'Any experienced teacher knows that if you leave a class to discuss issues without any support, they’re at significant risk of accepting trendy stereotypes or allowing inaccuracies to go unchallenged. Sadly, I saw a fair share of this in EVOKE discussions. It could also be argued that the EVOKE story was simply a mechanism designed to encourage initial discussion and later activism—a prod to social networking and action, rather than educational content in itself. This, I think, is a much more substantive response to my concerns. After all, the website is built around the idea of participation and discussion. It also repeatedly emphasizes the “ten powers” needed to change the world—collaboration, courage, creativity, entrepreneurship, local insight, knowledge sharing, resourcefulness, spark, sustainability, and vision—all of which are obviously good things. However, I think they’ve underestimated the extent to which students can absorb the wrong lessons...' -- Points or it didn't happen

‘Beware of white women who come bearing Nigerian proverbs.' – Nigerian proverb. -- To play, post a comment explaining your Nobel-Prize-winning idea for how the World Bank can successfully whitewash its international public image. Note: All of your ideas are valid, except any solution that suggests that the World Bank make online propaganda in the form of a game. They already did that – it’s called EVOKE! -- Our game INVOKES the guise of progressive social activism and community organising to promote pro-capitalist ideology. Its implicit message is that the problems of the world – including hunger, poverty, environmental destruction, injustice and disease – can and must be solved within the logic of the free market system.' -- Well it could, if it were actually free. +9000 internets for the parody and righteous anti-debt campaigning, -10000 burned-out braincells for the lack of economic understanding – which is precisely what enables these parasitic institutions to take hold.

Righteous parody is righteous (Are we not yet sick of McGonigal's endless fixings of the world? Can has 'research' monies in return for *youth recruitment*, plox? Yes, Ms McGonigal, you rankle every possible suspicion when you're being funded by global government.) -- As many of you would be aware, the World Bank is behind a new online game called Evoke. A parody has been created. Invoke is described as an “ARG to save the World Bank”. The parody is a critique of the World Bank, capitalism, branded entertainment, ARGs, Jane McGonigal’s online games [and] the rhetoric of ‘games saving or changing the world’. This is something that Jane has been championing for years. The Invoke attack on branded entertainment is somewhat specific to the World Bank being behind this project.' -- The World Bank is not a 'brand', it's a non-voluntary, global government institution, specifically mandated with 'shock therapy' debt predation.

'Here's the interesting bit. On page 13 of the online comic, it's possible to click on a computer monitor in one of the frames. This plunges you into a sort of old school text adventure, which borrows the first line from classic of the genre, Zork. This is followed by another mini-game based around assembling genetic codes. Apparently, X will eventually be a cross-platform retail game release, which will include consoles. It will also turn up as a printed graphic novel and an online community-driven ARG. Somehow, they will all align and interact. "We've introduced a world inside a graphic novel that people can come and explore at their own pace, go as deep down that rabbit hole as they want, and join and interact with a community of other people all doing the same thing. Now, once you have a global universe evolving, and the player's experience unfolds within that universe, you have some real potential for complementary, parallel stories."'

'In the show, a synthetic blood beverage called “Tru Blood” allows vampires to walk among humans. HBO faced some specific communications challenges marketing True Blood. Primary among them was creating awareness, building buzz and ultimately driving tune-in.

"This football metaphor ... has a few flaws: Firstly, it references a game that has no story. You could argue that the actions of players creates a meta-story about injuries, rivalries, transfer windows, etc, but that’s not the point of football; the point is scoring goals. This is not so true of ARGs with stories – which is to say, most of them. Secondly, the metaphor fails to capture the wide range of involvement that players have in ARGs." -- Left a comment about 'tidying up' messes.

'Michelle Senderhauf, a pro ARG creator and staff writer at the Alternate Reality Gaming Network, says that revealing the backstory of the numbers separated the TV audience into groups with different levels of involvement. Which may have been the producers’ intention in the first place — to give ARG players an early treat and drive “passive” show watchers “to search for more meaning.” This would be apropos for a series dealing with personal discovery. But, like Senderhauf says, if they reveal the meaning in the last season, “I wonder if the ARG players will be the ones who feel cheated. The big reveal on the show would have been spoiled by facts they learned years ago through the ARG.' -- Mystery vs Puzzle

'In the next 10 years, we're going to see all the forms of entertainment—film, television, video, games, and print—melding into a single-platform "story engine." The moment you connect creative output with a public story engine, a narrative can continue over a period of months or years. It's going to rewrite the rules of fiction. -- What the digital approach allows you to do is take a tangential and nonlinear model and use it to expand the world. For example: If you're following Leo Bloom from Ulysses on a certain day and he crosses a street, you can abandon him and follow someone else.'

'This paper presents five Alternate Reality Game (ARG) case studies which reveal common features and mechanisms used to attract and retain diverse players, to create task–focused communities and to solve problems collectively. Voluntary, collective problem solving is an intriguing phenomenon wherein disparate individuals work together asynchronously to solve problems together. ARGs also take advantage of the unique features of new media to craft stories that could not be told using other media. -- We suggest that the collective story that emerges during an ARG normally supplants the grand or master narrative (Lyotard, 1984) and allows players to become actors and heroes. ...the goal of these games is not to create an alternate reality, but to create a storyline that infiltrates real life. If the drive to solve collective problems could be yoked to a significant social goal, ARGs could result in collective behavior that does more than market media products.'

#26. Videogames Adventure Services of New York City: Arranges bespoke kidnappings and other customized real-life (despite the name) adventures for thrill seekers. -- Consumer Recreation Services?

Area Code... On people being the killer app [via Russell Davies' quotation]: "Computers are better at connecting you to another person than they are at simulating one." -- On ambient gaming: "These are games with computers in them rather than the other way around." -- Notes: Everything is an object, every object is an environment, the act reverses them... -- McLuhan: "The content of a medium is always another medium." -- *through the looking glass*... narrative objects (foreground) narrative environments (background), narrative acts (user/viewer). Shark Runner (Battleships/"it" mechanic) Shark (object) movement (act) generates map (environment) -- Numb3rs: Fake billboards (environment) for fake products (object) = Proof (act). Video game is actually an interface to !RL crypto !app via !distributedcomputing (acts-objects-environment:instance=object(!app) -- Parking Wars on FB: IDEAL-ACTION. Do(act) media(object:environment). The user is the content. Design for the event (instantiation).

'It is from simulation that virtual games emerged, broke loose only to be reintegrated into the assemblages of world capital, as a means of inducing the "flexible personality" demanded by digital work, war and markets. As this hacker innovation was captured by the game factory, it has continued to generate surplus know-how that escapes complete capture in the commodity form. Some commentators see such "autoludic" activity as automatically empowering and democratizing. We, however, insist on what Paolo Virno terms "the ambivalence of the multitude." We ask of digital play what Félix Guattari asked of collective humanity: "how can it find a compass by which to reorient itself?" His response, by "remaking social practices," was grounded in a reading of transformations already underway. To speak of games of multitude is to assert that the possibilities of virtual play exceed its imperial manifestations, and the desires of many gamers surpass marketers' caricatures of them.'

'The actress playing the operator would ... ask them a simple personal question—like, “Tell me something that you’re especially good at.” Once the operator got her answer, she would inform the player that she would be calling another phone within one hour, and whoever answered that phone needed to know what that player had told her as the answer. She didn’t tell the player which phone she was going to call; the player needed to make sure that all of the other players in the field who would potentially receive the call knew that information. The designers shortened the time between the calls throughout the day, planning to reach a point where the players could no longer relay the necessary information quickly enough. But, to the designers’ surprise, they never reached the limit of the players’ capabilities. By the end of the day, the players were able to broadcast the pertinent message from one individual to a world-wide network of teammates in the real-world in less than 15 seconds.'

Amazing portfolio of interactive work.

"Masquerade is a children’s book, written and painted by Kit Williams, which sparked a worldwide treasure hunt by concealing clues to the location of a jewelled golden hare, created and hidden somewhere in Britain by Williams. It became the inspiration for a genre of books known today as armchair treasure hunts."

"... OMG ensued." -- ;^)

"WE SUCK: #Don't have enough players #The people who play are weird #The people who play have no money #The people who play aren't mainstream #We make games for the hardcore #We're too expensive #We don't scale (Ouch!) #We lie" -- Hehe. Seriously: "we make games... and we tell stories [that] encourage people to do things" -- Yup. (via Toby Barnes. Thanks.)

"Training yourself not to think about The Game is nearly impossible, and often counter-productive. The best strategies involve causing others to lose more than yourself. The best way to do this is to always announce your loss to as many people as possible. This reminds current players about The Game and initiates new ones." -- You lose!

"Superstruct is like a big, fun brainstorming session." -- Video.

Comment: Barbara Fister: "... an amorphous, self-organizing group that works to sustain a story - that reminds me of what it felt like as a kid to play "let's pretend" with a group, all working off the same premise. I haven't had that experience as an adult, and I remember exactly when we all looked at each other and realized we were too old to do anymore. We had become self-conscious and it ruined the improvisational ability to make stuff up on the fly together. I'd love to have that experience again!" -- :((

"Serving you into the 21st Century" (Meta-Cortex)

"On Friday 5th December, the world's first conference on ARGs in Charity and Education will be held in London. With sessions and panels by leading ARG designers, academics and educators in the field, this conference is an exceptional introduction to 'serious ARGs'. For developers and commissioners of ARGs, it's a great chance to learn about recent games and developments in the UK and around the world, and to network with key players."

"You can take the Personality Test to figure out your ancient strength (sofia, thumos, chariton, dikaiosune, sophrosune, or mythopoeia) and use the missions corresponding to each strength as a starting point for jumping in."

"Play the game. Invent the future."

'In Superstruct, players will bring their own personal knowledge and experiences to the table. "We don't need everybody to be experts on how climate might change and how the economy might be impacted," says McGonigal. "If you're a teenaged girl, tell us how a teenaged girl would respond to this crisis. We need that personal intelligence from everybody." Cascio says that his highest hope is that the collaborating players will come up with innovative ideas that have applications here, in the real world of 2008. "The mass of ideas can become almost an epiphany engine," he says.'

"Superstructing is what humans do. We build new structures on old structures. We build media on top of language and communication networks. We build communities on top of family structures. We build corporations on top of platforms for manufacturing, marketing, and distribution. Superstructing has allowed us to survive in the past and it will help us survive the super-threats."

"The existing structures of human civilization—from families and language to corporate society and technological infrastructures—just aren’t enough. We need a new set of superstructures to rise above, to take humans to the next stage. You can help. Tell us your story. Strategize out loud. Superstruct now. It's your legacy to the human race." -- Stories in comments.

'Based on the results of a year-long supercomputer simulation, the Global Extinction Awareness System (GEAS) has reset the "survival horizon" for Homo sapiens - the human race - from "indefinite" to 23 years. - SEPTEMBER 22, 2019 -- This is the premise for Jane McGonigal's newest game, Superstruct. The game's goal is to crowdsource forecasting for the Institute For The Future. And based on that premise the IFTF is hoping that participants will do no less than help them find solutions to super-threats (climate refugees, water, carbon quotas and more are listed).'

"Here are flowcharts and an excel doc from some alternate reality games. These charts give a good but small snapshot of some of the approaches used by ARG designers."

"I'm organising a spy-themed Alternate Reality Game that's raising money for Cancer Research UK, and we're looking for corporate sponsors. The game is extremely innovative and high quality, and will reach a young, online audience. Any tips on how I might find sponsors?"

"*I will never be the first to solve a puzzle. COROLLARY-I will only find out about puzzles after they have already been solved. COROLLARY-My name will never appear in the Trail, Guide, or any other game-related website. COROLLARY-If I do actually solve a puzzle, the solution will have been posted by somebody else minutes before."

42 Entertainment’s 5 ARG Tenants: '#3. The 18-35 demo has grown up in a marketing-saturated environment and has developed a sophisticated set of tools for avoiding the vast majority of marketing messages. As a rule of thumb, the bigger the neon sign the faster they’ll run the other way. So the premise here was, instead of shouting, go the opposite way and whisper—hide it. Finding it becomes an act of discovery—something they can feel proud of and are willing to talk about with their friends. It shifts entertainment presentation from exhibitionist to voyeuristic. #4. In doing so we turned those other media elements from “must be avoided” into “must be dissected.” For a very small amount of additional media dollars, it turns your large investment into something people will seek out.'

'Rogow is thrilled with Cisco's digital signs, which can be remotely programmed to display anything you want — like a coded message for Anna. "Which is, I think, why you really invented it: for superspies to get secret messages in malls," he quips. "We think that's real cool." He's equally happy with the surveillance system, which can send Anna a digital alert on her smartphone. "But we want to make sure we've got the Cisco logo in a prominent position"

“World of War Craft…is the best-designed reality of all time. What’s great about it is that the minute you log onto the game you have a display of all the people who want to be your allies. They want to collaborate with you. They want to help you. You have a clear mission and a purpose. [The mission] is important because there is a narrative around the importance of your quest. And your getting constant real-time feedback about levels that you’re achieving and talent points you’re amassing. And [it’s] just an incredible amount of info designed to make you feel like a hero, to help you collaborate with other people and to make you successful. We don’t have the kind of display and these kinds of alliances in real life. For people who play these games it’s real discouraging. They want real life to work more like this game.”

".... depth and complexity are built around the show, rather than weighing it down by presenting it front and center."

"There's currently no culture of micro-payment revenue from ARGs. My future revenue plans are in the separate directions of MMOGs and ticketed live events with innovative technology."

"Our first project is codenamed Sleeper Cell. Developed for the Let's Change The Game initiative, it's an interactive, cross-media and massively multiplayer game to raise money and awareness for Cancer Research UK." -- Intrigue :)

"Hexagon Challenge is an educational Alternate Reality Game in which students will attempt to solve a mystery by infiltrating a secret society, answering initiation questions regarding history, science, mathematics, world languages, and the arts." Illuma?

"Sleeper Cell is a fun, immersive and original game that invites players to participate in the epic yet kitschy battle between the forces of Good and Evil; in the grand tradition of Comic Relief, it presents a light-hearted way to raise funds and have fun

"Gaming projects include City of Vice by Littleloud, which invites the user to solve historical crimes from Georgian London and Six to Start's project The Ministry, which explores privacy and identity online."

"Six to Start was founded in December by Dan and Adrian Hon, both veterans of the London games firm Mind Candy."

"... some of the most exciting possibilities are provided by players as storytellers... I think the successful games of the future will provide player with story hooks and loose ends with which to co-create shared narratives within a cohesive framework."

"Games are the ultimate happiness engine."

"... reality is fundamentally broken, and we have a responsibility as game designers to fix it, with better algorithms and better missions and better feedback and better stories and better community and everything else we know how to make." -- :)

Crazy fun stuff at Channel 4: "We have a huge romp of a alternate-reality treasure hunt in development, with a central theme of genomics, cartography, patent busting and DNA experimentation."

"Alternate reality games [and] 10 collective-intelligence competencies: #mobbability #cooperation radar #signal/noise management #protovation #emergensight #open authorship #influency #multicapitalisml #longbroading #high ping quotient"

"We're working on a really exciting project (an ARG) involving history, cartography and genome research, and the Wellcome Trust are working with us so that we can base it on the bleeding edge of scientific research." Oooo!

"We don't have to think in terms of funnels and winners in online storytelling. We can let stories fracture, multiply, escape and wither, depending on how we want to encourage our users to play with them."

[Defunct?]

"edoc laundry is the world's first interactive apparel line. Each garment in the edoc range has a secret hidden in the graphics, stitching, ink, or fabric that, when deciphered, can be entered into a website to unlock a fragment of a murder mystery."

"Valedictorian, scholar, genius... Meet Derek Francis Border. On June 7th 2002, the day of his graduation he disappeared without a trace. Each day since Derek's disappearance more questions have arisen. This site is dedicated to finding answers..."

".. if anyone from Nike is reading this and wants a game designer to develop an MMO around Nike+, just let me know. The world is waiting on an alternate reality MMO with physical input..."

"... aimed at readers 8 to 12 and offer mystery novels telling the story of a centuries-old family, the Cahills, who are supposed to be the world’s most powerful clan... famous historical figures Benjamin Franklin [&] Mozart were members of the family."

"...when a flight attendant said: "We have a message for Mr. Otis and Mr. Schindler - your lifts are waiting at the gate." maybe it’s a codeword for an emergency like the ‘Mr. Sands’ message on the London Underground that’s actually a fire alert"

"Alternate reality games are chaotic play when they run, and produce chaotic fiction as a result.. chaotic play may not necessarily be an ARG even if it exhibits similar characteristics to other ARGs and even though it produces chaotic fiction or theatre"

"Marketing opportunities “Product placement on crack” … opportunities to showcase products within the story… opportunities to require people to interact with products in order to progress story..." But bloody hard to organise it all!

"We are watching the birth of a new category of entertainment, one native to the wired age, built to let the audience participate as well as observe. Stories you can browse, take with you, push on and feel react. They invite exploration and community."

"Some projects will utilise the popularity of social networking sites such as Bebo and MySpace, while others will use purpose-built web services and online games." Delivering audiences to advertisers, huh? Leave them kids alone! (Only joking. Inevitable.)

"if you're not going to admit it's a game, and you haven't designed your not-game perfectly, it's going to break the moment the players ask themselves if they're involved in a designed experience, or ask each other what the designer means for them to do."

"Big Games use technology, but are not subservient to it. Big Games are made out of people, connections, ideas, situations, and events. Big Games have computers inside of them, not the other way around."

WTF?

"Let's Change the Game is a competition to find the best idea for an ARG that will raise money for Cancer Research UK. The winning team will be awarded £1000 ($2000) to develop the game together with top game designers and Cancer Research UK."

Cloverfield website (perhaps)

"The TINAG aesthetic should blur the lines between day to day life and the game to the point of being eerie. Up until now ARGs have relied on the player to honor or ignore the line between reality and game. Sending someone text messages isn’t engaging."

"In an age where information is more accessible and companies more open than ever before, we are still fascinated by secrecy and its power to connect us to other beings. We have an overwhelming desire to share secrets anonymously with others.”

Failed ARG: "the URL structure of the site was discovered and all the daily videos and clues were revealed.. Gamers also found the contact info for the Deep Focus staff working on the game [and] began calling staffers as if they were holding Andrew." !!!

"Apathy is creeping back. We're too clever, too tired of being told what to think and do. But advertisers aren't going to give up. In the coming advertising environment it won't be you playing the game, it will be the game playing you."

"SpaceBass of unfiction.com [uses] "Chaotic Fiction" as the context in which to define ARG but including ARG within videogaming foregrounds some of the more intriguing problems such as negotiating the relationship between participation and content."

"Is it acceptable for immersive fiction to be so seamlessly integrated with the needs of the advertising world? Is the idealism of Aristotle and Sidney still worth keeping? Or is such purism obsolete?"

"Games are now almost universally connected products. Social gaming is already on the rise, but some games companies will use that to their advantages and formalise the informal games kids (and some grownups) already play on social networking sites."

"Chaotic Fiction - an Alternate Reality in which the players interact with the characters to create the story as it goes, not really about puzzle solving to find the next chapter, but based on interaction between characters and players."

Good for staying updated on transmedia / arg / chaotic fiction stuffs. Has rumor rss feeds for your favourite stories.

A rather good alternative reality gaming / chaotic fiction / transmedia resource.

"The infection has to start small and feed on fascination. "You can't start by thinking about what's going to appeal to the mainstream... You have to ask, 'What's this narrow target market going to embrace and absolutely make its own?'"

"Collaborative alternative reality simulating an oil shock"

Official trailer and comments, video responses, misdirections? who knows?

"Cloverfield" is the code name of an upcoming science fiction film produced by J. J. Abrams, directed by Matt Reeves, and written by Drew Goddard."

WWO will encourage us to transfer our survival skills from its made-up world back into our real world... our reality itself becomes a game, eco-friendly behavior is not simply a moral or political obligation impressed upon us, now, it's also play."

#Buzzing your players with black helicopters #Letting go, good narrative and story #Hiding secrets using military grade encryption cyphers #Audience fragmentation and why immersive experiences matter now