So I’m sitting at work when up pops an AIM chat window from itstarted1988. His greeting to me is this: “they speak you listen. Of the Psycaem. You can look forward to games. To your satisfaction, perhaps not… A man, a woman, a line drawn. Not a shepard. Not a shepard. 1988.” In basic ARGer fashion, I go with it, and thus begins the trailhead for “Love Nevr Dies“[sic], another hostage-arg, with a name coined from the dark, creepy artistic design found at MySpace to which players were initially directed.
Through cryptic messages and puzzles given to us via various websites, phone calls and voicemails, itstarted1988 is telling us that we need to save a girl by a certain date or she’ll die. This is a game, he says, created by a sick man who once took his girlfriend Violet. Violet was never found, and itstarted1988 is now a messenger for the kidnapper. His puzzles lead to a voicemail telling us that we need to find “Jenny” by May 23rd. “It’s the first game… she is only 19 years old,” his voicemail says. “Should you fail, her family shall witness her death. Don’t underestimate the impact this torture will have. Any attempt to rescue will result in a slower death, and then you will have to choose who will die and how.”
From that point, it’s a race to find Jenny by tracking cryptic messages and user profiles across the web, leading to South East Ghost Society – a group that collects and investigates EVPs (Electronic Voice Phenomenon). Their website also includes a handy in-game forum for discussion and further ghost-related information.
After more creepy AIM chats and phone calls, we’re led to believe that Jenny is locked up, and we have to free her by finding the lock combinations. Thankfully, a number of people at unfiction were able to determine the numbers for Jenny’s locks and key just in time – but it doesn’t end. While Jenny has been freed, a new victim has been made known over AIM by ‘notashepard’ – a starlet by the name of “Lucy”.
Will you help find and save Lucy? Will you help find Violet, and hopefully rid the world of the creepy, dangerous ‘game’-player? Join the effort at unfiction.
Love Nevr Dies is another dark ARG along the lines of The Human Pet and Bristol Goodman. With plenty of url-jumping, phone-calling, creepy audio recordings, cryptic messages, ghost hunting, and a fairly rich character back-story to boot, this may be an ARG worth getting involved in.