A breath of fresh air swept through the alternate reality gaming community last month when This Is My Milwaukee came to town. The surreal, humorous and down right strange 10-minute promotional video is so dense with story and snippets of clues scattered through-out, that it requires many viewings to fully digest.
As the video explains, Milwaukee was home to a corporation known as Blackstar. Blackstar employed many locals and developed some sort of meta-being known as Go.D.S.E.E.D. With the arrival of Go.D.S.E.E.D came the subsequent destruction of much of Milwaukee’s natural environment. As there was no other option, project Go.D.S.E.E.D had to be destroyed, and so it was put to rest, buried deep below Milwaukee’s Canning District in an emerald casket. However, Go.D.S.E.E.D fragments still attack the locals from time to time. Sheltering one’s self in buildings with proper protection or carrying a flare gun and a rebreather is vital to one’s protection from Go.D.S.E.E.D fragment attacks.
Soon after the ARG was released, the emergence of a possible dead drop became apparent. Hidden at the bottom of TIMM’s website was a link to a YouTube video. When the video title’s long string of numbers was decrypted, it revealed the New York Public Library, Rose Reading Room, South Hall. At the end of the video was the call number AI3.A23. An Unfiction forum member went to the NYPL and successfully found the book referenced in the video, which revealed a sheet of paper with a picture of a fennel bulb and a new phone number.