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Zoom In On Ocular Effect

July 10, 2006 / Jackie Kerr

The ARGN Tipline lightbulb flashed this morning, alerting us to a new message arriving at the ARGcave. Our intrepid hero reporters donned their shiny gold catsuits and red swirlie over-the-suit panties, flipped their capes over their shoulders and flew into the internet wild to gather information, like the Thunderbirds but with better marionettes.

They came back with a mysterious website, Ocular Effect. The rather barren site displays a flash movie entitled “spiroclock” – but wait! Is that what we think it is?! IT’S A COUNTDOWN! We hooked Brains up to his new fangled math program and he chugged out an answer – Monday! The countdown clock runs to this upcoming Monday, July 17th! Holy good mathing, Brains!

We then sent Virgil Tracy out to whois the domain. He was amazingly successful and Lady Penelope was most enthused. Virgil gathered intriguing information that leads the ARGNbirds to believe that the magical world of Disney is behind this project. Gordon, not wanting to be out-performed by that pantywaist Virgil, noticed in his investigation that Ocular Effects redirects to 00112358.net, which isn’t registered to Disney, oddly enough.

What may happen on Monday has yet to be discovered — it’s unclear what Disney project is being promoted, and equally hazy what the strange, spinning wheel with the ooglie-booglie, danger music represents, but rest assured, the ARGNbirds are ready, prepped, and pantied to keep you informed of every surprise.

Eon8 Activate!

June 30, 2006 / Jonathan Waite

When something pops up on the radar with enough force to bog down an entire message forum, we generally sit up and take notice. Today, eon8 is the web site that is shaking the ARG world, and it has a familiar feeling to it. If you are lucky enough to be able to access the site (traffic jams are just as nasty on the Internet as in real life, I guess) you will notice the countdown (currently at 0d:01h:30m:37s) as well as a Project Status (currently X13600 Imminent, whatever that means). A link to deployment logs reveals a lot of alphanumeric strings, while the Deployment Tracker is a lovely little link… that I can’t seem to access, yet. Many of the links on the front page go to a password-protected subdomain as well, evidence that this may indeed turn into an ARG.

All of that aside, this is another occasion where it’s not entirely certain what this site has in store, but with the amount of attention it has received so far, we’ll keep an eye out and update when we find out what the X13600 is going on.

:: Discussion at Unfiction forums (connection may be slow due to high volume of traffic)

Update!
So, as it turns out, the entire thing was a social experiment. At 12:00 AM EST, the site reloaded. These are excerpts of the text from the eon8.com site, under a link called “Reveal The Truth”:

Yo Ho Ho, ‘Tis the Dead Man’s Tale

June 27, 2006 / Jonathan Waite

Sometimes, ARG doesn’t mean alternate reality gaming. Sometimes, ARG means ARRRRRG, the bellow from the pit of the pirate’s stomach that sends scurvy dogs runnin’ and strikes fear in the hearts of the fisherman who sail the… alright, so our piratespeak isn’t very good. In any event, Dead Man’s Tale has led us to raise the Jolly Roger and lose ourselves in the world of Billy Bones, through the magic of Microsoft’s Windows Live Messenger software. A promotion for the upcoming movie Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, the IM-based game allows you to add Billy as a friend, and starting a conversation with the skeletal character moves you further into the story with text scripts and fun games and puzzles that load within the messenger window. One of the interesting elements of this game is the ability to pair up with a friend and tackle the various challenges together, while an accompanying MSN Spaces site holds important information which ties in with the messenger experience.

Normally, we wouldn’t obsess over a pirate-themed messenger interactive experience, but this one has a special connection to the ARG universe. We received a rumor that this might be another venture by the creative forces at 42 Entertainment, a theory which we think we’ve proven to be true by looking at Billy’s MSN profile. Of course, we might just be wrong on this, but coincidences are rare these days, and bee keeping seems an odd interest for those in the pillaging and plundering profession. Even with the connection to 42, there is no indication that this is the beginning of any alternate reality game campaign, but based on initial game play, it’s a fun way to add marketing hype to the Disney blockbuster set to hit theaters on July 7. So, grab your swords and log into the world of Bones and his swashbuckling hi-jinks.

Editor’s Note: We found this link a few minutes ago, so our suspicions were right. Yarr.

Catching The Wish: Large and In Charge

June 26, 2006 / Jonathan Waite

One month ago, we were happy to send out a Game Alert about Catching The Wish, the sequel to the 2003 alternate reality game Chasing The Wish. In the weeks since that announcement, the game has exploded onto computer screens everywhere with multiple websites, a rich and engrossing storyline, and interactivity that has added layer upon layer of immersive game play for the players following the story of Dale Sprague and his life-changing wish. The ARG is also tied in with Chasing The Wish: Book One, the first in a series of four comic books based on the storyline originally created by Dave Szulborski, who designed the first CTW and has since worked on projects like Art of the Heist and Who Is Benjamin Stove.

I was lucky enough to get a copy of the comic book last month, and even though I am not necessarily a fan of comics, the writing and artistic design were enough to keep me turning pages. With a script written by Jason Stackhouse, art by P. Emerson Williams and Jessica Kaos, and an overall creative vision by James Curcio, the comic is visually entertaining while delivering a concise and thrilling story. Book One is available through online venues, such as Indyplanet and New Fiction Publishing.

Digital Communities 2006 Conference

June 26, 2006 / Jonathan Waite

In three days, the Digital Communities conference will be taking place in Bristol, UK. Clare Reddington, the project manager for the conference, was kind enough to give us a heads-up about the event, as well as a special promotional rate for those of you interested in attending! Here’s what Clare had to say about the gaming segment of the conference:

Broadband, mobile devices and wireless connectivity have transformed the world of gaming from a solitary sofa-based pursuit to a multi-player, multi-media community forum. From Google’s Da Vinci Code Quest to the labyrinth of forums, fake websites and additional content that exist to solve the mysteries of ABC drama Lost, increasingly sophisticated consumer marketing campaigns are contributing to the blurring of lines between gaming, media and real life. This session explores how the latest incarnation of the gaming phenomena attracts a broader demographic and is creating virtual communities who share knowledge, pool resources and establish new markets.

Speakers for the gaming discussion (called All In The Game) include Hugh Hancock, the Chief Executive of Strange Company (Machinima Production Company), Maurice Wheeler of Digital Outlook (represents Xbox 360), and Dan Hon, the Chief Operating Officer of a little company we’ve heard of once or twice before — Mind Candy. If you are new to alternate reality gaming, Mind Candy is the company producing the Perplex City ARG, which we continue to watch closely as the search for the Receda Cube carries on.

As far as that promotional rate goes, here’s the scoop: ARGN has secured a special 10% discount for the Digital Communities Communities Conference. To book tickets at the discounted price of Â£89, phone Watershed Box Office on 0117 927 5100 quoting ARGN. We really appreciate the offer Digital Communities has given us and our readership, and encourage you to book your tickets soon.

We’re Four! Let’s Eat Cake!

June 15, 2006 / Jonathan Waite

ARGN While things are simmering on medium heat in the world of Alternate Reality Gaming (we are in the midst of an in-depth look into Catching The Wish, so look for that in the next few days), we’d like to toot our own horn for a brief moment. In June 2002, “The Godfather” Steve Peters launched this site as a place where people could hang out and talk. Today, the Alternate Reality Gaming Network is not only alive and kicking, but taking great strides towards the future. There are a few projects that are being explored for development, including the ARG Archive and podcast interviews, so we hope our fifth year of existence proves to be another great year. Thanks go out to all of you who keep coming back and supporting our site!