a picture of Arclight hidden in the reflection of a security camera dome. A picture of one Emile Smithson.
With all this information in hand, Nisha returns to Los Angeles to find the truth. As Virgil was working the crowd at The Viceroy, Nisha made her way to the Tatum Think offices. There she found Emile who was chatting online with the retrievers under another one of his identities, CyberGosse, whom the Retrievers knew as Ian’s hacker friend from France. The Retrievers saw CyberGosse’s connection drop as Nisha confronted Emile and, thanks to video provided by disgruntled ex-employee scapegoat0521, they later saw Emile confessing to being Arclight. As it turns out Emile was tired of Virgil taking all the credit for the work that Emile himself did. So he created this elaborate plot to bring Virgil down by implicating him in the Uffizi heist. He set the groundwork months in advance by befriending Ian as CyberGosse so he could keep closer tabs on all of the players in revenge scheme. The video ends as Nisha, hearing enough about Emile’s twisted plans, pays him back for the death of HitsHerMark.
Although Virgil was cleared of the Uffizi heist plot, he kidnapped Ian all on his own. With Emile/CyberGosse/Arclight given a taste of his own medicine, Nisha heads off to Virgil’s Relaunch event to rescue poor Ian. As Virgil took the stage to talk about his magnificent return to the game world, Nisha starts playing the security cam footage of her and Emile over the monitors. Virgil became furious that Nisha would dare ruin his comeback moment. Pushed to the limit, he gloats that he captured the real thief, Ian, still unknowing, or maybe just unwilling to believe, that it was all just a setup for him. He then reveals the stolen A3 hidden behind the stage curtain with his prisoner tied up in the front seat. Nisha and two members of the audience free Ian, who promptly confronts Virgil. However, seeing Virgil beaten and humiliated, Ian elects to leave the scene hand-in-hand with Nisha. Virgil, dejected, friendless and loveless, stalks off the stage, still bellowing in his attempt to feel important.
And with that, the game was concluded. The webcast cut off and the 300+ guests at The Viceroy were informed they had just witnessed the final act in The Art of the H3ist. The dead came back to life and were able to mingle with the rest of the guests, reports trickled back in from other Retrievers lucky enough to get tickets to the event and those souls burdened with misfortunate geographical kismet stumbled bleary-eyed to bed knowing that they had done their part to make this one of the most talked about ARGs this year.
Overall, The Art of the H3ist has to be considered one of the giants of the ARG genre. The richness of the story, the depth of background, the amazing live interactions and the masterful puzzles all played a role in making this a must-play game.
Of course, no game is perfect. The small active player base became frustrated over several puzzles, one of which quickly rose to the hatred level reserved for the most infamous of puzzles (such as where.gif from Lockjaw). There was also a mid-game lull in the action that left a bitter taste in some players' mouths. They were taunted for not solving puzzles, yet were not given any real motivation to persevere in solving them. Lack of communication also marred some of the live events where players were left to fend for themselves, giving them a feeling that some of the main characters were emotionally inaccessible to the players.
Communication issues aside, The Art of the H3ist pushed the envelope when it came to interaction in ARGs. From undercover ops stealing SD cards from various Audis across the country to nighttime boat rides with Zombie Mimes, the live events kept the Retrievers on their toes (and handsomely rewarded as well). Even those stuck far away from the action were able to experience the missions through live webfeeds and archives of audio communication between team members.
The game also stretched the ideas of meta with their film quality Easter Eggs. The seven videos, with their clever binary titles, gave the players new insights into several “off screen” moments and were extremely entertaining to everyone who watched. The transition of HitsHerMark from player to character was also handled expertly and helped to blur the line between fiction and reality even further.
Despite some minor disappointment that everyone playing didn't receive a brand new A3, the players were gratified at the end with the big reveal. While they had speculated the Emile/CyberGosse/Arclight connection throughout the game, it was impossible to know until the very end if that was indeed the case and kept them guessing up until the last few moments. With the rescue of Ian, the story became complete and the players started thanking all of the Puppet Masters, Actors, and Behind-the-Scenes people for a job well done.
There will be a open discussion on The Art of the Gam3 featuring The Art of the H3ist Puppet Masters at ARGFest IV July 23, 2005 from 11am to 1pm at the Hotel Penn in New York City.
Photo courtesy of HitsHerMark
Posted by Carie Ward at 1:47 PM
June 26, 2005
"Art of the H3ist" Finale Set for Wednesday
Players of Audi's Art of the H3ist (as it's now presenting itself) are preparing for what looks to be the culmination of the three month-long alternate reality game. Many players are converging on an event scheduled for this Wednesday, June 29th, to witness what goes down.
The Art of The H3ist unfolded in real time over the course of the last three months, its players experiencing a quality story of theft, love and betrayal through many diverse media: Print ads, billboards, television commercials, radio spots, Web Sites, live events, e-mails, videos, IRC chats, voice transcripts, machinima, puzzles, photos, scanned documents, and more.
Since events of H3ist unfolded in real time, the participants were not only able to watch what happened, but were also able to influence events (or at least were given the illusion of doing so) through their direct participation in live "retrieval missions" that were often webcast in real time, one of which I was lucky enough to be a part of.
It's apparent that an important aspect of the game design was enabling wide accessibility to the mainstream, so they could enjoy and understand the idea of the story no matter how closely they followed the characters. This was accomplished by mostly by the site www.stolena3.com, which functioned well as a "story so far" resource, enabling new players to get up to speed (no pun intended) quickly. Interestingly, H3ist did something new by developing a number of commercial partnerships, which diversified things quite a bit and helped the overall realism of the game, including Apple, Sony Computer Entertainment America, Palm, E3, Coachella, URB magazine, VH1, AFI and Bose.
H3ist did a lot to further mainstream recognition and interest in Alternate Reality Games, with news buzz happening all over the country, and even overseas. ARGN alone had dozens of press inquiries about the game over the last three months, which indicates how strong this interest was.
We'll be sorry to see H3ist come to an end. It was a great ride, and major props go out to the folks behind it: Mike Monello (of Blair Witch fame), Brian Clarke, Dave Szulborski, to name but a few. We'll be looking forward to their next endeavor.
Keep watching ARGN for firsthand reports of the finale on Wednesday.
Posted by Steve Peters at 1:12 PM
June 24, 2005
ARGTalk Shows Its True Stripes?
While some of us like to think we are 'in the know' when it comes to Alternate Reality Gaming, there is always opportunity to pull the wool over the collective eyes of the community every so often. Tonight, there is evidence (although wildly speculative) that ARGTalk, an ARG meta discussion site that popped up this year out of the blue, might actually be a front for a new ARG. Confused? Me too.
Here's what we can pull together so far: ARGTalk, a blog-style ARG resource, has been overhyping a radio show that was scheduled for earlier tonight. In the past week, people have noticed comments popping up from disgruntled sources, as well as a tirade from one if its own writers. These comments have mysteriously disappeared shortly after being displayed. And in the radio show, which sounds more like a well-rehearsed script read by professional voice actors than an impromptu webcast, one of the ARGTalk writers was *gasp* kidnapped before the show went off the air.
Do these recent events and unfolding details suggest that this is really a carefully constructed game on the verge of bigger and better things? We can't make a clear determination as of yet. If this is indeed a launch, then it's had many of us fooled for months. If not, then I guess it's 'fool me twice, shame on me'.
Posted by Jonathan Waite at 9:50 PM
June 17, 2005
Sin2 Viral Site Discovered
Those who are waiting for the sequel to Ritual Entertainment's game Sin got a little surprise recently when trying to access the Sin2 website. The site, www.sin2.com, suddenly began redirecting to Legion Pharmaceutical (www.legionpharma.com).
A very little digging revealed a small puzzle. Semi-Hidden text revealed "First is the key!" followed by an alphanumeric series: P12-66/P1-13/P2-3/P6-39/P3-9/P4-4/P5-8/P7-14/P8-45/P9-6/P10-12/P11-45.
That's about it for now. To keep tabs on what's solved/discovered and whether this leads to anything like an alternate reality game, follow this thread at Unfiction.
Posted by Steve Peters at 9:32 AM
June 15, 2005
The Traveler Returns?
In December of 2004, we told you about some interesting web activity surrounding the then-upcoming novel The Traveler by John Twelve Hawks. Links were found to multiple websites that looked very much like a new alternate reality game. Players scoured websites for the Evergreen Foundation, Resurrection Auto Parts, Hollis Martial Arts and Judith Strand, where thye found many hidden goodies, including memos about something escaping from a Genetic Research Center. Everything looked pretty promising, and further investigation led to......nothing. A dead end. A few cool sites that made for a nice internet marketing campaign, but that's all.
Or was it?
Fast forward to May 27th, 2005. A new Unfiction member stopped by the forums there and gave everyone a little poke in the eye. Taking a second look at things, it seems that blogs and in-game message boards that had been stagnant for six months have become active again. There are new entries, details and links, including this new site that we've never seen. Is what was thought to be a dead game coming to life after all?
There are a couple of interesting things worth mentioning, here. It turns out that Unfiction's eye-poker is the very same person on whose blog the original references to The Traveler were made back in December (here and here). Is he real, an in-game character, or a little of both? Difficult to say, but it definitely seems like someone's trying to get the attention of the alternate reality gaming community with all of this.
Additionally, I was interviewed a while back by a reporter for a magazine in California, who wanted to know my thoughts on the cool new alternate reality game that Random House was producing for The Traveler. Sometimes it was a little awkward as, at the time, it seemed to me as though everything about this ARG had ground to a halt.
So, what can be concluded about all this? Was there a game that was put on hold? Is there something more extensive planned? All we can say is that something definitely seems to be struggling to breathe here. Exactly what remains to be seen.
Discussion on Unfiction
Gabe's Blog
Random House Book Page (links at the bottom)
Posted by Steve Peters at 2:02 PM
June 14, 2005
Super ARGFest-O-Con 4 : New York City, July 22-24, 2005
After successful ARGFest-O-Cons in Las Vegas, Orlando and Vancouver BC, we think it's high time to invade the Big Apple! Meet other ARG-obsessed souls, eat, drink, and be merry at our 4th glorified ARGParty!
ARGFest-O-Con 4 looks to be the biggest gathering of ARG players and developers yet, with players from all over the US, Canada and Great Britain planning to attend. In addition, you'll be able to meet some of the folks behind such games as The Art of the Heist, The Beast, Chasing the Wish, Lockjaw, Metacortechs, and Perplex City.
Past events have proved to be a lot of fun for everyone, so it doesn't matter if you're a Cloudmaker, Jawbreaker, Beekeeper, Retriever, or just a general ARGonaut, everyone is welcome. Planned events currently include a Game Developer Roundtable, a meet-and-greet party on Friday night, general fun throughout the weekend, and perhaps even an ARGish surprise or two. Okay, maybe not perhaps.
To get up to speed on plans, hotels, transportation, etc., visit the ARGFest-O-Con 4 website, and check the discussion thread at Unfiction for the most current details.
Posted by Steve Peters at 12:02 AM
June 13, 2005
Is There A Dr. Who Game Afoot?
Infocult reports this morning on some apparent ARGishness going on over at the BBC, in relation to the Dr. Who television series. It seems there have been recent clues about a certain Bad Wolf showing up in the series, which has led viewers to a related website.
Interestingly, the disclaimer page reveals some (previously) hidden text:
This website has been made by the BBC. It is placed on the Internet.The Internet is an information superhighway based on the sharing of information between computers using wires. The Internet is used by kind permission of GeoComtex.
Hmm, nothing like a suspicious coroporate website to make a cool rabbithole. Whether this leads to a full-blown alternate reality game remains to be seen, but it's very encouraging to see the BBC continue to explore ARG territory, as is evidenced by projects like their upcoming Jamie Kane game (currently in beta).
Posted by Steve Peters at 10:49 AM | TrackBack
June 10, 2005
The Daughters of Freya are Gonna Get Ya
Every once in a while, the staff of ARGN are approached by people wanting to share their talents and ideas with the ARG community. When Michael Betcherman, a co-creator of emailmystery.com approached us with an opportunity to experience the mystery of The Daughters of Freya, I jumped upon the chance to try something a little out of the ordinary.
ARGers, when not in the midst of a game, usually spend their time honing their puzzling skills by creating or playing puzzle trails and dunking their pens into the ink well of the internet to find some similar puzzle game. Rarely do they find the chance to indulge themselves in the “other side” of ARGs, the more literary, story and character driven half. Michael and his co-creator, David Diamond, have tapped the proverbial beer keg of immersive story greatness that allows even the most hardcore, plot-driven ARGers the opportunity to flex their brainpower on something other than vigenere or the latest Dan Brown novel.
Email Mystery revolves around the story of a journalist, Samantha Dempsey, who finds herself embroiled in a mystery surrounding the cryptic group of young women, The Daughters of Freya, and their pursuit of bettering the world through “creative” treatment sessions.
The story unfolds daily in a series of emails delivered to your inbox. Running 3 weeks, the emails tell the story through exchanges between Samantha and her friends and family as the mystery of what she’s reporting on slowly engulfs her.
As a reviewer, I had the opportunity to skip ahead in the story to see what happens and get the article out faster. I found that once I got into the story and the way in which it is both told and delivered, I couldn’t force myself to read ahead. So I sat through the entire thing, one email at a time. In the middle of finals week, I would jump up from my exam to “take a break” and run to the nearest computer to check my gmail and find out the latest tidbit of information from Samantha and her friends. I was truly disappointed when it ended, because suddenly, I had no reason to check my email obsessively anymore. I’d check only to find… nothing, as if my friends had forgotten to email me.
I sat in a bit of a depressed state for a while, Steve harping in my ear “Where’s the story? Where’s the story? Where’s the story?” like some kind of warped Wendy’s commercial. Despite my reluctance to really believe the story was over, I bucked up, took charge and appeased my inner curiosity by calling Michael, whom was kind enough to put up with me asking him some questions about his work and future plans.
Conceived of during a bicycle trip, the co-creators set out to write a novel in email format. As the online writing community grew, some were trying out emailing novels to subscribers in chapters – Michael and David wanted to try something a little different: Using emails themselves as the format for the story structure. Books, whether online or in print format, place the reader in the role of an observer, emotionally distanced from the story. By creating a plot that integrated the way people use the internet and use email, the creators managed to close that distance between character and reader, making the reader feel more of a participant in the story. On the other hand, emails themselves are often sent “after the fact” or after the drama or action in our lives has taken place, limiting the ability of the writer to portray real time action. The authors overcame this obstacle by giving the characters BlackBerry portable devices, linking the characters more intimately to the current action.
The response to Michael and David’s creativity with storytelling has been widely favorable, and I, for one, found it both stimulating and fascinating. Based on the success of The Daughters of Freya, they are currently also working on the development of two other stories using this format, one in particular being aimed towards 10-12 year old boys who usually shy away from reading, the so-called “reluctant readers.” Michael hopes that this untraditional format will be more effective at engaging this group in reading, and plans on increasing the amount of visual reinforcement to the story by integrating both audio and video.
From the casual ARG lurker to the more relentless ARG pursuer, I would highly recommend Email Mystery to anyone looking for a break from the norm and an excellent story. The Daughters of Freya is currently running, and costs $7.95 for the full experience. For those less inclined to randomly drop $10 on an internet venture, a free preview is also available.
Posted by Jackie Kerr at 12:52 PM
June 8, 2005
ARG Author Does Talk Radio
Dave Szulborski, author of "This is Not a Game," will be featured in an hour long live radio interview tomorrow night, June 9th at midnight on the show Beyond Strange and Mysterious. The show is broadcast on WSNR 620 AM from New York City and reaches New York, Pennsylvania, parts of Connecticut, and is also syndicated in Virginia.
Dave will be speaking about his experiences as an amateur and professional ARG creator, including his involvement with Audi's Art of the Heist campaign. He'll also be speaking about his book This Is Not A Game, the release of the hard cover edition, and upcoming books he will be releasing very soon. You can expect him to drop a few hints about his upcoming projects as well, including Project Game Light and a few other tantalizing surprises.
Posted by Steve Peters at 3:36 PM
"Art of the Heist" Team Announces Roundtable
Immersive Gaming has announced it will be sponsoring a special discussion event at the upcoming ARGFest in New York City. "The Art of the Game" will feature the team behind Audi's "The Art of the Heist" in an open roundtable about the behind-the-scenes aspects of writing, developing and implementing an alternate reality game on a major scale. The discussion will take place at the Hotel Penn in New York City on Saturday, July 23, 2005 from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm.
In addition, there will be a live webchat during the event, during which virtual participants worldwide can ask questions of the team. For updates and further information, visit immersivegaming.com.
Posted by Steve Peters at 3:03 PM
June 6, 2005
Gorgonbox.com
At E3 a couple of weeks ago, some attendees were given promo cards bearing the URL www.gorgonbox.com. At first glance, it appears to be an online encoder/decoder to send secret messages to your friends, but delving deeper it appears there is a puzzle trail of sorts, waiting to be explored.
More than likely Gorgon Box is a marketing website for an upcoming videogame, but if you enjoy puzzle trails you should have some fun with it.
EDIT: Players have already started to unravel the mystery, and this looks to be fairly interesting so far.
Discussion at UnForums
Posted by Dee Cook at 6:56 PM
June 3, 2005
Oh Serenity! A Firefly ARG?
Casual surfing this evening led me to a rather interesting website… BlueSun.org. On the surface, the site is unremarkable with just a simple image and a title of Coming Soon. So, why am I intrigued? What led me there?
Serenity, the feature-length adaptation of Joss Whedon's prematurely cancelled TV show "Firefly" is going to hit the big screens this fall. Set some years in the future, the space western has often been on the lips of avid ARG players as an ideal property to utilize a promotional Alternate Reality Game. Not only are there great characters and settings to take advantage of, but there’s a very engaging mystery behind one of the main characters.
This evening, such rumors led me to looking for more information. Specifically, I was looking at Blue Sun, a company that may or may not have something to do with the aforementioned mystery. What I found was BlueSun.org. Curiously, it was registered under Domains By Proxy, a favorite service of ARG developers as it allows a sort of anonymous web site registration. Also curious, searching for the site specifically via Google does not return any results.
Could it be? Dare we hope? … a Firefly ARG?
It’s obviously far too soon to tell. If one does appear, will it be officially tied to the property or will it be another fan effort along the lines of the incredibly popular Metacortechs written by fans of the Matrix trilogy? One thing is certain,we’ll be keeping our eyes on this.
Posted by Brooke Thompson at 8:54 PM
June 1, 2005
Cold Winter Behind Chilling Videos
The video game industry is at it again, with an ARG-like immersive advertising campaign for the newly-released Cold Winter. Players came across freesterling.com, which contained pleas for help from a man named Robert Sterling.
Robert had reason to believe that his brother Andrew was a British spy who had been kidnapped by Chinese agents, but he couldn’t get the British government to help or even admit to any knowledge of the situation. Quite a mess for the anxious Robert, who had gotten his hands on videos of Andrew being kidnapped and then interrogated.
He asked readers to sign a petition to get help for Andrew. The website has since come clean about its real purpose, but it still hosts the videos and a message from Robert. Andrew the spy is the main character of Cold Winter, which begins with him having to escape Chinese captivity.
The campaign was run by Making Waves, which styles itself as a “youth marketing agency” that uses "experience" as its advertising medium.
Posted by Yulia Mostovoy at 8:12 AM
Logan's Run ARG?
Last night, numerous ARG community members received unsolicited phonecalls (cue Mystery ARG Theatre theme music). The voice on the other end of the line said something like, "the City of Domes is now accepting citizens," then hung up.
After much discussion in the #unfiction chatroom, players discovered www.cityofdomes.net, which, based on keywords in the source code, seems to be laying the groundwork for some sort of game based on the 70's sci-fi film Logan's Run. Players who emailed the site received an autoresponse with a small puzzle that led to an AIM screen name.
In addition, the domain registration is masked by an anonymous proxy service, which is usually a dead giveaway to an ARG-related website. Speculation points to VirtuQuest's previous announcement of a summer ARG, but it's obviously way to soon to come to any conclusions. Although, if I was a betting man....
We'll keep an eye on this one and keep you posted.
Discussion at unfiction.
Posted by Steve Peters at 2:27 AM