Tag: Dreamworks

World Robot Boxing League Presents History of “Real Steel”

March 15, 2011 / Michael Andersen

PAX East was held in Boston this weekend, and conference attendees that took the time to dig through their conference swag bags discovered cardboard cut-outs of a futuristic controller. If rumor is to be believed, this innocuous controller serves as the trailhead to 42 Entertainment’s newest alternate reality game for the film Real Steel. Each controller was labeled with an alphanumeric code and the url WWW.WRB.COM. At the time, the website displayed the controller alongside four progress bars. Inputting codes from PAX caused the progress bars to slowly fill up until earlier tonight, when the history of World Robot Boxing was revealed.

The history of robot boxing is charged with clashing personalities. The sport was born at Raiden’s Koma Club in Tokyo’s Akihabara district. Raiden carefully cultivated the bot boxing community, offering scrap from fights in the club to help local designers get their start in the industry. Quickly, Kizu, an up-and-coming designer backed by Cold Siren Industries, dominated the fights with his bot Backslash. Kizu split from the Koma Club to found the World Robot Boxing League with billionaire Nate Matheson before abandoning Cold Siren Industries to create the next champion, Gamma.

Kizu did not get to enjoy his championship long before Gamma was defeated by the Lemkovas, a family of Russian oligarchs, and their bot called Rubicon. Partnering with former rival Tak Mashido, the Lemkovas created the current reigning champion and unstoppable juggernaut known as Zeus. But while the era of Kizu appears to be over, the figure depicted on the controller given away at PAX bears a striking resemblance to Gamma, and the “G2” logo can be found on Gamma’s blueprints, so his work may resurface again.

It is at this point, presumably, that former boxer Charlie Kenton (Hugh Jackman) steps into the ring with the Real Steel film. According to IMDB’s description of the plot, Kenton “thinks he’s found a champion in a discarded robot.” The Hero Complex blog hints that you might see director Shawn Levy and Hugh Jackman “using this particular campaign to communicate with fans in some special ways.”

Monsters vs Aliens Invades the Superbowl

January 25, 2009 / Michael Andersen

A few weeks ago, I wrote about the new alternate reality game promoting DreamWorks’ new animated film, Monsters vs. Aliens. This article announces an update of gigantic proportions.

Since our last article, players discovered the existence of Dr. Harold Filkenheimer, an eccentric and ethically flexible researcher at DARGenetech International with a quirky sense of humor. The comical Dr. Filkenheimer carries a grudge against Jeffrey Freedman, and he needs our help to discredit the gullible conspiracy theorist. On Superbowl Sunday, Harold Filkenheimer is going to activate the Abstract Recrimination Generator (or A.R.G.) to “use our most devious black ops skills to create a mass media propaganda campaign to turn the tables on those who would accuse us of problematic things.” Apparently, he will need the “l33t sk1llz” of those skilled with A.R.G.

Dr. Filkehnheimer sent a coded message to players instructing them to “[c]ommence the attack against top secret conspiracy on 1st fish February 2009 convincing public truth all part campaign marketing evidence we planted to discredit him Super Bowl 43.”

According to an article on the Variety website, DreamWorks purchased a 90-second 3-D advertisement for Monsters vs. Aliens during the SuperBowl. In preparation, DreamWorks is giving away 150 million pairs of glasses at 28,000 retail locations. You can also request a pair of glasses by calling 1-800-646-2904. Will the extended trailer lead to something else? Only time will tell. So grab your chicken wings and be on the lookout for something suspicious during the Superbowl.

Go Steelers!

Editor’s note: The aforementioned support of the Steelers is the view of the author and is not in any way representative of the views of ARGNet. ARGNet supports both teams, especially the Cardinals, because everybody loves a Cinderella story. 🙂

A Top Secret Conspiracy for Monsters vs. Aliens

January 6, 2009 / Michael Andersen

Conspiracy theorists are often a depressing lot, decrying the end of the world at the hands of a cabal of aliens, monsters, and the Illuminati. Thus, it was refreshing to receive an email from Jeffrey Freedman, internet reporter and administrator for TopSecretConspiracy, who somehow manages to believe every scatterbrained theory he hears while retaining a sense of humor. Of course, it helps that he’s promoting the new Dreamworks animated sci-fi comedy Monsters vs Aliens in the process.

According to Freedman, “There is a massive conspiracy at work being engineered from the media, the NWO, the Illuminati, genetic laboratories, corporations, public utilities, crossword puzzle writers, and various recreational senior activities groups. They want us to be passive and ignore the looming extraterrestrial threat in our midst. They want us to fall asleep at the wheel of our tractor trailer truck of truth and derail on the freeway of propaganda.”

TopSecretConspiracy.com is Freedman’s attempt to help people learn the truth, but he doesn’t stop there. In Episode 7 of “Expose the Truth”, Freedman infiltrated WorldCon 2008 to discuss a government and conspiracy to disguise the truth of the alien threat as “science fiction” stories through a comedic series of interviews with convention attendees. The previous six episodes are conspicuously absent from the website, no doubt due to those troublesome recreational senior activities groups.

io9 reports that a number of book covers filmed in “Expose the Truth” include the characters Bob, Dr Cockroach PhD, and Ginormica from the upcoming Dreamworks film Monsters vs Aliens, scheduled for wide release March 27, 2009. Furthermore, the website’s Terms of Use state that the website is made available by Pacific Data Images, Inc., a computer animation production company owned by DreamWorks SKG.

Interaction is currently limited to contacting Mr. Freedman via twitter or email with evidence of the massive conspiracy encompassing practically every aspect of our lives: however, once players prove their loyalty, they can become part of a “trusted cabal of citizen journalists.”

Tag: Dreamworks

World Robot Boxing League Presents History of “Real Steel”

Monsters vs Aliens Invades the Superbowl

A Top Secret Conspiracy for Monsters vs. Aliens

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