It’s just come to our attention that the recently concluded ARG Acheron was honored by being selected as EpiGuide’s April 2004 Pick of the Month.
Congratulations go out to the Acheron PM Team! Well done!
Category: Update (Page 41 of 41)
On February 4th, UbiSoft/Cyan announced the premature demise of the multiplayer portion of their most recent addition to the Myst franchise, Uru: Ages Beyond Myst. The online version, which was in an open beta ‘prologue’ had attracted thousands of diehard Myst fans who eagerly logged on to explore the virtual 3D world of D’ni together. A thriving community was built over the holidays and into the new year, and the official launch was looked forward to with much anticipation. Unfortunately, the player base proved to be inadequate to support the ongoing development, and after what surely must have been a painful decision, the plug was pulled on February 9th at midnight PST.
Cyan had done an amazing job in creating the most realistic alternate reality yet, made up of 3D worlds, cities and neighborhoods that were beautiful to explore, and added the capability of interacting live in the same space with other players from around the world. Think of the multiplayer version of your favorite 1st-person shooter game and take away the weapons and gore, add cooperative interaction, chat and intelligent puzzles, and you’ll get an idea of what it was like.
Well, at least what the potential was. The mourning players went through at the end of Uru: Live was visceral, with many gathering in their neighborhoods to be with friends as the clock counted down to midnight. Players wanted to be together at the end of the world, so to speak, and spent their last minutes partying, taking group photos and reminiscing. All is not lost, however, as Cyan announced it will be releasing much of the content developed for Uru: Live as single-player expansion packs. To get an idea, we’ve archived some DivX videos of Uru: Live before it was killed.
In other news, a rumored rabbithole has seemingly been found for a possible upcoming ARG (geez, can we be any more non-commital?). An anonymous tipster pointed us to the Amboy Monthly, and we’re told this will become a trailhead site for an ARG in development entitled Aware. Stay tuned for this one, as it looks very promising.
The ARGN staff had a great winter break, but now it’s time to get back to business. A lot has happened in the past few months, so let’s get up to speed, shall we?
Acheron has been progressing. The time-travel related ARG has a very nice Guide up and kept current, so be sure to check things out.
A Matrix-related game caused a buzz and ran for 8 weeks beginning on October 1st of last year. As we were part of the development team, we just didn’t feel right about shilling it here, but hey, now that it’s over I guess it’s okay. Codenamed Project MU, this ARG was a fan-fictionesque game taking place in the Matrix universe, but not directly involving any actual characters from the movie. The trailhead was at MetaCortex, the company that Neo worked for as Thomas Anderson at the beginning of the first movie.
According to The Guardian, this was “the most successful ARG ever, with around 12,000 players and visits
logged from 118 different countries.” Admittedly, not all of these players were actively involved throughout the run, but the response definitely exceeded expectations.
Project MU employed many of the classic ARG techniques of blurring reality with the game world, utilizing emails, IM’s with ingame characters and even a Halloween night phone call that went out to almost 1,000 players.
From our viewpoint now looking back, Project MU really set a precedent for a new form of fan-fiction. While not endorsed by the film’s producers, they had no problem with it whatsoever as long as it wasn’t connected with a commercial enterprise and didn’t “degrade their intellectual property.” In case you missed it, you can find discussion and links to all of the pertinent sites at Unfiction.
In other news, Hidden Alliance has been showing signs of………. something. Hidden Alliance is an ARG that has, as far as we know, been in development since 2002. We’re not quite sure what, if anything, is going on, but the situation is being monitored at Unfiction.
In addition, there have been quite a few instances of possible ARGs that have so far become dead ends. It was thought something was afoot that was related to the Stephen King Dark Tower series of novels, but it turned out to apparently be a small fan-based site. Other possibities that went nowhere over the past few months included Paycheck, RYT Hospital, IRobotNow, Lacuna Inc., Hunt for Riddick, a Harry Potter site, and even a Doom site.
So, currently, Acheron’s you’re best bet as far as live games go, but you could always wait a few weeks……
Well, it’s been a while since we’ve been able to post any news, as there just hasn’t been a lot of news going on. The summer has been pretty quiet, as far as new announcements and events go.
Chasing the Wish kept throngs of players occupied, and finished up two days ago on August 27th, much to the bittersweet delight of fans. Although the story of Chasing the Wish has wrapped up, word is there are still quite a few loose ends leaving players hanging and chasing the wish of a sequel.
Literally on the heels of the Chasing the Wish finale, Acheron began showing signs of life, showing that the folks behind this game seemingly were indeed waiting for Chasing the Wish to finish up. The known introductory site pages have been updated, and it seems momentum is building for a proper launch any time soon.
In addition to saying farewell to CTW and hello to Acheron, ARGN and Unfiction have announced an East Coast version of their Super ARG-Fest-O-Con. This time, ARG afficianados will be gathering in Orlando, FL on November 7-9, 2003. There are already many fun things planned, along with a few things that I’d tell you, but I’d get killed for. For more information, see this thread.
That’s about it, well, that we know of. Remember, if you hear rumors of something, or find something suspicious, drop us a line! Hope you all had a great summer!
Search4e has seeminly joined the list of failed Alternate Reality Games, as an email was sent out this morning to players seemingly cancelling the game. The email states, in part, “It is with deep regret that True Crime Books announces that it is ending all formal ties with the Ed Sobian case….This decision was not taken lightly.” Continuing with their attempts at making player communications look to be a part of the search4e world, it seems the producers are announcing the cancellation of the search for Ed Sobian.
The troubled game was suspended for a while at the end of 2002, while new sponsorship/financing was sought. Once it restarted, the producers seemed unable to regain momentum, and compounded their problems by making decisions that further limited their player base. We are still awaiting final confirmation of the death of search4e, at which time it will be added to the list of ARG meltdowns.
Another ARG bites the dust. According to a wordy announcement on noahboddy.com, “…the current Noahboddy.com game must be brought to a definitive close.” This cancellation was attributed to lack
of sponsorship and funding.
There is still plenty of action out there for Alternate Reality Gamers, however. Current live games include:Chasing the Wish, Time Hunt and the JMX Experience, with L3 and Ark II possibilities in develpment.
generation loss
undertone
subtext game
escape rooms
scp afterworld
giggleland