Author: Michelle Senderhauf (Page 4 of 6)

Staff Writer
Michelle's first ARG love affair was with Majestic back in 2001. Just as she was about to discover the world of ARGs she was persuaded to play herself in another alternate reality that included a husband and a baby girl. Once she came to her senses, Michelle returned to play ABC's Push, Nevada. That's when she realized that she wasn't really all that good at solving puzzles, so she stuck around to learn a thing or two from the people playing Chasing the Wish and JMX.

Michelle has played or lurked through countless games since and even took a stab at being a Puppetmaster with Omnifam and Orbital Colony. She intends on keeping up with that trend by only becoming involved with ARGs that begin with the letter O. In her free time she likes to pretend that she's still a young, artsy college student by splattering paint and pencil shavings around the house.

A Call for Help: Folding the Wish

April 18, 2008 / Michelle Senderhauf

Folding the Wish crane As ARG players, we often receive cries of help from mysterious strangers. Over the years, people in this community have banded together to help these strangers no matter what the task. We’ve found missing loved ones. We’ve defeated dangerous cults. We’ve saved the world countless number of times.

This time it isn’t a mysterious stranger who needs our help, but one of our very own community members. Dave Szulborski, puppetmaster of countless ARGs over the years including Chasing the Wish and Urban Hunt, has recently fallen ill and will be undergoing treatment for the next several weeks.

So what can you do? Fold him a wish.

There is an ancient Japanese legend that says that anyone who receives one thousand paper cranes will be granted one wish. A few community members have been furiously folding cranes and we need your help.

How to fold a wish:

1. Find a square piece of paper.

2. Write your well wishes for Dave on the paper.

3. Use the paper to make a paper crane.

4. Stick the crane in the mail. Email varin[at]foldingthewish.com for the mailing address.

We will be stringing the cranes together and sending them to Dave by May 2nd. If for some reason you cannot make your own crane or won’t be able to get it to us in time, we will make one for you. Just email us your wish for Dave. We’ll also be compiling a list of the wishes for Dave to read so that he doesn’t have to actually unfold all one thousand cranes to read them. So please be sure to let us know what your wish is if it’s hidden inside the crane.

Check www.foldingthewish.com for updates on the project.

Eldtrich Errors: Live Events Come in Threes for Book Three

January 31, 2008 / Michelle Senderhauf

As we reported a few days ago, Book Three of Eldritch Errors has officially launched. The ARG has started off with plans for three nearly concurrent live events in Sacramento, New York City and Austin. Several players had a clandestine meeting with an in-game contact last night at the first event in Sacramento. The remaining two events are scheduled to happen tonight at 8pm.

Check out the Sentry Outpost or Unfiction to follow the action!

Eldritch Errors, Book 3?

January 14, 2008 / Michelle Senderhauf

Much to the excitement and delight of Eldritch Errors players across the globe, it looks as if the launch of the ARG’s third book, titled Red Moon Rising, may be imminent. Book two ended with a live event chock-full of Lovecraftian horror goodness. Players and in-game characters spent the weekend together in a rustic cabin on top of Bald Knob in West Virginia. The weekend was full of good-hearted fun, camaraderie, mediocre chili and terrified screaming.

ARGers who are looking for a new game can easily jump in and play without having participated in the previous two books. Players can catch up quickly by reading the detailed Story Thus Far on the game’s meta site. Also, the puppetmasters’ behind-the-scenes blog at www.schmeldritch.com gives a sneak peak behind the curtain (for those who are into that sort of thing).

Join in on the discussion at Unfiction or the in-game forums at sentryoutpost.com.

Does Tom Tooman hail from Jericho, KS?

November 16, 2007 / Michelle Senderhauf

It started with a handwritten message on notebook paper and some barcode stickers found in the mailboxes of Sean Stacey and other alternate reality gaming players. These clues led to a website which showed nothing but an entry box and blank submit button. It was described by one player of the game, xnbomb, as “wonderfully devoid of anything encouraging, which in itself is encouraging”. Eventually, after picking through the clues provided for them, the players entered the correct password and were rewarded with a black and white map of the midwest.

What kind of ARG could possibly come out of a sheet of notebook paper, some barcodes and a map of the midwest? Well, an ARG for a major network television show, of course! A source close to the game has confirmed that the Tom Tooman ARG is an official product for the CBS television show, Jericho.

Over the past three months, things have been slowly ramping up in the Tom Tooman ARG. The midwestern map went through several changes, finally giving an elusive message which included the words, “Are you bored yet?”. While some of the more impatient players may have responded with a “yes” to that question and moved on, those who knew the adage about what comes to those who wait were rewarded with several new meaty updates. New websites were found including one for the Sakanas, Kansas community newspaper where players discovered that the midwest had been hit by several atomic bombs. Another website, for Black Hills Radio Control, has allowed players to scan the radio waves looking for communications from survivors of the attack.

The Ultimate Search for Jason Bourne (and Prizes!)

July 30, 2007 / Michelle Senderhauf

Google and Universal Studios have joined forces to bring us the latest and greatest movie-themed timewaster, The Ultimate Search for Bourne. The sweepstakes timewaster coincides with the release of the latest movie in the Bourne series, The Bourne Ultimatum. Players join the game as an agent hot on the trail of Jason Bourne and are promised great rewards if they find him. The prizes include a 2008 Volkswagen, $25,000 and a four destination vacation.

Even if you’ve never seen the previous Bourne movies or read the original novels, the puzzles and storyline are simple enough that anyone can play. It’s a fun little timewaster as long as you don’t mind overlooking a slightly over-the-top obvious advertisement or two. Clues have led players to a fictional dating website and Mastercard’s priceless.com website which doesn’t hide the fact that it is associated with the game.

Ludium II Follow-up: An Interview With Studio Cypher

July 29, 2007 / Michelle Senderhauf

Last month I reported live from the Synthetic Worlds Initiative‘s Ludium II conference at Indiana University in Bloomington. The Ludium was designed by one of Indiana’s finest ARG companies, Studio Cypher.

At this point you’re probably wondering what a Ludium is exactly. Thomas Malaby, the spokesperson elected at the conference, explains it best on the Terra Nova blog, “The Ludia are conferences structured as games, and this one was modeled on a political convention, the first Synthetic Worlds Congress.” The goal of this Synthetic Worlds Congress was to develop a set of guidelines pertaining to virtual words that would be sent to all of the major 2008 presidential candidates along with members of Congress.

In the beginning, I wasn’t sure if Alternate Reality Games were at all similar to virtual worlds like World of Warcraft or Second Life. I was reporting on the event purely because it was a Studio Cypher project and I was looking for ARGish elements in the Ludium’s game design. By the end of the conference, I had become a full and willing participant in the Ludium fighting for what I thought fair and just much like the other attendees. I realized that many of the issues facing virtual world designers are the same or at least quite similar to the issues facing alternate reality game designers–issues like developer liability and freedom of expression.