Alternate Reality Game?
What do you guys think about making an Alternate Reality Game (ARG) for one of our upcoming projects?
Have you played one before?
What do you think would be awesome aspects to include?
Any other ideas?
What do you guys think about making an Alternate Reality Game (ARG) for one of our upcoming projects?
Have you played one before?
What do you think would be awesome aspects to include?
Any other ideas?
March 29th, 2007 at 11:09 am
MMORPG interactive style with a more community based dynamic story line, or more along the style of the internet based ones that send you phone calls, emails, faxes and weird stuff?
If it cost a monthly fee and the genre of the game would play a part in its appeal.
Need more details on it to form an opinion, but sometimes things like that die pretty quickly after the initial novelty wears off depending on
Funny Story: There was a free two week trial for something like that were you interacted with the game about a shadow government conspiracy and it led you to web sites and you received mysterious phone calls faxes and emails. We signed up one of my office co-workers and he started receiving threatening phone calls and faxes… It was really funny but we can to calm him down after the second day because he was starting to freak out.
March 29th, 2007 at 12:33 pm
I’m not sure, but i think Buggo is talking about a ARG in order to announce or follow the developpment of a new Relic project, like an advanced blog or something, rather than the genre of their upcoming project.
If i understood well, it would be very exciting!
Best ARG i know is actually “In Memoriam”, a serial killer game where you have to watch real shots movies, solve interactive puzzles, do some researches on fake websites, recieve automactic emails or text messages on your cellphone.
March 29th, 2007 at 1:15 pm
That’s correct…. more to unveil a new game
You would not pay or have to purchase anything to be involved with it…
March 29th, 2007 at 2:10 pm
To be honest, I think that although it would be fun, and probably a great game, to be a mainstream success most modern games have to adhere to the standard shooter, RTS, or RPG templates, simply because the average user doesn’t have time or thought to sink into a more complex game, no matter how fulfilling it can be.
March 29th, 2007 at 3:28 pm
Again, this is meant to PROMOTE one of our upcoming games, not BE an upcoming game… lol… ^____^
March 29th, 2007 at 5:39 pm
I think the best example of an ARG done to promote something else is probably the ilovebees campaign ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilovebees ). This generated a lot of buzz on the internet, and perhaps in internet-centered communities (colleges, urban areas) but the greatest drawback is the primary audience is tech litterate internet-dwellers.
Those are not the people who you need to draw into a game in order to sell them on it.
I doubt that I would participate in an ARG, just because the concept doesn’t interest me. In order to sucessfully weave the kind of mistique that ilovebees accomplished, you need to obfuscate the product you are promoting and often the company making said product. To me, that makes it a questionable use of my time. I could get all involved in trying to solve one of the puzzels, and then find out I’m totally disinterested in the game the ARG is promoting.
I’d think the best use of an ARG would be to draw in non-gamers, a sort of real-world outreach. A good & recent example is Nine Inch Nails’ ARG to promote their new album ( http://www.xomba.com/trent_reznor_of_nine_inch_nails_creates_alternative_reality_game is the best I could find). Start people out in the real world and darw them into the digital one. Campaigns like that will generate buzz with the internet community anyway, but may help draw new customers.
March 29th, 2007 at 7:21 pm
What I am hoping to accomplish is not just to draw new people to the game (that is the role of THQ Marketing anyhow), but more so to give people who are already fans of our games a way to uncover interesting things about an upcoming project they already want to know more about. I’m trying to find a happy balance but it is hard
Thanks for all your suggestions guys, keep ‘em coming!
March 29th, 2007 at 9:49 pm
If it is for promotion then i think it could be quite fun, though i am not sure about phoning and such.. wouldn’t it be a bit limiting somehow ? Especially if people across the globe will participate ? But otherwise it could become a lot of fun for the people participating in it.. of course i think it depends on how much work you put into it..
March 30th, 2007 at 8:00 am
I heard Nine inch Nails is doing something like this at the moment, for their new album. It could be cool, but could also kinda suck, depending on how much people get “into it”.
April 1st, 2007 at 12:38 am
MMORPG’s? No thanks!
I wrote this when I quit WoW:
[quote]gaming, and the pursuit of happiness.
“Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness.” - Chuang Tzu 350 B.C.
its remarkable how games have been evolving.. its not as simple as it used to be. no longer are you working towards an end or trying to achieve a simple high score. there is no end, no “game over” to remind you to return to reality. as the number of people who participate increase, naturally - so does competition. and with competition, you have a diverse number of players. demographics that extend from teenagers to the average nine to five worker; categorized into casual and hardcore player subsets. and by hardcore, i’m mostly referring to those who sacrifice aspects of their real life to better themselves ingame. to become the truly “elite.” its no longer about the game itself, but how much time you’re willing to give up to play it. a noob is just a pro, with a little less practice.
as a source of entertainment and relaxation from everyday life, games have become the ultimate vehicle for escapism. but, the severity of this is much dependant on the individual player. in a given lifetime, we are provided the opportunities and the ability to excel in any direction of our choice. and games have become an alluring alternative to a fairly large population from that. as it did for me. give a kid in rural africa a handheld console, equipped with a competitive role playing game - and i wonder how viable of an escape from reality that would be. but, for those who have become complacent with their lives - making just enough to live comfortably - spending the remainder of their life inside a game may seem satisfactory. an oblivious and much ungrateful take on the opportunities that are bound to us.
many games emulate the development of virtual skillsets via a character. whether its: tony hawk unlocking hidden skateboard parks, mario learning how to fly, a sim becoming more charismatic, a world of warcraft warrior obtaining new combat skills through quests, or an eve-online character training to fly battlecruisers - it’s all the same. the emulation of real-life hardships to learn, replaced by simple mouse clicks or keystrokes coupled with time. lots of it. which are then presented to us in a fantasy world of low-gravity skateboarding, talking mushrooms, a virtual neighborhood, heroic ventures, and deepspace exploration. how truly delusional. yet, curiously entertaining.
but, seriously.. what other entertainment alternatives are there?: spending money to play obsolete games at the arcade? watching television sitcoms? going to the movies? going out to purchase alcohol at insane markups? spending time with the family? playing around with your pet cat, fuzzball? our standards of what makes us happy have undoubtedly skyrocketed with the advancement in technology. the ease of loading up a game has made some of these options less attractive.
at first, i became very cautious about games that required time commitment. i was careful when selecting a game to ensure there were no obligations for extended gameplay. everything i thought i had learned from quitting the world of warcraft. i was soon after, introduced to eve-online.. drawn by the idea of “playing whenever you want,” i decided to create a character and play casually. shortly enough, i came to the realization that any game that requires character development is a waste of time. i would never catch up to those who have played for years.
when the game eventually becomes obsolete (which all do), what sense of accomplishment is there? does it really matter if i collected all one hundred and twenty stars in mario 64? if i manually leveled my pokemon roster to level 99 without the rare candy hack? if i had one of the best pvp assassins of diablo ii on the east coast? if my world of warcraft character had the best equipment imagineable? if im piloting the most undefeatable spacecraft in all of eve-online? not really.
what is it that truly drives us gamers? its competition. and as difficult as it may seem to begin working on our real life attributes and skillsets, what is achievement without hardship? its not as easy as the matrix. you can’t sit in a chair and learn kung fu, or how to operate a helicopter. all the hours we had spent kicking ass in the virtual world, we could’ve become better individuals. keep yourself motivated, and eventually you’ll build momentum. motivation is the key to unlocking your success. or if the idea of that seems too overachieving, you can always falter back to the fantasy world where you can pretend to be “elite.”
so, how hard will it be to break the habit?
i really don’t know.
good luck.
out.
–Will.[/quote]
April 2nd, 2007 at 3:16 am
I totally disagree with the statement above. This happens when you treat games too seriuosly, instead just playing them for fun. It’s not about being first or the best. For me it’s more like watching interactive movie. It’s about relax. But I agree that with MMORPG you have to be all the time online since you’re paying for it. If it would be for free I would play WoW, but since I know I wont play it everyday theres no point in paying for it.
April 2nd, 2007 at 1:07 pm
If it’s not a full on promotion, but more of a hardcore community level engagement. I think you could do something like a global scavenger hunt after mailing objects out to select forum staff that folks would then have to find.
Something like Geocaching for example. Hide the clues to peice together a URL for a trailer revealing the game. Or screenshots, or a snippet of plot, etc.
April 5th, 2007 at 4:30 am
Yeah go for it!
ARG’s are very cool and have been used quite successfulyl int he past for promotional work. HALO and LOST used them I believe?
I’ve never taken part in one but the idea seems very cool.
Would it be global or restriced to certain regions? I’m guessing the latter but hey I can always hope.
April 6th, 2007 at 12:38 pm
I like ARGs a great deal and I’ve played a few over the past year or two. If you’re going to run one, I’m sure I’d give a glance, but it would need to be done right. An interesting story, diverse and various levels of difficulty in puzzles and clues, some amount of character interaction, the development of trust between puppet master and community all come to mind as required things.
July 11th, 2007 at 4:11 pm
Yeah, why not.
Those are always fun, even though i generally suck at them.
July 19th, 2007 at 4:17 pm
I have always wanted to play one, but I want to create one myself. While an individual effort stands no chance, I don’t see why a small group can’t prepare a decent local ARG.
I will confess that I have never worked on such a project, but maybe I wouldn’t be unsatisfied with a hands on ARG project!!
May 18th, 2009 at 12:01 am
Hmmmm, nice info there.
March 13th, 2010 at 12:23 pm
Quelques bonnes info mais toujours un bon post merci !
May 17th, 2010 at 11:58 pm
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