I don't think I'm smart enough to play an ARG

posted by The Vidiot @ 2:01 PM Permalink

I saw it on boingboing and loved the premise:

The early results are finally making it online as the preview of a graphic novel, which spills out into the trailhead of at least one Alternate Reality Game, and also comprises the back story of the coming videogame series. This is a big big universe - a giant war for the future of humanity, of course - with maybe one overall timeline but many different pathways through the material. So people might follow my characters through a series of graphic novels, and learn something about them that they can then use in the games, or an artifact they find in the game might help them decode something in the comics. And even the ARG that people are beginning to play right now - through which they are "finding the others," and forging coalitions with other gamers in their own parts of the world to solve certain challenges - is a set-up for the bigger game, where these larger groups will be responsible for various aspects of the coming war.

The object of the game right now is for the players to build the "Darknet," an alternative network through which a global resistance can operate, and people can begin to piece together why NASA scientists are being rounded up and what the hell happened over the skies in Los Angeles.

But I got in and set up a user name.... and then what? I'm just baffled. I can't figure out where folks are getting their clues, how their deciphering their clues, or even, frankly, what the hell they're talking about.

So, apparently, in the event of an alien invasion, I'll be useless to the resistance.

Labels: ARG gaming, WOW