Month: June 2010 (Page 2 of 2)

ARG Tools for iPhone: Pocket-Sized Power

June 7, 2010 / Jane Doh

ARGTools Netninja.com released the ARG Tools iPhone app this weekâ€”a well thought-out collection of tools, resources, and links for alternate reality gamers of all levels. Included in this free app are helpful interactive tools for solving substitution ciphers, base64 encoding, VignÃ¨re ciphers, and much more. The homegrown app also features cheat sheets for other reference materials, such as English word frequencies.

While this might seem intimidating, newcomers to ARGs can really benefit from the informative panels explaining many of the interactive tools. Puppetmasters may find many of the utilities, such as the countdown timer decoder, useful for creating and running ARGs.

According to developer Brian Enigma’s blog, ARG Tools is “a bit of a niche utility, aimed mainly toward puzzle solvers and ARG players, specifically with an eye toward live events”â€”the native iPhone app can be run offline once installed, except for the Google search bar and pre-built links leading to key ARG community and news resources.

Download ARG Tools in the iTunes Store. No iPhone? Check outÂ netninja.com for some great low-fi gaming resources, like a one-page wiki markup language cheat sheet and anÂ Emergency ARG Pocket Reference.Â Â Some of these tools are printouts that fit in your pocket. (You have those, right?)

A Call to Action for Alternate Reality Game Developers: Play ARGs

June 7, 2010 / Michael Andersen

In recent weeks, a number of alternate reality game developers have called for some changes. Brooke Thompson, the chair of the International Game Developer’s Association ARG special interest group, asked developers to make postmortems of completed games publicly available to foster an environment for constructive criticism. No Mimes Media co-founder and ARG Netcast host Steve Peters asked developers to concentrate on creating compelling player experiences as opposed to relying on free giveaways to generate buzz. And now, I’m throwing my hat into the ring.

Play alternate reality games.

Whether you’re an aspiring developers or one with a number of successful campaigns under your belt, you should be playing ARGs as often as you can. Take the time to go through the experience of discovery, and remind yourself what excited you about transmedia and alternate reality games by experiencing the communities that develop firsthand. People enmeshed in the television industry will still go home and watch television: after all, Joss Whedon is a self-professed GLEEk, and George Broussard and Scott Miller (formerly of 3D Realms)Â love World of Warcraft. What makes alternate reality games so different?

The answer I hear most frequently when I pose that question is “time.” There’s a perception that playing alternate reality games demands extensive time commitments that developers don’t have. And since ARGs have indefinite lengths, it can be even harder to commit to a game. However, if you find yourself unable to drop in and interact with an ongoing game, I would argue that’s a design flaw that you should internalize. Assuming that all ARG players have large blocks of time to dedicate to your game is a dangerous assumption that limits your audience to players dedicated to your game to the exclusion of almost everything else. Â And making that assumption feeds the stereotype that gamers are people with shallow pockets and lots of time on their hands. Based on anecdotal evidence, that is far from the truth. However, if game designers continue to operate on that assumption by creating games that are largely inaccessible without absolute dedication to a single game, it may become an unfortunate reality.

The Secret Is Out There: Coca Cola Creator Doc Pemberton Stars in “Secret Formula” Campaign

June 4, 2010 / Michael Andersen

The Coca Cola Company has enlisted the aid of Wieden+Kennedy, Portland to create an integrated marketing campaign exploring the history and mythology behind Doctor John Stith Pemberton, the inventor of Coca Cola. The Secret Formula campaign launched with the above video bears many of the trappings of an alternate reality game, with links leading to artifacts across the web, with the promise of expansion out into the real world in the near future. And while it is relatively easy to draw parallels between this campaign and Wieden+Kennedy’s previous Go Forth campaign for Levi’s, on first impression it appears as though Secret Formula will be a more passive experience.

According to the campaign’s The Secret Is Out There video, someone is trying to steal Coca Cola’s secret formula: and based on past experience, Pepsi can be ruled out as the culprit. In order to figure out who is after the formula, players will have to learn more about the two people who know the formula as well as the drink’s inventor, Doctor Pemberton, who has recently discovered twitter, although it seems as though the good doctorÂ had some trouble adjusting to the application at first.

Six to Start Makes a Game Out of Wired UK Issue

June 1, 2010 / Jane Doh

Wired UK has teamed up with alternate reality game designers Six to Start, creators of the 2010 SXSW Best Game Award winner Smokescreen, to make this month’s issue of Wired UK a platform for a transmedia game contest. Six to Start’s immersive transmedia games have been widely recognized for high-quality storytelling and entertaining game play. In Smokescreen, Six to Start and Channel 4 launched a fictional social network that brought issues of online identity and privacy to the forefront for a target audience of 14- to 19-year-olds. We Tell Stories, winner of the 2008 SXSW Experimental and Best in Show Awards, involved a collaboration with Penguin Books to encourage the reinvention and retelling of classic stories.

A novel mix of traditional print publishing and digital experience, this month’s issue of Wired UK contains a game within its pages. According to Six to Start producer and game designer Matt Wieteska,

The game has been designed to exist within and alongside this month’s Wired. The issue’s focus is on the rise of location-based and social gaming, and the idea of game-like ‘achievements’ and how they drive our curiosity and progress. Our tasks and puzzles are scattered throughout its pages, margins, graphics and text – so keep your eyes peeled! Of course, the issue is just the beginning – the game soon expands to take in online content and puzzles, alongside some cool bells and whistles that I don’t want to spoil for you!

Suggesting something even more than a puzzle contest, Wieteska teased me with this: “[t]he game itself does have a theme, an interesting setting, and some cool little stories nestling inside it. I don’t want to give too much away, but we’re hoping you’ll enjoy the fun, tongue-in-cheek tone and all the little easter eggs and references we’ve hidden to some of our favourite things.”

Only players based in the United Kingdom will be eligible for the grand prize Â of an iPad, but according to Six to Start co-founder, acting CEO, and chief creative officer Adrian Hon, the creators have “made an effort to make as many of the assets available internationally” as possible. Non-UK players will still be able to experience most of the game online, even though, according to Wieteska, “[w]e’ve got some really cool stuff going on inside the issue, so people should grab one if they can!”

Month: June 2010 (Page 2 of 2)

ARG Tools for iPhone: Pocket-Sized Power

A Call to Action for Alternate Reality Game Developers: Play ARGs

The Secret Is Out There: Coca Cola Creator Doc Pemberton Stars in “Secret Formula” Campaign

Six to Start Makes a Game Out of Wired UK Issue

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