From wendeth at wendydespain.com Sat Jan 3 00:32:25 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Fri, 2 Jan 2009 21:32:25 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] ARGs in Charity and Education - slides now online In-Reply-To: References: <52a6f3110812221644p72706d2k12f9b7ed30755fe5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Thanks for posting this, Dan. I thought it was great. Funnily enough, when I was working on ARG-like things with sci-fi TV shows like ten years ago I always called the ARG-like websites "Fiction Websites" although I had to be careful about calling them that to the hollywood people because they thought I was saying "Fictional Websites" implying that they were paying me for websites that didn't exist. Alternate Reality was also a problem phrase though, because they thought it implied that the plot playing out on the internet conflicted/didn't relate to the plot going on with the TV show. After several years of doing this, we finally got a common language as they could say, "Let's Blair Witch this thing." And I could say, "You know how with Blair Witch they did XYZ?" Anyway, my point is - thank goodness this art form hasn't withered on the vine. As we build up a body of work we can get better and better. Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Mon, December 22, 2008 4:45 pm, Dan Hon wrote: > I've whacked up a transcript/re-working of my talk online as well: > > http://sixtostart.com/onetoread/2008/everything-you-know-about-args-is-wrong/ > > Dan > > On 23 Dec 2008, at 00:44, Adrian Hon wrote: > >> Hi all, >> >> I've just finished uploading all the slides from the ARGs in Charity >> and Education conference to our website, and also to Slideshare - >> you >> can find them here: >> >> http://conference.operationsleepercell.com/2008/12/conference-slides-and-report-new/ >> >> You can download the presentation in their original Powerpoint or >> Keynote form, and also in PDF. There are a few collated links of >> commentary about the conference at the top. Next time we'll >> definitely >> do videos as well. >> >> Have a Happy Christmas! >> >> Adrian >> >> -- >> Adrian Hon - mssv.net >> Chief Creative at Six to Start - www.sixtostart.com >> Founder of Let's Change the Game - www.letschangethegame.org >> _______________________________________________ >> ARG_Discuss mailing list >> ARG_Discuss at igda.org >> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From adam.m.s.martin at googlemail.com Wed Jan 7 15:23:41 2009 From: adam.m.s.martin at googlemail.com (Adam Martin) Date: Wed, 7 Jan 2009 20:23:41 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had in an ARG, and how did you handle it? Message-ID: The idea is that we will chuck a topic at you each week and given you a little something to think about and give us your thoughts. We've already come up with a list of questions at the minute, but if you want your question to be featured as part of the topic of the week, please let me know and we can add it to the list. (this week's is courtesy of Michelle :)) Adam From jaybushman at gmail.com Wed Jan 7 16:17:01 2009 From: jaybushman at gmail.com (Jay Bushman) Date: Wed, 7 Jan 2009 13:17:01 -0800 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had in an ARG, and how did you handle it? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <286DB30A-B0B1-4567-A0E4-A2947A9F1755@gmail.com> After 6 months of work, the people I was writing an ARG for decided that they didn't want to do an ARG anymore. How did I handle it? Poorly. :) =========================== The Loose-Fish Project: The Spoon River Metroblog: On Jan 7, 2009, at 12:23 PM, Adam Martin wrote: The idea is that we will chuck a topic at you each week and given you a little something to think about and give us your thoughts. We've already come up with a list of questions at the minute, but if you want your question to be featured as part of the topic of the week, please let me know and we can add it to the list. (this week's is courtesy of Michelle :)) Adam _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From wendeth at wendydespain.com Wed Jan 7 17:57:42 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Wed, 7 Jan 2009 14:57:42 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had in an ARG, and how did you handle it? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Hmm. My worst unforseen disaster was that I set up all the clues based on the "traditional," rather obscure, tech knowledge-heavy modes of play, and then failed to attract the tech-savvy, ARG-savvy audience. So essentially, nobody knew how to play the game because they had never played an ARG before and didn't know the drill. This slowed everything way down, and I didn't really figure out how to recover until nearly the end. The audience still had a good time, but not as good as I think they would have, if they'd had someone there to show them how to go deep, deep down the rabbit hole. I know other things went wrong, but that's the big one that jumps out right away. :-) Wendy Despain International Hobo On Wed, January 7, 2009 12:23 pm, Adam Martin wrote: > The idea is that we will chuck a topic at you > each week and given you a little something to think about and give us > your thoughts. We've already come up with a list of questions at the > minute, but if you want your question to be featured as part of the > topic of the week, please let me know and we can add it to the list. > > (this week's is courtesy of Michelle :)) > > Adam > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From varineq at gmail.com Wed Jan 7 22:00:46 2009 From: varineq at gmail.com (Michelle Senderhauf) Date: Wed, 7 Jan 2009 21:00:46 -0600 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had in an ARG, and how did you handle it? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <45cb08290901071900v44907027u62f6d5c07d98800d@mail.gmail.com> Ok, here's mine... some of you may have heard this story before ;) This was during the Alias fanfic ARG, Omnifam. We had an outdoor live event planned in a park where a player was going to meet an agent for an exchange. When the event plans were made, we realized that the player who was going to show up had met the agent several times and that the player would most likely recognize the agent. We didn't want to ruin the mystery of it all, so we did the only thing we could do -- dressed the agent up as a clown. It wasn't really all that crazy of an idea as the agent was my husband who used to be a professional clown. And is there really any better agent disguise than a clown at a child's birthday party in a park? :P Anyway, he dressed up in his clown suit and makeup and we drove to the meetup spot which was a hour or so away. It was really, really hot outside... not the kind of weather you want to be wearing full clown gear in. But it was the kind of weather that will make your car overheat! So as our temperature gauge needle is flirting with the big red H, we decide we have to turn the heat on if we want to make it to the park. My three year old daughter and father-in-law (who both came along for the ride) are miserable and the poor clown is sweating makeup all over the car. We roll the car into the parking lot and unbelievably get the event set up before the player arrived. We temporarily forgot about the car and how we were going to get home and went on with the show. There were a few minor problems with the event (it's really hard to make animal balloons in 100 degree heat), but all went well because we just rolled with the punches. We got the car taken care of after the event without having to ask the player for a ride! So now whenever there's a behind-the-scenes disaster, I just remember... everything will work out if the PMs just keep their cool (hehe). Michelle Senderhauf On Wed, Jan 7, 2009 at 4:57 PM, Wendy Despain wrote: > Hmm. My worst unforseen disaster was that I set up all the clues based > on the "traditional," rather obscure, tech knowledge-heavy modes of > play, and then failed to attract the tech-savvy, ARG-savvy audience. > So essentially, nobody knew how to play the game because they had > never played an ARG before and didn't know the drill. > > This slowed everything way down, and I didn't really figure out how to > recover until nearly the end. The audience still had a good time, but > not as good as I think they would have, if they'd had someone there to > show them how to go deep, deep down the rabbit hole. > > I know other things went wrong, but that's the big one that jumps out > right away. :-) > > Wendy Despain > International Hobo > > > > On Wed, January 7, 2009 12:23 pm, Adam Martin wrote: > > The idea is that we will chuck a topic at you > > each week and given you a little something to think about and give us > > your thoughts. We've already come up with a list of questions at the > > minute, but if you want your question to be featured as part of the > > topic of the week, please let me know and we can add it to the list. > > > > (this week's is courtesy of Michelle :)) > > > > Adam > > _______________________________________________ > > ARG_Discuss mailing list > > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > > > > Wendy Despain > quantumcontent.com > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > From jason at aporiacme.com Wed Jan 7 22:08:36 2009 From: jason at aporiacme.com (Jason Chrest) Date: Thu, 8 Jan 2009 03:08:36 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had inan ARG, and how did you handle it? Message-ID: <229455390-1231384118-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-998072739-@bxe267.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> During the development of an ARG.. Two hurricanes that disrupted the development process, a tornado that ripped through my neighborhood, multiple computer crashes to multiple staff members (one even having their computer stolen), a military deployment... Just to list a few things. Where did I slap karma in the face for all of that? Lol ------Original Message------ From: Adam Martin Sender: To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG ReplyTo: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had inan ARG, and how did you handle it? Sent: Jan 7, 2009 2:23 PM The idea is that we will chuck a topic at you each week and given you a little something to think about and give us your thoughts. We've already come up with a list of questions at the minute, but if you want your question to be featured as part of the topic of the week, please let me know and we can add it to the list. (this week's is courtesy of Michelle :)) Adam _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss Jason Chrest Aporia Cross-Media Entertainment, LLC. http://news.aporiacme.com Cell:(662)251-9312 jason at aporiacme.com From dflor71 at gmail.com Wed Jan 7 23:44:19 2009 From: dflor71 at gmail.com (David Flor) Date: Wed, 07 Jan 2009 23:44:19 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had inan ARG, and how did you handle it? In-Reply-To: <229455390-1231384118-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-998072739-@bxe267.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> References: <229455390-1231384118-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-998072739-@bxe267.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> Message-ID: <496584A3.3040408@gmail.com> For LGL I had the crazy idea of sending a Rubik's Cube to players because one of the puzzles was based on it. It ultimately wasn't necessary (they figured out how to solve it without a cube), but I figured it would not only confirm their theories but serve as a sort of reward. But my game had a short run - only 8 days - so it was vital to get the cubes to them as soon as possible. So I picked eight people for whom I had addresses in the US and mailed them a cube each using US Postal Service Priority Mail, which cost me around $12 a box. The problem was that I used Stamps.com, and took an educated guess on the weight. The USPS service thought otherwise and thought they would cost more. I wasn't that concerned about this and hoping on "law of averages"; I only needed one cube to get delivered successfully, and didn't care if the rest of cubes were never delivered and disappeared in to ether (at least three cubes did disappear and were never found). What I was *not* expecting was the USPS, even though there was not enough postage on the box for a few recipients, DID attempt to deliver it, but decided to charge the difference in postage - $3.50 in most cases - TO THE RECIPIENT. So people began posting on UF "hey, I got a package that the post office says I have to pay four bucks for!" which was hardly my plan. I wouldn't have minded if I got charged, but certainly not the players. I had to step out from behind the curtain briefly and contact these people, telling them that the package was not vital to the gameplay progression and they, at their discretion, could elect to not pay the postal service and return the package. Most players paid the $3.50 anyway, despite my recommendations. Jason Chrest wrote: > During the development of an ARG.. > > Two hurricanes that disrupted the development process, a tornado that ripped through my neighborhood, multiple computer crashes to multiple staff members (one even having their computer stolen), a military deployment... Just to list a few things. > > Where did I slap karma in the face for all of that? Lol > > > ------Original Message------ > From: Adam Martin > Sender: > To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > ReplyTo: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had inan ARG, and how did you handle it? > Sent: Jan 7, 2009 2:23 PM > > The idea is that we will chuck a topic at you > each week and given you a little something to think about and give us > your thoughts. We've already come up with a list of questions at the > minute, but if you want your question to be featured as part of the > topic of the week, please let me know and we can add it to the list. > > (this week's is courtesy of Michelle :)) > > Adam > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > > Jason Chrest > Aporia Cross-Media Entertainment, LLC. > http://news.aporiacme.com > Cell:(662)251-9312 > jason at aporiacme.com > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > From evan at mysteryjones.com Thu Jan 8 08:33:01 2009 From: evan at mysteryjones.com (Evan Jones) Date: Thu, 8 Jan 2009 09:33:01 -0400 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had inan ARG, and how did you handle it? In-Reply-To: <496584A3.3040408@gmail.com> References: <229455390-1231384118-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-998072739-@bxe267.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> <496584A3.3040408@gmail.com> Message-ID: <5b5c8e3b0901080533v5becbdc9x7e0d6db6dbe1137d@mail.gmail.com> Too many lessons learned over the years - I could write ten of these messages! One memorable instance was a storyline that involved the lead scientists of the fictional lab discovering and sequencing the lost 1918 Spanish Flu and then being betrayed by colleagues who weaponized the virus and planned to wipe out half the planet. The only snag was that almost to the exact day of that storyline's release - a REAL scientist managed to sequence the same virus in the EXACT SAME WAY which created two 'annoying' predicaments. 1. News wire services were now flooding the internet with every searchable term that I was using, rendering gameplay impossible. 2. I was about to launch a realistic-looking plan to weaponize a disease that killed up to 100 million people in the last century. Oops. --- Evan Jones Stitch Media 902-482-2157 From dan at sixtostart.com Thu Jan 8 08:37:46 2009 From: dan at sixtostart.com (Dan Hon) Date: Thu, 8 Jan 2009 13:37:46 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had inan ARG, and how did you handle it? In-Reply-To: <5b5c8e3b0901080533v5becbdc9x7e0d6db6dbe1137d@mail.gmail.com> References: <229455390-1231384118-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-998072739-@bxe267.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> <496584A3.3040408@gmail.com> <5b5c8e3b0901080533v5becbdc9x7e0d6db6dbe1137d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8DED77D8-251E-4B57-B062-E2917DFC24BC@sixtostart.com> That's YOUR cover story and you're STICKING TO IT! On 8 Jan 2009, at 13:33, Evan Jones wrote: > Too many lessons learned over the years - I could write ten of these > messages! > > One memorable instance was a storyline that involved the lead > scientists of > the fictional lab discovering and sequencing the lost 1918 Spanish > Flu and > then being betrayed by colleagues who weaponized the virus and > planned to > wipe out half the planet. The only snag was that almost to the > exact day of > that storyline's release - a REAL scientist managed to sequence the > same > virus in the EXACT SAME WAY which created two 'annoying' predicaments. > 1. News wire services were now flooding the internet with every > searchable > term that I was using, rendering gameplay impossible. > 2. I was about to launch a realistic-looking plan to weaponize a > disease > that killed up to 100 million people in the last century. > > Oops. > > --- > Evan Jones > Stitch Media > 902-482-2157 > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From varineq at gmail.com Thu Jan 8 08:49:40 2009 From: varineq at gmail.com (Michelle Senderhauf) Date: Thu, 8 Jan 2009 07:49:40 -0600 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had inan ARG, and how did you handle it? In-Reply-To: <5b5c8e3b0901080533v5becbdc9x7e0d6db6dbe1137d@mail.gmail.com> References: <229455390-1231384118-cardhu_decombobulator_blackberry.rim.net-998072739-@bxe267.bisx.prod.on.blackberry> <496584A3.3040408@gmail.com> <5b5c8e3b0901080533v5becbdc9x7e0d6db6dbe1137d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <45cb08290901080549p7655adc6v7ae3671eeddbec30@mail.gmail.com> oh, oh! But David was there to save the day, right?! Michelle Senderhauf On Thu, Jan 8, 2009 at 7:33 AM, Evan Jones wrote: > Too many lessons learned over the years - I could write ten of these > messages! > > One memorable instance was a storyline that involved the lead scientists of > the fictional lab discovering and sequencing the lost 1918 Spanish Flu and > then being betrayed by colleagues who weaponized the virus and planned to > wipe out half the planet. The only snag was that almost to the exact day > of > that storyline's release - a REAL scientist managed to sequence the same > virus in the EXACT SAME WAY which created two 'annoying' predicaments. > 1. News wire services were now flooding the internet with every searchable > term that I was using, rendering gameplay impossible. > 2. I was about to launch a realistic-looking plan to weaponize a disease > that killed up to 100 million people in the last century. > > Oops. > > --- > Evan Jones > Stitch Media > 902-482-2157 > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > From brooke at mirlandano.com Thu Jan 8 10:04:12 2009 From: brooke at mirlandano.com (Brooke Thompson) Date: Thu, 8 Jan 2009 10:04:12 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: What's the worst unforseen disaster you had in an ARG, and how did you handle it? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: A player gaining access, for several hours, to our online development space and as we were a remote team, that was *the* development space. Everything was there and they had access long enough to have downloaded it all - I later learned, that he had, in fact, downloaded it all. We moved to a different location and just accepted that it was all out there. However, with every major new plot point that was released, I created ways to divert from the story if it was deemed necessary (it never was). We were lucky in several respects: 1) we knew what the story was but hadn't figured out the exact telling of the end 2) the player that gained access (unbeknownst to us at the time) was one of the most active and dedicated players - he never had any intention of telling anyone what he had done and was very curious to compare and contrast the planned experience with the actual one. So, the discovery did not hurt his experience and, in some ways, enhanced it. From steve.vosloo at shuttleworthfoundation.org Mon Jan 12 14:03:27 2009 From: steve.vosloo at shuttleworthfoundation.org (Steve Vosloo) Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2009 21:03:27 +0200 Subject: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes Message-ID: <496B93FF.4060207@shuttleworthfoundation.org> The Foundation for which I work tries to innovate within the space of education (formal and informal) (amongst other spaces). I've suggested ARGs as an innovative way for youth to develop certain skills whilst they employ social media -- sometimes in a pop culture-based story context. The way that we work is that usually we pilot demonstration projects and then present the results to bigger stakeholders who can scale these projects, e.g. the Department of Education in South Africa. After having read Jane McGonical's /Why I Love Bees: A Case Study in Collective Intelligence Gaming/ and other pieces on the learning outcomes of ARG play, I'm asking this: if commercial companies use ARGs for marketing purposes, and players learn from them, then are these companies some of the stakeholders that the Shuttleworth Foundation should try to influence? Did I Love Bees turn Microsoft's gaming unit into creators of educational experiences? Did /The Lost Ring/ mean that McDonalds is not only in the fast food business, but in the business of education too? All thoughts would be much appreciated. Thanks, Steve -- Steve Vosloo Fellow, Communication and Analytical Skills Development The Shuttleworth Foundation Tel: +27 21 970 1240 | Fax: +27 21 970 1241 Web: www.shuttleworthfoundation.org Blog: www.innovatingeducation.wordpress.com Email disclaimer: wiki.tsf.org.za/EmailDisclaimer From nathan at studiocypher.com Mon Jan 12 14:22:42 2009 From: nathan at studiocypher.com (Nathan Mishler) Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2009 14:22:42 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes In-Reply-To: <496B93FF.4060207@shuttleworthfoundation.org> References: <496B93FF.4060207@shuttleworthfoundation.org> Message-ID: <8fc5b2700901121122h4bd6ba3eu9d0ca57b738ed13f@mail.gmail.com> It's possible. There's a problem with the thought that there are Games and then there are Educational Games. Many people think that only learning comes out of games that are specifically designed to teach. The thing is, ALL games teach. Granted, much of what entertainment games teach is not useful or applicable in any form in the real world. Okay, you learned how to avoid the alien's attacks on level 8. That is very specialized knowledge. ARGs on the other hand tend to involve more "real world" knowledge, using things that people already know (or can learn) as part of their puzzles. They also tend to encourage players to go out into the world and doing this learning on their own. Of course now I'm treading into a lot of things discussed in Dave S's book about the differences between formal gaming and the sort of hybrid game / storytelling systems that are in ARGs. And that's a looooong discussion. I'd say go for it, but recognize that they might not care that they make "learning" functions. Learning is part and parcel with the game, but they might not be interested tuning their marketing args towards a "benefit of all mankind" sort of thing. There's still a belief in some circles that games are "just entertainment" and any attempt to "shoehorn" learning into them will make the games unpopular. I think that's silly, seeing as games are nothing BUT learning systems, but not everyone recognizes it. On the other hand, Mc Donalds for instance is part of the whole "Children's Hospital" scene so it's not like they are entirely against the public good. If you can get their backing you could do a bunch of cool stuff. On Mon, Jan 12, 2009 at 2:03 PM, Steve Vosloo < steve.vosloo at shuttleworthfoundation.org> wrote: > The Foundation for which I work tries to innovate within the space of > education (formal and informal) (amongst other spaces). I've suggested ARGs > as an innovative way for youth to develop certain skills whilst they employ > social media -- sometimes in a pop culture-based story context. > > The way that we work is that usually we pilot demonstration projects and > then present the results to bigger stakeholders who can scale these > projects, e.g. the Department of Education in South Africa. > > After having read Jane McGonical's /Why I Love Bees: A Case Study in > Collective Intelligence Gaming/ and other pieces on the learning outcomes of > ARG play, I'm asking this: if commercial companies use ARGs for marketing > purposes, and players learn from them, then are these companies some of the > stakeholders that the Shuttleworth Foundation should try to influence? Did I > Love Bees turn Microsoft's gaming unit into creators of educational > experiences? Did /The Lost Ring/ mean that McDonalds is not only in the fast > food business, but in the business of education too? > > All thoughts would be much appreciated. > > Thanks, > Steve > > -- > Steve Vosloo > Fellow, Communication and Analytical Skills Development > The Shuttleworth Foundation > > Tel: +27 21 970 1240 | Fax: +27 21 970 1241 > Web: www.shuttleworthfoundation.org > Blog: www.innovatingeducation.wordpress.com > > Email disclaimer: wiki.tsf.org.za/EmailDisclaimer > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > From mmonello at campfirenyc.com Mon Jan 12 15:05:19 2009 From: mmonello at campfirenyc.com (Mike Monello) Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2009 12:05:19 -0800 Subject: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes In-Reply-To: <8fc5b2700901121122h4bd6ba3eu9d0ca57b738ed13f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Marketers are only interested in the kind of learning that leads you to buy a product. Yes, these companies have altruistic aspects to them, such as the Ronald McDonald House, but if you are talking to the marketing department, they want to sell products, and any education they do leads to that sale. But I'm not even sure that the people you would want to speak to are inside those companies. For instance, I'm not sure anyone at Audi really understand how the story of Art of the Heist pushed players to educate themselves about the features and benefits of the A3 on their own terms. They just were not connected to it in that way. They would talk about the ads, and "engagement" and they might cite some results, but people like myself and Brian Clark actually owned that part of the campaign - built it, brought it to life, monitored the results, etc. All they would likely recognize was that people who engaged in the story went to the online car configurator and engaged with that. I'm willing to bet the same is true for most marketing campaigns - if you want to get into how and why it worked, go to the people who actually did it. -Mike On 1/12/09 2:22 PM, "Nathan Mishler" wrote: It's possible. There's a problem with the thought that there are Games and then there are Educational Games. Many people think that only learning comes out of games that are specifically designed to teach. The thing is, ALL games teach. Granted, much of what entertainment games teach is not useful or applicable in any form in the real world. Okay, you learned how to avoid the alien's attacks on level 8. That is very specialized knowledge. ARGs on the other hand tend to involve more "real world" knowledge, using things that people already know (or can learn) as part of their puzzles. They also tend to encourage players to go out into the world and doing this learning on their own. Of course now I'm treading into a lot of things discussed in Dave S's book about the differences between formal gaming and the sort of hybrid game / storytelling systems that are in ARGs. And that's a looooong discussion. I'd say go for it, but recognize that they might not care that they make "learning" functions. Learning is part and parcel with the game, but they might not be interested tuning their marketing args towards a "benefit of all mankind" sort of thing. There's still a belief in some circles that games are "just entertainment" and any attempt to "shoehorn" learning into them will make the games unpopular. I think that's silly, seeing as games are nothing BUT learning systems, but not everyone recognizes it. On the other hand, Mc Donalds for instance is part of the whole "Children's Hospital" scene so it's not like they are entirely against the public good. If you can get their backing you could do a bunch of cool stuff. On Mon, Jan 12, 2009 at 2:03 PM, Steve Vosloo < steve.vosloo at shuttleworthfoundation.org> wrote: > The Foundation for which I work tries to innovate within the space of > education (formal and informal) (amongst other spaces). I've suggested ARGs > as an innovative way for youth to develop certain skills whilst they employ > social media -- sometimes in a pop culture-based story context. > > The way that we work is that usually we pilot demonstration projects and > then present the results to bigger stakeholders who can scale these > projects, e.g. the Department of Education in South Africa. > > After having read Jane McGonical's /Why I Love Bees: A Case Study in > Collective Intelligence Gaming/ and other pieces on the learning outcomes of > ARG play, I'm asking this: if commercial companies use ARGs for marketing > purposes, and players learn from them, then are these companies some of the > stakeholders that the Shuttleworth Foundation should try to influence? Did I > Love Bees turn Microsoft's gaming unit into creators of educational > experiences? Did /The Lost Ring/ mean that McDonalds is not only in the fast > food business, but in the business of education too? > > All thoughts would be much appreciated. > > Thanks, > Steve > > -- > Steve Vosloo > Fellow, Communication and Analytical Skills Development > The Shuttleworth Foundation > > Tel: +27 21 970 1240 | Fax: +27 21 970 1241 > Web: www.shuttleworthfoundation.org > Blog: www.innovatingeducation.wordpress.com > > Email disclaimer: wiki.tsf.org.za/EmailDisclaimer > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss --- Mike Monello Partner, Campfire 62 White Street, 3E New York, NY 10013 212-612-9600 http://www.campfirenyc.com From wendeth at wendydespain.com Mon Jan 12 15:33:43 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2009 12:33:43 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <9002030886414233644720b43b8695e3.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> I'd say it depends on the company. Some companies have education as an express part of their mission statement. Most don't. However, having worked in television development, there are those who are interested in building education into their products - and not just nonprofits like Sesame Street. In the US, stations broadcast over the air are required to include a certain number of hours of educational content. The definition of educational is pretty broad so if you can claim any educational content at all, you've got a better chance of being picked up (for non-prime time slots). Book publishers for kids might be another kind of company interested in education. As someone else mentioned, learning is often used in game design circles because it shows up in several theories of what makes things fun. And marketers are interested in educating consumers about their product. But sometimes it's considered an unpopular add-on. Personally, I'm a fan of learning and fun and love how ARGs approach these topics, but not everybody sees the world the way I do. :-) Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Mon, January 12, 2009 12:05 pm, Mike Monello wrote: > Marketers are only interested in the kind of learning that leads you > to buy a product. Yes, these companies have altruistic aspects to > them, such as the Ronald McDonald House, but if you are talking to the > marketing department, they want to sell products, and any education > they do leads to that sale. > > But I'm not even sure that the people you would want to speak to are > inside those companies. For instance, I'm not sure anyone at Audi > really understand how the story of Art of the Heist pushed players to > educate themselves about the features and benefits of the A3 on their > own terms. They just were not connected to it in that way. They would > talk about the ads, and "engagement" and they might cite some results, > but people like myself and Brian Clark actually owned that part of the > campaign - built it, brought it to life, monitored the results, etc. > All they would likely recognize was that people who engaged in the > story went to the online car configurator and engaged with that. > > I'm willing to bet the same is true for most marketing campaigns - if > you want to get into how and why it worked, go to the people who > actually did it. > > -Mike > > > On 1/12/09 2:22 PM, "Nathan Mishler" wrote: > > It's possible. > > There's a problem with the thought that there are Games and then there > are > Educational Games. Many people think that only learning comes out of > games > that are specifically designed to teach. The thing is, ALL games > teach. > Granted, much of what entertainment games teach is not useful or > applicable > in any form in the real world. Okay, you learned how to avoid the > alien's > attacks on level 8. That is very specialized knowledge. > > ARGs on the other hand tend to involve more "real world" knowledge, > using > things that people already know (or can learn) as part of their > puzzles. > They also tend to encourage players to go out into the world and doing > this > learning on their own. Of course now I'm treading into a lot of things > discussed in Dave S's book about the differences between formal gaming > and > the sort of hybrid game / storytelling systems that are in ARGs. And > that's > a looooong discussion. > > I'd say go for it, but recognize that they might not care that they > make > "learning" functions. Learning is part and parcel with the game, but > they > might not be interested tuning their marketing args towards a "benefit > of > all mankind" sort of thing. There's still a belief in some circles > that > games are "just entertainment" and any attempt to "shoehorn" learning > into > them will make the games unpopular. I think that's silly, seeing as > games > are nothing BUT learning systems, but not everyone recognizes it. > > On the other hand, Mc Donalds for instance is part of the whole > "Children's > Hospital" scene so it's not like they are entirely against the public > good. > If you can get their backing you could do a bunch of cool stuff. > > On Mon, Jan 12, 2009 at 2:03 PM, Steve Vosloo < > steve.vosloo at shuttleworthfoundation.org> wrote: > >> The Foundation for which I work tries to innovate within the space >> of >> education (formal and informal) (amongst other spaces). I've >> suggested ARGs >> as an innovative way for youth to develop certain skills whilst they >> employ >> social media -- sometimes in a pop culture-based story context. >> >> The way that we work is that usually we pilot demonstration projects >> and >> then present the results to bigger stakeholders who can scale these >> projects, e.g. the Department of Education in South Africa. >> >> After having read Jane McGonical's /Why I Love Bees: A Case Study in >> Collective Intelligence Gaming/ and other pieces on the learning >> outcomes of >> ARG play, I'm asking this: if commercial companies use ARGs for >> marketing >> purposes, and players learn from them, then are these companies some >> of the >> stakeholders that the Shuttleworth Foundation should try to >> influence? Did I >> Love Bees turn Microsoft's gaming unit into creators of educational >> experiences? Did /The Lost Ring/ mean that McDonalds is not only in >> the fast >> food business, but in the business of education too? >> >> All thoughts would be much appreciated. >> >> Thanks, >> Steve >> >> -- >> Steve Vosloo >> Fellow, Communication and Analytical Skills Development >> The Shuttleworth Foundation >> >> Tel: +27 21 970 1240 | Fax: +27 21 970 1241 >> Web: www.shuttleworthfoundation.org >> Blog: www.innovatingeducation.wordpress.com >> >> Email disclaimer: wiki.tsf.org.za/EmailDisclaimer >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> ARG_Discuss mailing list >> ARG_Discuss at igda.org >> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss >> > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > > > --- > Mike Monello > Partner, Campfire > 62 White Street, 3E > New York, NY 10013 > 212-612-9600 > http://www.campfirenyc.com > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From bclark at gmdstudios.com Mon Jan 12 16:56:54 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2009 16:56:54 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes In-Reply-To: References: <8fc5b2700901121122h4bd6ba3eu9d0ca57b738ed13f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <002f01c97500$af728ea0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> I tend to agree with the observations of many of the other people here: for the most part, marketers are marketers and more concerned with the results than the pedagogy of how they get produced. So there's probably an accurate observation that commercial ARG developers are more closely associated with your mission (as they we're iteratively studying processes that are indistinguishable from what you're interested) ... less likely to find interest from our clients. The exception might be the communities related to Serious Gaming and Games for Change -- the spots with the NFP arts and mission world collide with gaming. There, you've got similar goals in addition to similar interest in approach. All of that, though, comes with the caveat that educational ARG development as part of the experiential education strand is well represented here in the SIG (so this group is a good crossing ground for these various camps, for certain!) Brian -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Mike Monello Sent: Monday, January 12, 2009 3:05 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes Marketers are only interested in the kind of learning that leads you to buy a product. Yes, these companies have altruistic aspects to them, such as the Ronald McDonald House, but if you are talking to the marketing department, they want to sell products, and any education they do leads to that sale. But I'm not even sure that the people you would want to speak to are inside those companies. For instance, I'm not sure anyone at Audi really understand how the story of Art of the Heist pushed players to educate themselves about the features and benefits of the A3 on their own terms. They just were not connected to it in that way. They would talk about the ads, and "engagement" and they might cite some results, but people like myself and Brian Clark actually owned that part of the campaign - built it, brought it to life, monitored the results, etc. All they would likely recognize was that people who engaged in the story went to the online car configurator and engaged with that. I'm willing to bet the same is true for most marketing campaigns - if you want to get into how and why it worked, go to the people who actually did it. -Mike On 1/12/09 2:22 PM, "Nathan Mishler" wrote: It's possible. There's a problem with the thought that there are Games and then there are Educational Games. Many people think that only learning comes out of games that are specifically designed to teach. The thing is, ALL games teach. Granted, much of what entertainment games teach is not useful or applicable in any form in the real world. Okay, you learned how to avoid the alien's attacks on level 8. That is very specialized knowledge. ARGs on the other hand tend to involve more "real world" knowledge, using things that people already know (or can learn) as part of their puzzles. They also tend to encourage players to go out into the world and doing this learning on their own. Of course now I'm treading into a lot of things discussed in Dave S's book about the differences between formal gaming and the sort of hybrid game / storytelling systems that are in ARGs. And that's a looooong discussion. I'd say go for it, but recognize that they might not care that they make "learning" functions. Learning is part and parcel with the game, but they might not be interested tuning their marketing args towards a "benefit of all mankind" sort of thing. There's still a belief in some circles that games are "just entertainment" and any attempt to "shoehorn" learning into them will make the games unpopular. I think that's silly, seeing as games are nothing BUT learning systems, but not everyone recognizes it. On the other hand, Mc Donalds for instance is part of the whole "Children's Hospital" scene so it's not like they are entirely against the public good. If you can get their backing you could do a bunch of cool stuff. On Mon, Jan 12, 2009 at 2:03 PM, Steve Vosloo < steve.vosloo at shuttleworthfoundation.org> wrote: > The Foundation for which I work tries to innovate within the space of > education (formal and informal) (amongst other spaces). I've suggested ARGs > as an innovative way for youth to develop certain skills whilst they employ > social media -- sometimes in a pop culture-based story context. > > The way that we work is that usually we pilot demonstration projects and > then present the results to bigger stakeholders who can scale these > projects, e.g. the Department of Education in South Africa. > > After having read Jane McGonical's /Why I Love Bees: A Case Study in > Collective Intelligence Gaming/ and other pieces on the learning outcomes of > ARG play, I'm asking this: if commercial companies use ARGs for marketing > purposes, and players learn from them, then are these companies some of the > stakeholders that the Shuttleworth Foundation should try to influence? Did I > Love Bees turn Microsoft's gaming unit into creators of educational > experiences? Did /The Lost Ring/ mean that McDonalds is not only in the fast > food business, but in the business of education too? > > All thoughts would be much appreciated. > > Thanks, > Steve > > -- > Steve Vosloo > Fellow, Communication and Analytical Skills Development > The Shuttleworth Foundation > > Tel: +27 21 970 1240 | Fax: +27 21 970 1241 > Web: www.shuttleworthfoundation.org > Blog: www.innovatingeducation.wordpress.com > > Email disclaimer: wiki.tsf.org.za/EmailDisclaimer > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss --- Mike Monello Partner, Campfire 62 White Street, 3E New York, NY 10013 212-612-9600 http://www.campfirenyc.com _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From steve.vosloo at shuttleworthfoundation.org Tue Jan 13 02:33:03 2009 From: steve.vosloo at shuttleworthfoundation.org (Steve Vosloo) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 09:33:03 +0200 Subject: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes In-Reply-To: <002f01c97500$af728ea0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> References: <8fc5b2700901121122h4bd6ba3eu9d0ca57b738ed13f@mail.gmail.com> <002f01c97500$af728ea0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: <496C43AF.5060105@shuttleworthfoundation.org> Thanks to all for the responses. It seems one needs to tread carefully when working with marketers AND seeking educational outcomes in an ARG. But that doesn't mean it's not possible to make both groups -- marketers and educators -- happy. It also seems best to canvas commercial ARG designers and the advertising agencies of commercial companies, rather than approach the marketing departments of commercial companies directly. --Steve Brian Clark wrote: > I tend to agree with the observations of many of the other people here: for > the most part, marketers are marketers and more concerned with the results > than the pedagogy of how they get produced. So there's probably an accurate > observation that commercial ARG developers are more closely associated with > your mission (as they we're iteratively studying processes that are > indistinguishable from what you're interested) ... less likely to find > interest from our clients. > > The exception might be the communities related to Serious Gaming and Games > for Change -- the spots with the NFP arts and mission world collide with > gaming. There, you've got similar goals in addition to similar interest in > approach. > > All of that, though, comes with the caveat that educational ARG development > as part of the experiential education strand is well represented here in the > SIG (so this group is a good crossing ground for these various camps, for > certain!) > > > Brian > > -----Original Message----- > From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On > Behalf Of Mike Monello > Sent: Monday, January 12, 2009 3:05 PM > To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes > > Marketers are only interested in the kind of learning that leads you to buy > a product. Yes, these companies have altruistic aspects to them, such as the > Ronald McDonald House, but if you are talking to the marketing department, > they want to sell products, and any education they do leads to that sale. > > But I'm not even sure that the people you would want to speak to are inside > those companies. For instance, I'm not sure anyone at Audi really understand > how the story of Art of the Heist pushed players to educate themselves about > the features and benefits of the A3 on their own terms. They just were not > connected to it in that way. They would talk about the ads, and "engagement" > and they might cite some results, but people like myself and Brian Clark > actually owned that part of the campaign - built it, brought it to life, > monitored the results, etc. All they would likely recognize was that people > who engaged in the story went to the online car configurator and engaged > with that. > > I'm willing to bet the same is true for most marketing campaigns - if you > want to get into how and why it worked, go to the people who actually did > it. > > -Mike > > > On 1/12/09 2:22 PM, "Nathan Mishler" wrote: > > It's possible. > > There's a problem with the thought that there are Games and then there are > Educational Games. Many people think that only learning comes out of games > that are specifically designed to teach. The thing is, ALL games teach. > Granted, much of what entertainment games teach is not useful or applicable > in any form in the real world. Okay, you learned how to avoid the alien's > attacks on level 8. That is very specialized knowledge. > > ARGs on the other hand tend to involve more "real world" knowledge, using > things that people already know (or can learn) as part of their puzzles. > They also tend to encourage players to go out into the world and doing this > learning on their own. Of course now I'm treading into a lot of things > discussed in Dave S's book about the differences between formal gaming and > the sort of hybrid game / storytelling systems that are in ARGs. And that's > a looooong discussion. > > I'd say go for it, but recognize that they might not care that they make > "learning" functions. Learning is part and parcel with the game, but they > might not be interested tuning their marketing args towards a "benefit of > all mankind" sort of thing. There's still a belief in some circles that > games are "just entertainment" and any attempt to "shoehorn" learning into > them will make the games unpopular. I think that's silly, seeing as games > are nothing BUT learning systems, but not everyone recognizes it. > > On the other hand, Mc Donalds for instance is part of the whole "Children's > Hospital" scene so it's not like they are entirely against the public good. > If you can get their backing you could do a bunch of cool stuff. > > On Mon, Jan 12, 2009 at 2:03 PM, Steve Vosloo < > steve.vosloo at shuttleworthfoundation.org> wrote: > > >> The Foundation for which I work tries to innovate within the space of >> education (formal and informal) (amongst other spaces). I've suggested >> > ARGs > >> as an innovative way for youth to develop certain skills whilst they >> > employ > >> social media -- sometimes in a pop culture-based story context. >> >> The way that we work is that usually we pilot demonstration projects and >> then present the results to bigger stakeholders who can scale these >> projects, e.g. the Department of Education in South Africa. >> >> After having read Jane McGonical's /Why I Love Bees: A Case Study in >> Collective Intelligence Gaming/ and other pieces on the learning outcomes >> > of > >> ARG play, I'm asking this: if commercial companies use ARGs for marketing >> purposes, and players learn from them, then are these companies some of >> > the > >> stakeholders that the Shuttleworth Foundation should try to influence? Did >> > I > >> Love Bees turn Microsoft's gaming unit into creators of educational >> experiences? Did /The Lost Ring/ mean that McDonalds is not only in the >> > fast > >> food business, but in the business of education too? >> >> All thoughts would be much appreciated. >> >> Thanks, >> Steve >> >> -- >> Steve Vosloo >> Fellow, Communication and Analytical Skills Development >> The Shuttleworth Foundation >> >> Tel: +27 21 970 1240 | Fax: +27 21 970 1241 >> Web: www.shuttleworthfoundation.org >> Blog: www.innovatingeducation.wordpress.com >> >> Email disclaimer: wiki.tsf.org.za/EmailDisclaimer >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> ARG_Discuss mailing list >> ARG_Discuss at igda.org >> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss >> >> > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > > > --- > Mike Monello > Partner, Campfire > 62 White Street, 3E > New York, NY 10013 > 212-612-9600 > http://www.campfirenyc.com > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > -- Steve Vosloo Fellow, Communication and Analytical Skills Development The Shuttleworth Foundation Tel: +27 21 970 1240 | Fax: +27 21 970 1241 Web: www.shuttleworthfoundation.org Blog: www.innovatingeducation.wordpress.com Email disclaimer: wiki.tsf.org.za/EmailDisclaimer From adam.m.s.martin at googlemail.com Tue Jan 13 14:20:53 2009 From: adam.m.s.martin at googlemail.com (Adam Martin) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 19:20:53 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes In-Reply-To: <8fc5b2700901121122h4bd6ba3eu9d0ca57b738ed13f@mail.gmail.com> References: <496B93FF.4060207@shuttleworthfoundation.org> <8fc5b2700901121122h4bd6ba3eu9d0ca57b738ed13f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: 2009/1/12 Nathan Mishler : > It's possible. > > There's a problem with the thought that there are Games and then there are > Educational Games. Many people think that only learning comes out of games > that are specifically designed to teach. The thing is, ALL games teach. Yep, so ... > Granted, much of what entertainment games teach is not useful or applicable > in any form in the real world. Okay, you learned how to avoid the alien's > attacks on level 8. That is very specialized knowledge. ... I disagree that what you learn from a shmup is to "avoid the alien's attacks on level 8" :). I believe that with any good game you learn more transferable skills than you ever learn sepcialized ones. For instance, someone said to me recently that Tetris teaches mostly "how to pack objects in a box with no wasted space". Nah ... it teaches you a bunch of things much more than that, each related to the actual gameplay mechanics, such as "mentally rotate any object in 2D with a low degree of error when it comes to accidental reflection" (the game gives you L pieces upside-down for their most common use-case, forcing you to mentally rotate them before deciding where to position them). It takes some effort to work out what a game is *really* teaching, and in my experience it is very rare for either professionals or education researchers to do that, in detail. Among professionals it seems there's a widespread (b belief that the deep, highly transferrable skills are there - and often in much greater number than people suspect - but few of them have ever done the analyses themselves. > > ARGs on the other hand tend to involve more "real world" knowledge, using > things that people already know (or can learn) as part of their puzzles. > They also tend to encourage players to go out into the world and doing this > learning on their own. With ARGs I think you'd have to start by breaking out the highly differentiated classes of players, from the problems solvers to the forum lurkers to the researchers to the group-organizers ... Etc ... And look at the different sets of experiences each was going through. The overall journey/game experience for each kind of player is usually very very different - often they don't even experience the same content, or even the same narrative (many people get different subsets of the narrative) That said, I think it would be much easier to just embed traditional learning inside traditional ARGs, capitalising on how readily they absorb and link other media. As I understand it, that's what most of the educational ARGs have done to date (and in some cases done very successfully?) It may not be optimal, nor work as exceptionally well as a fully integrated learning experience+ARG might, but IMHO it would already be a big improvement on the educational tools we currently have in this area, and so it's very worthwhile in it's own right. Adam From adam.m.s.martin at googlemail.com Tue Jan 13 14:11:54 2009 From: adam.m.s.martin at googlemail.com (Adam Martin) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 19:11:54 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? Message-ID: (The idea is that we will chuck a topic at you each week and given you a little something to think about and give us your thoughts. If you want your question to be featured as part of the topic of the week, please let me know and we can add it to the list.) Adam From brooke at mirlandano.com Tue Jan 13 14:46:37 2009 From: brooke at mirlandano.com (Brooke Thompson) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 14:46:37 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <08160E94-0C10-47E9-A261-C5EF3CB957AC@mirlandano.com> No real answer, but a slight issue with the phrasing of the question. It continues to perpetuate the idea that the Beast was the first ARG and, I know, I'm not the only one on the list that disagrees with that assumption - especially as we continue to broaden the definition of ARGs. Heck, for some "Hands Across America" would be classified as an ARG if it were to happen today and I'm certain that someone would brand that fun Earth Day thing that the schools around me did in the 70s as an ARG - we had puzzles! and challenges! and there were stories! and collaborative play! it happened in the classrooms and in our homes and outside! There are so many other milestones we could use other than "almost 8 years after the Beast..." - what about "with the 10th anniversary of Blair Witch upon us..." or "15 years after Publius Enigma...". On Jan 13, 2009, at 2:11 PM, Adam Martin wrote: > (The idea is that we will chuck a topic at you each week and given you > a little something to think about and give us your thoughts. > > If you want your question to be featured as part of the topic of the > week, please let me know and we can add it to the list.) > > Adam > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From adam.m.s.martin at googlemail.com Tue Jan 13 15:02:44 2009 From: adam.m.s.martin at googlemail.com (Adam Martin) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 20:02:44 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <08160E94-0C10-47E9-A261-C5EF3CB957AC@mirlandano.com> References: <08160E94-0C10-47E9-A261-C5EF3CB957AC@mirlandano.com> Message-ID: 2009/1/13 Brooke Thompson : > There are so many other milestones we could use other than "almost 8 years > after the Beast..." - what about "with the 10th anniversary of Blair Witch > upon us..." or "15 years after Publius Enigma...". I was interested in what people thought of the recent era where we've seen an especially big proliferation of new ARGs, and the proliferation of particularly strong communities (i.e. ones that have persisted beyond the end of the ARG's that inspired them) for playing, studying, and inventing them. I do believe it did some unique things - such as inspiring people to believe that ARGs could work, and showing them how, in a way that other projects didn't, and at a time when Majestic had freshly crashed and burned - but I wasn't trying to imply that it was the first or most important of the ARGs. I'm sorry if it sounded that way. Adam From bclark at gmdstudios.com Tue Jan 13 15:31:09 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 15:31:09 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: <08160E94-0C10-47E9-A261-C5EF3CB957AC@mirlandano.com> Message-ID: <00bb01c975bd$e00d3340$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Like Brooke, I disagree with the premise ... "Blair Witch" had far more impact on rethinking this type of storytelling. You could just as easily pick "13th Anniversary of 'Johnny Mnemonic'" and hit the same themes as The Beast and a longer legacy in terms of defining "experience design" as a discipline. One must be careful not to let one's own "first ARG" become some arbitrary indicator of the beginning of time. But really your suggested topic boils down to "what is your favorite ARG and why?" No offense, but not the most inspiring of discussion starters, is it? For me, it just begs the question, "When exactly did the golden age of ARGing end?" My nomination would be 2003 when Perplex City and Art of the Heist were running at the same time. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Adam Martin Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 3:03 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast,which is your favourite ARG and why? 2009/1/13 Brooke Thompson : > There are so many other milestones we could use other than "almost 8 years > after the Beast..." - what about "with the 10th anniversary of Blair Witch > upon us..." or "15 years after Publius Enigma...". I was interested in what people thought of the recent era where we've seen an especially big proliferation of new ARGs, and the proliferation of particularly strong communities (i.e. ones that have persisted beyond the end of the ARG's that inspired them) for playing, studying, and inventing them. I do believe it did some unique things - such as inspiring people to believe that ARGs could work, and showing them how, in a way that other projects didn't, and at a time when Majestic had freshly crashed and burned - but I wasn't trying to imply that it was the first or most important of the ARGs. I'm sorry if it sounded that way. Adam _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From bclark at gmdstudios.com Tue Jan 13 15:50:57 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 15:50:57 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <00bb01c975bd$e00d3340$6600a8c0@Tricorder> References: <08160E94-0C10-47E9-A261-C5EF3CB957AC@mirlandano.com> <00bb01c975bd$e00d3340$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: <00c101c975c0$a3e00cf0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Did I say '03? My Alzheimers must be setting in ... that was '05. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Brian Clark Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 3:31 PM To: 'Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG' Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast,which is your favourite ARG and why? Like Brooke, I disagree with the premise ... "Blair Witch" had far more impact on rethinking this type of storytelling. You could just as easily pick "13th Anniversary of 'Johnny Mnemonic'" and hit the same themes as The Beast and a longer legacy in terms of defining "experience design" as a discipline. One must be careful not to let one's own "first ARG" become some arbitrary indicator of the beginning of time. But really your suggested topic boils down to "what is your favorite ARG and why?" No offense, but not the most inspiring of discussion starters, is it? For me, it just begs the question, "When exactly did the golden age of ARGing end?" My nomination would be 2003 when Perplex City and Art of the Heist were running at the same time. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Adam Martin Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 3:03 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast,which is your favourite ARG and why? 2009/1/13 Brooke Thompson : > There are so many other milestones we could use other than "almost 8 years > after the Beast..." - what about "with the 10th anniversary of Blair Witch > upon us..." or "15 years after Publius Enigma...". I was interested in what people thought of the recent era where we've seen an especially big proliferation of new ARGs, and the proliferation of particularly strong communities (i.e. ones that have persisted beyond the end of the ARG's that inspired them) for playing, studying, and inventing them. I do believe it did some unique things - such as inspiring people to believe that ARGs could work, and showing them how, in a way that other projects didn't, and at a time when Majestic had freshly crashed and burned - but I wasn't trying to imply that it was the first or most important of the ARGs. I'm sorry if it sounded that way. Adam _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From mmonello at campfirenyc.com Tue Jan 13 16:00:58 2009 From: mmonello at campfirenyc.com (Mike Monello) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 13:00:58 -0800 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: I've been doing a lot of thinking about the Blair Witch experience, as I am going to be rolling out 20+ articles focusing on various aspects of it throughout 2009, but I wasn't offended by the question. Blair Witch was an interactive transmedia narrative, it had a massive world-wide community (that is still very much active today on fansites around the world since 1998, but (correct me if I am wrong), the term ARG was really coined to describe the specific mixture of puzzles, gameplay, and narrative that made the Beast experience different from BWP, so I understand where Adam was coming from. In that regard, things like BWP, Masquerade, Tristam Shandy, etc., don't really apply despite coming before The Beast and clearly informing the Beast on some level, the way all earlier works ultimately influence what comes next, right? I would argue that the $240+ million worldwide gross of Blair Witch proved it could work well before The Beast came along, however, as we didn't have proven box office names like Steven Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick to motivate people to see the film! Mike --- Mike Monello Partner, Campfire 62 White Street, 3E New York, NY 10013 212-612-9600 http://www.campfirenyc.com On 1/13/09 3:02 PM, "Adam Martin" wrote: 2009/1/13 Brooke Thompson : > There are so many other milestones we could use other than "almost 8 years > after the Beast..." - what about "with the 10th anniversary of Blair Witch > upon us..." or "15 years after Publius Enigma...". I was interested in what people thought of the recent era where we've seen an especially big proliferation of new ARGs, and the proliferation of particularly strong communities (i.e. ones that have persisted beyond the end of the ARG's that inspired them) for playing, studying, and inventing them. I do believe it did some unique things - such as inspiring people to believe that ARGs could work, and showing them how, in a way that other projects didn't, and at a time when Majestic had freshly crashed and burned - but I wasn't trying to imply that it was the first or most important of the ARGs. I'm sorry if it sounded that way. Adam _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From brooke at mirlandano.com Tue Jan 13 16:41:15 2009 From: brooke at mirlandano.com (Brooke Thompson) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 16:41:15 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Jan 13, 2009, at 4:00 PM, Mike Monello wrote: > Blair Witch was an interactive transmedia narrative, it had a > massive world-wide community (that is still very much active today > on fansites around the world since 1998, but (correct me if I am > wrong), the term ARG was really coined to describe the specific > mixture of puzzles, gameplay, and narrative that made the Beast > experience different from BWP, so I understand where Adam was coming > from. I suppose my issue (which isn't with Adam or even the question) is that there has been resistance to coming up with a definition to the term and, without a definition, how can we say that something is an ARG, let alone look at early examples or talk about what may have inspired those examples. I understand that we don't want to lock an ARG into being a certain something in order to avoid stifling creativity, but the result is that now a pillow fight in a park or character blog for a television show are as much of an ARG as the Beast was. And, if a flash mob a park is an ARG, then why wouldn't Hands Across America would be one. And, if a character blog is an ARG, than Blair Witch most definitely was. "I can't define it, but I'll know it when I see it" isn't working and we wind up with presentations on how to pitch your experience as a story game because, well, it's a story and a game and that leaves you wind open to creating anything you want! It could be the next flash mob or MMORPG, but goshdarnit, it's an ARG! As this is a Special Interest Group on Alternate Reality Games that is, apparently, filled with people that are experts on the genre and even we can't come to an understanding of what an ARG is, how can we meet the aims of the group which, I think, include promoting ARGs and sharing our knowledge about them. My other issue is that I really hate this issue but I keep banging my head against it anyway. From bclark at gmdstudios.com Tue Jan 13 16:59:26 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 16:59:26 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> I also hope I didn't imply I took any offense. Mike wrote: "the term ARG was really coined to describe the specific mixture of puzzles, gameplay, and narrative that made the Beast experience different from BWP" Let's be clear, though: the term was coined by Sean Stacey after the fact in attempt to describe a genre of experiences that would include The Beast and Majestic. That, though, is the way that genre labels tend to come about: they tend to be applied by the fans of the work after the fact (in contrast to "schools of art" where a definition is come up with between a group of artists practicing at the same time.) So as a label, I can only assume it was intended to be something broader than "experiences just like the Beast or inspired by the Beast" ... otherwise, it is extremely narrow term of art. Brooke wrote: "I understand that we don't want to lock an ARG into being a certain something in order to avoid stifling creativity" Eh. I don't really care if it is a narrow label or a broad label: it is the question of whether ARG is more like "rockabilly" or more like "rock" -- if ARG is a narrow subset with very stringent requirements to meet that definition, it only begs the question of what the umbrella category is. If ARG is a big umbrella category, then there is plenty of room for lots of sub-labels inside of it to provide greater granularity. The armchair academic in me thinks the only real innovations in "ARG" as a useful label are that it is essentially a Internet age phenomenon (thus the "collective participation" qualities) and that it is a real-time performance instead of a media form (thus, it has a beginning and an end that is shared by all of the collective audience.) Does that leave room for lots of sub-flavors, some of which might even break those core rules? Sure. Brooke also wrote: " As this is a Special Interest Group on Alternate Reality Games that is, apparently, filled with people that are experts on the genre and even we can't come to an understanding of what an ARG is, how can we meet the aims of the group which, I think, include promoting ARGs and sharing our knowledge about them." I think that ship has already sailed, hasn't it? ARG is a fan-generated label, so as a creator I don't feel the need to be bound by it or to be responsible for defining it. I find myself not even using the term too much, because for MOST of the people in the world, it has come to mean "a form of viral marketing game promoting a product on the Internet." Not that I think that is a particularly good definition, and it is far far afield from what I think Sean Stacey was trying to describe. But at this point, it is as difficult to change the perception of as "viral marketing" (which I also don't believe means what most people think it means ... it has come to mean everything from a "tell-a-friend" feature to an ARG.) I'm totally post-ARG now :P -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Brooke Thompson Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 4:41 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast,which is your favourite ARG and why? On Jan 13, 2009, at 4:00 PM, Mike Monello wrote: > Blair Witch was an interactive transmedia narrative, it had a > massive world-wide community (that is still very much active today > on fansites around the world since 1998, but (correct me if I am > wrong), the term ARG was really coined to describe the specific > mixture of puzzles, gameplay, and narrative that made the Beast > experience different from BWP, so I understand where Adam was coming > from. I suppose my issue (which isn't with Adam or even the question) is that there has been resistance to coming up with a definition to the term and, without a definition, how can we say that something is an ARG, let alone look at early examples or talk about what may have inspired those examples. I understand that we don't want to lock an ARG into being a certain something in order to avoid stifling creativity, but the result is that now a pillow fight in a park or character blog for a television show are as much of an ARG as the Beast was. And, if a flash mob a park is an ARG, then why wouldn't Hands Across America would be one. And, if a character blog is an ARG, than Blair Witch most definitely was. "I can't define it, but I'll know it when I see it" isn't working and we wind up with presentations on how to pitch your experience as a story game because, well, it's a story and a game and that leaves you wind open to creating anything you want! It could be the next flash mob or MMORPG, but goshdarnit, it's an ARG! As this is a Special Interest Group on Alternate Reality Games that is, apparently, filled with people that are experts on the genre and even we can't come to an understanding of what an ARG is, how can we meet the aims of the group which, I think, include promoting ARGs and sharing our knowledge about them. My other issue is that I really hate this issue but I keep banging my head against it anyway. _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From dan at sixtostart.com Tue Jan 13 17:54:39 2009 From: dan at sixtostart.com (Dan Hon) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 22:54:39 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> References: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: <5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> I was half-way through responding to Brooke's post while this came in from Brian, which pretty much says what I wanted to say: On 13 Jan 2009, at 21:59, Brian Clark wrote: > Let's be clear, though: the term was coined by Sean Stacey after the > fact in > attempt to describe a genre of experiences that would include The > Beast and > Majestic. That, though, is the way that genre labels tend to come > about: > they tend to be applied by the fans of the work after the fact (in > contrast > to "schools of art" where a definition is come up with between a > group of > artists practicing at the same time.) So as a label, I can only > assume it > was intended to be something broader than "experiences just like the > Beast > or inspired by the Beast" ... otherwise, it is extremely narrow term > of art. From my point of view, though (and you kind of hint at this below) - it doesn't matter anymore, because *to most people* (ie everyone who's not on this mailing list), an ARG is what Brian says below: "a form of viral marketing game promoting a product on the Internet." and, honestly, best typified by an experience of the kind 42 Entertainment produces. So it doesn't matter what we think - everyone else has already decided. [snip stuff I agree with, particularly the umbrella term that's includes real-time performance and collective participation] Brooke also said: "I can't define it, but I'll know it when I see it" isn't working and we wind up with presentations on how to pitch your experience as a story game because, well, it's a story and a game and that leaves you wind open to creating anything you want! It could be the next flash mob or MMORPG, but goshdarnit, it's an ARG!" I should probably point out at this point that, with regard to the whole "story game" business: - we (at Six to Start) don't pitch what we do as "story games"; - nor do I seriously expect people to go around saying that they make "story games" just that, when it comes down to it, *some* of the things that ARGs[1] do, are combine great storytelling with gameplay[2], and that those two things (story, gameplay) are things that some ARGs have done incredibly well. One of the other things, not mentioned, was/is their native multi-platform-ness. We recently changed our What We Do page at work, and the reason why we re-wrote the text was that we increasingly didn't see ourselves as "an ARG company", but that was how most people (audience and clients and potential partners) saw us and were approaching us. What we saw at the same time, though, was that we were increasingly doing things that weren't what we've been calling "traditional ARGs". By "traditional ARG", I mean: * a live game, that unfolds over time and isn't replayable * probably client-led (as opposed to commission-led, and produced by an agency-style outfit where there isn't IP retention) * "content" that's unlockable by solving puzzles * played by lots of people at the same time, but not necessarily distinguishing between individual players I suspect that the position I'm holding here is incredibly close to Brian's - from my point of view, we just want to make cool things. Some of them are "ARG-like" *in the eye of the beholder*, but lots of them are not. More frequently than not, in fact, because they're not the right thing. I really can't stress this enough: the problem that I have with what ARG means as a label isn't what people who've been around for the last 8 years or so think about it, it's what *new* people think about it. And that's Brian's whole "viral marketing" point above. This is the way things work pretty much every other week when an agency calls up to brief us: - they'd like "an ARG" - we say: well, what do you think you want? - they say "Well, Year Zero / Dark Knight / ilovebees, please" - we say: that doesn't make much sense *in the context of what you want to do* - we think for a bit, and we come up with something else, in the context of: "look, games and play have lots of really interesting characteristics that can elicit certain kinds of behaviour, including engagement" as well as "oh look, so does good storytelling". - sometimes that shifts into service design (much more along the line of us designing things that are like Nike+) and sometimes it shifts into straight programme support or worldbuilding. Sometimes (though not so far) the most appropriate thing might even be a teenage amnesiac girl who needs your help on a worldwide treasure hunt. > Brooke also wrote: " As this is a Special Interest Group on Alternate > Reality Games that is, apparently, filled with people that are > experts on > the genre and even we can't come to an understanding of what an ARG > is, how > can we meet the aims of the group which, I think, include promoting > ARGs and > > sharing our knowledge about them." > > I think that ship has already sailed, hasn't it? ARG is a fan- > generated > label, so as a creator I don't feel the need to be bound by it or to > be > responsible for defining it. I find myself not even using the term > too much, > because for MOST of the people in the world, it has come to mean "a > form of > viral marketing game promoting a product on the Internet." Not that > I think > that is a particularly good definition, and it is far far afield > from what I > think Sean Stacey was trying to describe. But at this point, it is as > difficult to change the perception of as "viral marketing" (which I > also > don't believe means what most people think it means ... it has come > to mean > everything from a "tell-a-friend" feature to an ARG.) See above. This is how we describe what we do now, and how we've internally described what we do for the last year and and a half: "We invent and build new kinds of entertainment? ?new kinds of entertainment that are designed, from the start, to live on multiple platforms. For us, this has so far included alternate reality games, integrated on-and-offline experiences for theme parks, playful storytelling like We Tell Stories, or more game-like things, like our forthcoming production with Channel 4 (shh! It?s a secret!). Who knows what it might involve next, but everything we make reflects our joy in entertaining people through play and stories." > I'm totally post-ARG now :P > and I'm with you :) > > -----Original Message----- > From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org > ] On > Behalf Of Brooke Thompson > Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 4:41 PM > To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast,which > is your > favourite ARG and why? > > On Jan 13, 2009, at 4:00 PM, Mike Monello wrote: >> Blair Witch was an interactive transmedia narrative, it had a >> massive world-wide community (that is still very much active today >> on fansites around the world since 1998, but (correct me if I am >> wrong), the term ARG was really coined to describe the specific >> mixture of puzzles, gameplay, and narrative that made the Beast >> experience different from BWP, so I understand where Adam was coming >> from. > > I suppose my issue (which isn't with Adam or even the question) is > that there has been resistance to coming up with a definition to the > term and, without a definition, how can we say that something is an > ARG, let alone look at early examples or talk about what may have > inspired those examples. > > I understand that we don't want to lock an ARG into being a certain > something in order to avoid stifling creativity, but the result is > that now a pillow fight in a park or character blog for a television > show are as much of an ARG as the Beast was. And, if a flash mob a > park is an ARG, then why wouldn't Hands Across America would be one. > And, if a character blog is an ARG, than Blair Witch most definitely > was. > > "I can't define it, but I'll know it when I see it" isn't working and > we wind up with presentations on how to pitch your experience as a > story game because, well, it's a story and a game and that leaves you > wind open to creating anything you want! It could be the next flash > mob or MMORPG, but goshdarnit, it's an ARG! > > As this is a Special Interest Group on Alternate Reality Games that > is, apparently, filled with people that are experts on the genre and > even we can't come to an understanding of what an ARG is, how can we > meet the aims of the group which, I think, include promoting ARGs and > sharing our knowledge about them. > > My other issue is that I really hate this issue but I keep banging my > head against it anyway. > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From wendeth at wendydespain.com Tue Jan 13 19:08:38 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 16:08:38 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> References: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> <5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> Message-ID: Hmm. I didn't take this in the sense of "When was the golden age of ARGs?" so much as "What's the ARG canon? Is the last great ARG The Beast?" I'm very interested in the answer to that question, but I don't feel like I have anything to contribute to it. And I wonder if we'd get a different answer if we asked it in a more player-rich environment (vs. designers). Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From wendeth at wendydespain.com Tue Jan 13 19:10:04 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 16:10:04 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> <5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> Message-ID: <0ed70fcff77800d04a2b458da7a55202.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> I also meant to say that I don't think we have yet seen the golden age of ARGs, but I don't much care what word or phrase we use, as long as we can hold conversations about them and understand each other. Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Tue, January 13, 2009 4:08 pm, Wendy Despain wrote: > Hmm. > > I didn't take this in the sense of "When was the golden age of ARGs?" > so much as "What's the ARG canon? Is the last great ARG The Beast?" > I'm very interested in the answer to that question, but I don't feel > like I have anything to contribute to it. And I wonder if we'd get a > different answer if we asked it in a more player-rich environment (vs. > designers). > > Wendy Despain > quantumcontent.com > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From brooke at mirlandano.com Tue Jan 13 20:50:43 2009 From: brooke at mirlandano.com (Brooke Thompson) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 20:50:43 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> References: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> <5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> Message-ID: <30BD2659-5996-4ABF-99FD-8C46489E4EE5@mirlandano.com> On Jan 13, 2009, at 5:54 PM, Dan Hon wrote: and On 13 Jan 2009, at 21:59, Brian Clark wrote A whole bunch of stuff that I agree with. However, I also think that you're looking at it with more of an agency eye. Lately, the majority of assumptions that I'm getting are not "evil viral marketing" or "Dark Knight/Year Zero/I love Bees" but revolve around urban play. I assume that's because I've been talking to people more about urban play, mobile, and installation pieces than I have been about online marketing experiences. So, my question is, I guess, if we're in agreement that there's a heck of a lot more to ARGs than marketing and 42e-type experiences - and those are things that we're feeling drawn to play with, doesn't it behoove us to use the term in order to make it more clear what an ARG is? Or, do we just have to keep coming up with new meaningless phrases that we pretend have more meaning because it has more adequate descriptors in it, unless we just fall back on "ARG-like" I mean there's a heck of a lot more to ARGs than promotional work that includes an asian girl calling out for help to solve some cryptic mystery with esoteric puzzles ... and I don't think that makes them "ARG-like". From gmartin at myndcastmedia.com Wed Jan 14 01:07:56 2009 From: gmartin at myndcastmedia.com (G.C. Martin) Date: Tue, 13 Jan 2009 22:07:56 -0800 Subject: [arg_discuss] Intro Post Message-ID: <005c01c9760e$7c093e10$741bba30$@com> I am Principal of a new media consulting company called, Myndcast Media (http://myndcastmedia.wordpress.com). My interest in this space lies primarily with securing financing for Grassroots ARGs and other Transmedia experiences through independent financing and corporate brands. I have spent the last 15 years connecting major brands to media properties in the traditional (professional and collegiate sports teams/networks) and interactive (sports aggregation, video game online media publishing) spaces and am now interested in moving away from selling Cost per Thousands, Clicks, and Acquisitions and toward Cost per Engagement. From Markus.Montola at uta.fi Wed Jan 14 07:54:40 2009 From: Markus.Montola at uta.fi (Markus Montola) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 14:54:40 +0200 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <30BD2659-5996-4ABF-99FD-8C46489E4EE5@mirlandano.com> References: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> <5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> <30BD2659-5996-4ABF-99FD-8C46489E4EE5@mirlandano.com> Message-ID: <20090114145440.15033v7fyzj01ls0@imp2.uta.fi> My favourite ARG? Eagle Eye: Free Fall. I haven't played it, since I don't have an US phone number. I haven't even read a good walkthrough description, since Google didn't conjure me one. But hey -- an ARGlike experience that runs for 10 minutes, is reportedly fabulous and features an extremely strong connection to the movie it is supposed to promote? One that you can pick up when you want, not only in May-April 2002 if you followed a random meme? I'm in. (Also, it questions many assumptions regarding ARG -- such as the requirement of communality.) - Markus Montola (PS. If someone played it and would like to write a brief description on how it unfolds, I'd be curious. You can still play it, just google it and go. If you have an US phone number, that is.) From bclark at gmdstudios.com Wed Jan 14 08:27:10 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 08:27:10 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder><5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> Message-ID: <007301c9764b$cf089240$6801a8c0@Tricorder> Wendy wrote: "I didn't take this in the sense of "When was the golden age of ARGs?" so much as "What's the ARG canon? Is the last great ARG The Beast?" I'm very interested in the answer to that question, but I don't feel like I have anything to contribute to it." Really? Toss out a statement like that, but not interested in backing it up with discussion? If the "last great ARG" happened before the term was coined, I renew my suggestion that we should close this SIG as being somewhat irrelevant. Brian From bclark at gmdstudios.com Wed Jan 14 08:32:55 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 08:32:55 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <30BD2659-5996-4ABF-99FD-8C46489E4EE5@mirlandano.com> References: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder><5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> <30BD2659-5996-4ABF-99FD-8C46489E4EE5@mirlandano.com> Message-ID: <007401c9764c$9bffbb70$6801a8c0@Tricorder> Brooke wrote: "However, I also think that you're looking at it with more of an agency eye." I don't think so, I'm just looking at it from the combination of press coverage (including ARGN) and what Unfiction chooses to get involved in. I do totally get what you're saying, though, Brooke -- I guess I just feel that was a battle the community needed to take arms to in 2006 before the definition cemented or devolved. In practice, the semantics of ARG have become so broad and undefined that chickens probably can't be returned to the coop. A good example of that is Markus' suggestion of "Eagle Eye" as an ARG -- for me, something that you play by yourself on a cellphone in 10 minutes doesn't meet enough of the undefinitions of ARG. /shrug I've been in too many of those semantic wars over the last decade and a half: they are hard to make a dent in if you don't enter the fray until too late. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Brooke Thompson Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 8:51 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast,which is your favourite ARG and why? On Jan 13, 2009, at 5:54 PM, Dan Hon wrote: and On 13 Jan 2009, at 21:59, Brian Clark wrote A whole bunch of stuff that I agree with. However, I also think that you're looking at it with more of an agency eye. Lately, the majority of assumptions that I'm getting are not "evil viral marketing" or "Dark Knight/Year Zero/I love Bees" but revolve around urban play. I assume that's because I've been talking to people more about urban play, mobile, and installation pieces than I have been about online marketing experiences. So, my question is, I guess, if we're in agreement that there's a heck of a lot more to ARGs than marketing and 42e-type experiences - and those are things that we're feeling drawn to play with, doesn't it behoove us to use the term in order to make it more clear what an ARG is? Or, do we just have to keep coming up with new meaningless phrases that we pretend have more meaning because it has more adequate descriptors in it, unless we just fall back on "ARG-like" I mean there's a heck of a lot more to ARGs than promotional work that includes an asian girl calling out for help to solve some cryptic mystery with esoteric puzzles ... and I don't think that makes them "ARG-like". _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From morbus at disobey.com Wed Jan 14 08:49:16 2009 From: morbus at disobey.com (Morbus Iff) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 08:49:16 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <007401c9764c$9bffbb70$6801a8c0@Tricorder> References: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder><5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> <30BD2659-5996-4ABF-99FD-8C46489E4EE5@mirlandano.com> <007401c9764c$9bffbb70$6801a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: <496DED5C.60206@disobey.com> Above all, I prefer longevity and wealth of story. With that said, my favorite in most recent years has been Perplex City: * Cards to collect; I'm a heavy collector and packrat. * Lots of story available. Not all of it was "mysterious". * Lasted a long time. If I look at current-day "ARGs", the only one (I know of) that matches would be Scholastic's The 39 Clues, which shares much the same bullets: 10 books, 2 years, 355+ cards, and /tons/ of online content. There's so much content that I still haven't gone through it all yet. I love it. And yeah, it's aimed for 6 to 14 year olds. Oh well. A lot of the problem I have with most ARGs is they're too mysterious to start out with. It's hard for me to "solve a puzzle because it's there", when there's no contextual reason on /why/ I should (and "I'm missing!" or "I need your help!" is irrelevant when I have no clue who the characters are who are pleaing for help). If I want to "solve a puzzle because it's there", I'll buy a GAMES Magazine. If I want to play an ARG, I want the AR before I get the G. Of course, "wealth of story" can backfire. The Halo 3 ARG was neat for a bit, but quickly became an elitist adventure where you had to have read the books to really "get it" (since when do toting FPSers read books?). FTLR was neat for a bit, but I hated the foreign language aspects of it all. The Cloverfield stuff was great (but that's primarily because I've had a hard-on for kaiju eiga forever). -- Morbus Iff ( accept no prostitutes ) Technical: http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/779 Enjoy: http://www.disobey.com/ and http://www.videounderbelly.com/ aim: akaMorbus / skype: morbusiff / icq: 2927491 / jabber.org: morbus From andrhia at gmail.com Wed Jan 14 10:16:44 2009 From: andrhia at gmail.com (Andrea A. Phillips) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 10:16:44 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <456990FC-F680-4118-9064-96549C0DAC10@gmail.com> Well! This has certainly turned into an interesting discussion. I thought about this definitions problem, again, and last night had a manic session making Venn diagrams to show myself why exactly we can't seem to agree on what exactly an ARG is, which I then turned into kind of an epic blog post: http://www.deusexmachinatio.com/deus_ex_machinatio/2009/01/wtf-is-an-arg-2009-edition.html Basically I come down on the side of "many of us intuitively feel ARGs are a subset of some other thing, but we don't have a name for that thing so we use 'ARG' anyway." But to get back to the actual topic of the week... my most favorite ARGs. Obviously Perplex City is my most, most favorite. But that has little to do with the game itself, and a lot to do with the incredible lovefest collaboration process that brought it to life. I wish everybody could have a creative experience like that one day. I also find it hard to play games, post-Beast. I observe them, and I've tried to play several, but it just isn't there for me anymore. I've gone over to the other side, and for me at least, there's no going back. And even if I were a heavy player, it's difficult for me to pick favorites of anything. I love *all* of them, why do I have to love one *more*?! But there are tons of games/experiences/projects/cool-stuff-on-the- internet that I've learned from, and that heavily inform my sensibilities. The most ARG-like of those would be, in no particular order: Art of the Heist; Year Zero; Cathy's Book; True Blood; Cloverfield; Eagle Eye Freefall; We Tell Stories; Young Bond; The Dark Knight; World Without Oil. Some of these arguably aren't ARGs, and all of them are professional. That's not to say there haven't been some fantastic grassroots games -- I know for a fact there have been. They just haven't entered the scope of stuff-that-heavily-influences-my-thinking, for whatever reason. -- Andrea Phillips http://www.deusexmachinatio.com Words * Culture * Interaction From mmonello at campfirenyc.com Wed Jan 14 10:58:11 2009 From: mmonello at campfirenyc.com (Mike Monello) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 07:58:11 -0800 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <456990FC-F680-4118-9064-96549C0DAC10@gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/14/09 10:16 AM, "Andrea Phillips" wrote: http://www.deusexmachinatio.com/deus_ex_machinatio/2009/01/wtf-is-an-arg-2009-edition.html Nice post, Andrea, but I've got take issue with one detail and your conclusion. First, the detail: you state that Blair Witch didn't offer audience volition or puzzles, but that is not true - it's a common misunderstanding of many people who's experience of BW comes second hand, probably through reading. This is one misconception I'll be addressing soon in my series of blog articles, but for the record, Blair Witch had a great deal of audience volition. Much of the back story details of BW were fleshed out through the dialog between the BW community and ourselves. While the outcome was pre-determined (as in Choose your own adventures and many ARGs, the path we took to get there and what we created to fill out the story was informed by the community. People launched fan investigative sites and became characters in the larger BW myth, some of them even ended up in the 1 hour sci fi channel special that is part of the experience. As for puzzles, well it did not have traditional puzzles, and I don't equate with gameplay, but we did have many game like elements in the experience, including hiding pages of Heather's hand written journal throughout the site and not making them live until the audience discovered them. Remember that the Blair Witch community and experience existed for 15 months before the movie was released theatrically. A LOT happened in that time, and most of it has never really been documented, as there wasn't the kind of attention paid to what was happening with online entertainment that existed even a year later, when we did Freakylinks ( http://www.haxan.com/portfolio-of-past-work/ ), for example, or the year after that, when The Beast happened. That being said, I wouldn't call Blair Witch an ARG! ;) As for the semantics and definition issue (and I'm sorry I brought it up again), I'm not interested in redefining ARG. I agree with Brian's assessment that the definition is in place and changing the perception of it at this point is fruitless. I am interested in a broader term that embraces a larger subset of experiences. But I disagree with you that all this discussion is just wanking. You might only be concerned with whether something is fun or not, but if you want someone to put up some money to pay you to make it, then you better be prepared to explain it, define it, and defend it from all the other definitions and buzz out there surrounding it. Mike --- Mike Monello Partner, Campfire 62 White Street, 3E New York, NY 10013 212-612-9600 http://www.campfirenyc.com From andrhia at gmail.com Wed Jan 14 11:24:27 2009 From: andrhia at gmail.com (Andrea A. Phillips) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 11:24:27 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com> On Jan 14, 2009, at 10:58 AM, Mike Monello wrote: > > Nice post, Andrea, but I've got take issue with one detail and your > conclusion. First, the detail: you state that Blair Witch didn't > offer audience volition or puzzles, but that is not true - it's a > common misunderstanding of many people who's experience of BW comes > second hand, probably through reading. This is one misconception > I'll be addressing soon in my series of blog articles, but for the > record, Blair Witch had a great deal of audience volition. Aw, shucks. Lucky for me I've come to terms with the idea that when I talk about somebody else's work, I will *always get it wrong* ;) Please link us up here when you do all of this writing about Blair Witch -- I feel like it would be incredibly educational to get a good post-mortem out of it. > As for puzzles, well it did not have traditional puzzles, and I > don't equate with gameplay, but we did have many game like elements > in the experience, including hiding pages of Heather's hand written > journal throughout the site and not making them live until the > audience discovered them. Hmm. I might consider that story archaeology, though. I guess it depends on what you mean by "hidden pages," and how players went about finding them. Puzzles are one of those flash-point disagreements in the definition debate, anyway. > Remember that the Blair Witch community and experience existed for > 15 months before the movie was released theatrically. A LOT happened > in that time, and most of it has never really been documented, as > there wasn't the kind of attention paid to what was happening with > online entertainment that existed even a year later, when we did > Freakylinks ( http://www.haxan.com/portfolio-of-past-work/ ), for > example, or the year after that, when The Beast happened. I'd considered making another condition, that being a galvanized community of players dedicated to going through the experience together. I didn't include that, though, because that's got more to do with how the project is accepted by the public than how it's designed. As I understand, Freakylinks DID have such a community, and Blair Witch had bunches (small groups dedicated to "unraveling the mystery.") Did it have cast/world interaction at all? ;) > But I disagree with you that all this discussion is just wanking. > You might only be concerned with whether something is fun or not, > but if you want someone to put up some money to pay you to make it, > then you better be prepared to explain it, define it, and defend it > from all the other definitions and buzz out there surrounding it. Well, yeah, you're right that when you want somebody to open their wallet, you need to be able to explain what they're buying. My intuition is that you can do that a lot better and faster if you don't say 'ARG,' though. If the client comes to you saying 'ARG,' you're going to have to ask them to clarify no mater what. But hey, if you have a client coming to you asking you for ANY creative work -- an ad campaign, a sculpture, whatever -- you'll be having a similar conversation. It's just a part of the process, and it doesn't mean that we don't have enough consensus on what 'sculpture' means. Still, I'm not in the trenches pitching stuff; somebody else will surely correct me on this. (See above: always wrong when talking about somebody else's work!) But myy accusation of wankery really revolves more around the stuff like, "Well, but was (X) an ARG? Should (Y) be considered the first ARG?" Where X and Y are usually things that hit some of those criteria I pulled out of thin air, but not all of them. It reaches a kind of strange reductive point where people can bring out an example of anything that meets one or two of those elements - epistolary novels and MUDs very often -- and say "Well, but then was THIS an ARG?" The thing is, not one of those elements is a novel invention. As for whether the combination of several of them together rises to the level of a novel invention... well... that just gets us back into more semantics arguments, I think. -- Andrea Phillips http://www.deusexmachinatio.com Words * Culture * Interaction From mmonello at campfirenyc.com Wed Jan 14 11:40:52 2009 From: mmonello at campfirenyc.com (Mike Monello) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 08:40:52 -0800 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/14/09 11:24 AM, "Andrea Phillips" wrote: But hey, if you have a client coming to you asking you for ANY creative work -- an ad campaign, a sculpture, whatever -- you'll be having a similar conversation. If the client is coming to you then you have no issue at all! But if your work is being lumped into the commonly accepted definition of "ARG" then you'll only get clients coming to you who want an "ARG" and the truth is, most clients don't need an ARG at all. Put it this way - if a client thinks they know what an ARG is, based on the commonly accepted definition, and they don't think they need an ARG, then why do they pick up the phone and call you, or agree to a meeting with you, if all your work is, in their minds, painted by that ARG brush? This is what I see when I read posts like Dan's explaining why they don't call themselves ARG creators, or why Brian prefers Experience Design, and why I'm perfectly happy to have most Campfire's narrative projects be perceived as "not-ARGs" even if they hit all but 1 or 2 of the major touchpoints that people consider to be ARGs. It's easy to move someone to your side in a conversation, but it's getting to that conversation that is affected by the definition and meaning of the term, whether your funding comes from clients or investors or anyone else. --- Mike Monello Partner, Campfire 62 White Street, 3E New York, NY 10013 212-612-9600 http://www.campfirenyc.com From brooke at mirlandano.com Wed Jan 14 12:26:09 2009 From: brooke at mirlandano.com (Brooke Thompson) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 12:26:09 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com> References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 14, 2009, at 11:24 AM, Andrea A. Phillips wrote: > But myy accusation of wankery really revolves more around the stuff > like, "Well, but was (X) an ARG? Should (Y) be considered the first > ARG?" Where X and Y are usually things that hit some of those > criteria I pulled out of thin air, but not all of them. It reaches a > kind of strange reductive point where people can bring out an > example of anything that meets one or two of those elements - > epistolary novels and MUDs very often -- and say "Well, but then was > THIS an ARG?" As I was the only person to make such statements yesterday, then I guess, I'm the wanker. I have no problem with that. It's an extremely helpful exercise if you look at as more than just wankery. It's in those discussions that I learn more about what draws people to ARG-like things (whether it's playing them, designing them, or producing them) and, as the discussion has occurred regularly for about 7 years now, it's really interesting to see how that has changed over the years which actually lets me see some trends. Sure, it's a small sample size (I only got ~40 responses to my "what was the first ARG?" inquiries yesterday) but it's still quite informative. I learned of a number projects that I had no awareness of before yesterday - 3 or 4 of them from the early 1900s which are completely fascinating from the subject matter to the intent to the reaction. I had a very enjoyable conversation about public play in the 70s and the similarities and differences to public play today - it even resulted in a potential collaboration as we'd like to explore some of the things that were done in the late 60s and early 70s with the added influence of some modern technology. So, yeah, it may be wankery to look at long out of print books or some bizarre elementary school playground game and discuss if and how it fits into the landscape of ARGs/ARG-like things but is there anything wrong with that if it's a fascinating discussion that has the potential to make us better designers? I don't think so. Plus, now I've got a half a dozen new items on both my to read and to play lists that I'm quite eager to get to. So, in my experience, it's been anything but reductive. In fact, it's expanded my knowledge and understanding considerably over the years. From mj_williams at mac.com Wed Jan 14 12:36:55 2009 From: mj_williams at mac.com (mj williams) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 17:36:55 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Strong Agree! As someone whose worked for both digital ad agencies as a creative seeking to sell games in, and as a producer/designer for a broadcaster, I'm afraid to say something of a consensus has emerged. ARGs - as recent history has defined them - aren't right; that they haven't worked. That, dare I say it, they're dead... You know, I wonder if ARGs have served their purpose. Maybe they've just been something really interesting on the way? They've introduced the idea of a very explicit sort of game play, that requires high engagement from its participants and unites gameplay and storyteling in a whole new way, but they really aren't for everyone. They've been part of an explosion of how and where and why we play games and given rise to some sterling moments, but is it maybe a onetime only? On the plus side, what anyone holding a jar with money in it now knows is that games can mean anything - not that you can just badge a penguin-lobbing game clone with your brand and say you made a game. There is so much more you can do. Something Andrea said really cut through: the fact that she has struggled to play any ARG since the Beast clairifed my own experience: I spent one afternoon absolutely lost, completely *in heaven*, wandering through the BWP. The way people talk about the Beast (which I missed) It sounds like the same thing: we all had one singularly powerful opening experience into the idea of game-and-story in combination. Anything I've engaged with since just hasn't done it in the same way, sad to say (but props for trying to We tell stories, World without Oil and Cloverfield) So maybe it was all about seeing the idea for the first time and comprehending how much fun play, undefined, can be. -- mj williams | www.bushofgoats.com | mj_williams at mac.com | +44(0)7971 004821 On 14 Jan 2009, at 16:40, Mike Monello wrote: > On 1/14/09 11:24 AM, "Andrea Phillips" wrote: > > But hey, if you have a client coming to you asking you for ANY > creative work -- an ad campaign, a sculpture, whatever -- you'll be > having a similar conversation. > > If the client is coming to you then you have no issue at all! But if > your work is being lumped into the commonly accepted definition of > "ARG" then you'll only get clients coming to you who want an "ARG" > and the truth is, most clients don't need an ARG at all. > > Put it this way - if a client thinks they know what an ARG is, based > on the commonly accepted definition, and they don't think they need > an ARG, then why do they pick up the phone and call you, or agree to > a meeting with you, if all your work is, in their minds, painted by > that ARG brush? > > This is what I see when I read posts like Dan's explaining why they > don't call themselves ARG creators, or why Brian prefers Experience > Design, and why I'm perfectly happy to have most Campfire's > narrative projects be perceived as "not-ARGs" even if they hit all > but 1 or 2 of the major touchpoints that people consider to be ARGs. > > It's easy to move someone to your side in a conversation, but it's > getting to that conversation that is affected by the definition and > meaning of the term, whether your funding comes from clients or > investors or anyone else. > > --- > Mike Monello > Partner, Campfire > 62 White Street, 3E > New York, NY 10013 > 212-612-9600 > http://www.campfirenyc.com > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From Bryan.Alexander at nitle.org Wed Jan 14 12:58:42 2009 From: Bryan.Alexander at nitle.org (Bryan Alexander) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 12:58:42 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes In-Reply-To: References: <496B93FF.4060207@shuttleworthfoundation.org><8fc5b2700901121122h4bd6ba3eu9d0ca57b738ed13f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67801087A54@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> Coming in late to the conversation: I share Wendy's delight for the learning-play combination. I also agree with Adam's point about transferrable learning between games. There's some scholarship on this (James Paul Gee; Harry Brown; Consance Steinkuhler; the Selfe and Hawisher anthology). One of the hard parts, though, is helping students see such transfers as possible. Academic boundaries block this in many ways, and not just on gaming's learning. So does academia's disdain for gaming. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Adam Martin Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 2:21 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes 2009/1/12 Nathan Mishler : > It's possible. > > There's a problem with the thought that there are Games and then there are > Educational Games. Many people think that only learning comes out of games > that are specifically designed to teach. The thing is, ALL games teach. Yep, so ... > Granted, much of what entertainment games teach is not useful or applicable > in any form in the real world. Okay, you learned how to avoid the alien's > attacks on level 8. That is very specialized knowledge. ... I disagree that what you learn from a shmup is to "avoid the alien's attacks on level 8" :). I believe that with any good game you learn more transferable skills than you ever learn sepcialized ones. For instance, someone said to me recently that Tetris teaches mostly "how to pack objects in a box with no wasted space". Nah ... it teaches you a bunch of things much more than that, each related to the actual gameplay mechanics, such as "mentally rotate any object in 2D with a low degree of error when it comes to accidental reflection" (the game gives you L pieces upside-down for their most common use-case, forcing you to mentally rotate them before deciding where to position them). It takes some effort to work out what a game is *really* teaching, and in my experience it is very rare for either professionals or education researchers to do that, in detail. Among professionals it seems there's a widespread (b belief that the deep, highly transferrable skills are there - and often in much greater number than people suspect - but few of them have ever done the analyses themselves. > > ARGs on the other hand tend to involve more "real world" knowledge, using > things that people already know (or can learn) as part of their puzzles. > They also tend to encourage players to go out into the world and doing this > learning on their own. With ARGs I think you'd have to start by breaking out the highly differentiated classes of players, from the problems solvers to the forum lurkers to the researchers to the group-organizers ... Etc ... And look at the different sets of experiences each was going through. The overall journey/game experience for each kind of player is usually very very different - often they don't even experience the same content, or even the same narrative (many people get different subsets of the narrative) That said, I think it would be much easier to just embed traditional learning inside traditional ARGs, capitalising on how readily they absorb and link other media. As I understand it, that's what most of the educational ARGs have done to date (and in some cases done very successfully?) It may not be optimal, nor work as exceptionally well as a fully integrated learning experience+ARG might, but IMHO it would already be a big improvement on the educational tools we currently have in this area, and so it's very worthwhile in it's own right. Adam _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From andrhia at gmail.com Wed Jan 14 13:01:06 2009 From: andrhia at gmail.com (Andrea A. Phillips) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:01:06 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com> Message-ID: <512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com> On Jan 14, 2009, at 12:26 PM, Brooke Thompson wrote: > On Jan 14, 2009, at 11:24 AM, Andrea A. Phillips wrote: > >> But myy accusation of wankery really revolves more around the stuff >> like, "Well, but was (X) an ARG? Should (Y) be considered the first >> ARG?" Where X and Y are usually things that hit some of those >> criteria I pulled out of thin air, but not all of them. It reaches >> a kind of strange reductive point where people can bring out an >> example of anything that meets one or two of those elements - >> epistolary novels and MUDs very often -- and say "Well, but then >> was THIS an ARG?" > > > As I was the only person to make such statements yesterday, then I > guess, I'm the wanker. I have no problem with that. It bears pointing out, Brooke, that out of all of us... I'm the one who spent four hours making charts and writing up a post on the topic. ;) And I don't refer to the conversation of yesterday *in specific.* This is just the latest iteration of a well-worn conversation. > It's an extremely helpful exercise if you look at as more than just > wankery. *Cutting lots of v. good points about learning stuff.* Yeah, the conversation often winds up shining light on some really interesting corners. No disagreement from this quarter. But we could just as easily frame it as "Hey, what are some interesting antecedents to ARGs?" and come up with similar results, without even bringing up what bucket any of it fits into. From wendeth at wendydespain.com Wed Jan 14 13:15:54 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 10:15:54 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <007301c9764b$cf089240$6801a8c0@Tricorder> References: <00d201c975ca$342519a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder><5BB49E8D-7077-41A7-8A52-180A192FEC1C@sixtostart.com> <007301c9764b$cf089240$6801a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: <9720a5fda01e7d83b68d746d4f446dc6.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> Hmm. Perhaps there's been some misunderstanding here. It's not that I'm not interested in backing up my statements, I just feel like other people have much more useful ideas to contribute. I'm in sponge-mode, and don't feel like my half-thought-out-ideas would really contribute anything useful to the conversation. For one thing, I don't even think of The Beast as a great ARG. I think of it as an important one, but not a great one. In fact, I'm not sure anyone - including myself - has yet created a great ARG. While some people are saying they're post-ARG or that ARGs are dead, I'm sitting here feeling like the art form has just barely begun to be born, and our greatness is yet to come. In my opinion, we won't see a truly great ARG for another ten years or so, as the kids who can't imagine a world without the Internet get into their 20's. This doesn't mean I'm going to give up and not even try. I'm going to do my best to push the medium in all the weird directions I think it can go, just to see what greatness can be uncovered. I'm loving being a part of an emerging artform. But this seems to be completely upside down and backwards from what everyone else on this list is saying. So I just don't know what I have to contribute to the conversation. Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Wed, January 14, 2009 5:27 am, Brian Clark wrote: > Wendy wrote: > > "I didn't take this in the sense of "When was the golden age of ARGs?" > so much as "What's the ARG canon? Is the last great ARG The Beast?" > I'm very interested in the answer to that question, but I don't feel > like I have anything to contribute to it." > > Really? Toss out a statement like that, but not interested in backing > it up with discussion? If the "last great ARG" happened before the > term was coined, I renew my suggestion that we should close this SIG > as being somewhat irrelevant. > > > Brian > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From scpeters at gmail.com Wed Jan 14 13:23:50 2009 From: scpeters at gmail.com (Steve Peters) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 10:23:50 -0800 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Strong Disagree! :) Year Zero for Nine Inch Nails and Why So Serious for The Dark Knight are, I daresay, just two examples of very recent "ARGs" that "worked," based on just about any traditional metrics (even though quantifying what the *real* measure of success is for any given ARG is a topic for another day). When they *don't* work (promotional ARGs, that is) is when the advertising cart gets put before the creative horse. When clients insist on using traditional metrics and methodologies over good storytelling and just plain fun. It then becomes tantamount to telling a filmmaker to just work hard on the trailer for his film, not the film itself, since it's all about creating buzz and getting butts in theater seats, not the experience once they're there. It is indeed possible to build an "ARG" experience that is both satisfying and fun, yet doesn't require a hardcore level of intense engagement from all of its participants; that has a low barrier to entry while still providing a non-watered-down experience. Build an experience that's rich and rewarding and made with care, craftsmanship and respect for those experiencing it, and just watch what happens. You won't need any Digg This buttons, that's for sure. Like Paul, ARGs (or *whatever* we call them individually) aren't dead. Those of us who make them and shape them and morph them and grow them know that for a fact. It's just our responsibility to be able to quantify and communicate what it is that they are, despite them not being quite what they were six months ago, whatever the heck that was. :) We're still at Kitty Hawk, guys. And despite the fact that future experiences will have fuselages of carbon fiber and on-board wifi and free drinks instead of two propellers and fabric wings...they'll still fly! And someday soon we'll be able to found our own airlines that don't depend on us plastering billboards on the sides of the jets to pay for the fuel! :) On 1/14/09 9:36 AM, "mj williams" wrote: > Strong Agree! > As someone whose worked for both digital ad agencies as a creative > seeking to sell games in, and as a producer/designer for a > broadcaster, I'm afraid to say something of a consensus has emerged. > ARGs - as recent history has defined them - aren't right; that they > haven't worked. That, dare I say it, they're dead... > > You know, I wonder if ARGs have served their purpose. Maybe they've > just been something really interesting on the way? > They've introduced the idea of a very explicit sort of game play, > that requires high engagement from its participants and unites > gameplay and storyteling in a whole new way, but they really aren't > for everyone. They've been part of an explosion of how and where and > why we play games and given rise to some sterling moments, but is it > maybe a onetime only? > On the plus side, what anyone holding a jar with money in it now knows > is that games can mean anything - not that you can just badge a > penguin-lobbing game clone with your brand and say you made a game. > There is so much more you can do. > > Something Andrea said really cut through: the fact that she has > struggled to play any ARG since the Beast clairifed my own experience: > I spent one afternoon absolutely lost, completely *in heaven*, > wandering through the BWP. The way people talk about the Beast (which > I missed) It sounds like the same thing: we all had one singularly > powerful opening experience into the idea of game-and-story in > combination. > Anything I've engaged with since just hasn't done it in the same way, > sad to say (but props for trying to We tell stories, World without Oil > and Cloverfield) > > So maybe it was all about seeing the idea for the first time and > comprehending how much fun play, undefined, can be. > > > > > -- > > mj williams > | www.bushofgoats.com > | mj_williams at mac.com > | +44(0)7971 004821 > > > From brooke at mirlandano.com Wed Jan 14 13:33:37 2009 From: brooke at mirlandano.com (Brooke Thompson) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:33:37 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com> References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com> <512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 14, 2009, at 1:01 PM, Andrea A. Phillips wrote: > Yeah, the conversation often winds up shining light on some really > interesting corners. No disagreement from this quarter. But we could > just as easily frame it as "Hey, what are some interesting > antecedents to ARGs?" and come up with similar results, without even > bringing up what bucket any of it fits into. I, slightly, disagree. I think when you ask "what was the first arg" you learn not only what the person thinks might be the first ARG (or what they're willing to argue for that day), but also what specific components they're looking at to define "ARG" as well as how broadly and narrowly they define it. For example, the broadest answers when I asked this yesterday were "when the first caveman told his first story" (obviously story must be the important draw to the two people that gave this answer) and "when Thespis stepped out of the chorus and did his own thang" (they expanded by saying that it was "certainly an innovative way to tell an immersive narrative" - so we've got innovation, immersion, and narrative from their answer). Now, if you asked about antecedents, those same broad answers may have come up, but without the primary assumption of "first ARG" which may give you a lot of great answers but it won't give you as much of a clue as to what they're looking at as a primary element. Another person said "Lockjaw - that's when the phrase was coined" - the last time I had this discussion with them, they argued, fairly persuasively, for The Cottingley Fairy hoax. So, yesterday's answer showed an unwillingness to define things, even though they definitely have an answer. This shows the trend of not wanting to define the genre. If I had asked for antecedents, I'd have definitely gotten The Cottingley Fairies (and who knows what else) which wouldn't show the unwillingness to define (or, maybe, a desire to use the definition only for experiences after the term was coined). From martine at kezos.com Wed Jan 14 13:41:11 2009 From: martine at kezos.com (Martine Parry) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 18:41:11 -0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] Where ARGs are used? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Hi - Where are ARGs used in the main? I'm interested in taking a 'story-telling' line to various clients but unsure which sectors or markets are receptive and want to use ARGs. Can you help? MARTINE www.applygroup.com From andrhia at gmail.com Wed Jan 14 13:46:33 2009 From: andrhia at gmail.com (Andrea A. Phillips) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:46:33 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs In-Reply-To: References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com> <512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com> Message-ID: <9B3E51F6-FC4E-42B4-801C-CC91BA55850D@gmail.com> Brooke has pointed out that the conversation the last day or so has come up with a lot of stuff that are of interest to ARG developers, whether or not they could be qualified as ARGs themselves. And wouldn't you know, we do actually have a place in the SIG Wiki to record information like this, which was completely blank up until about *checks watch* two minutes ago: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Antecedents_to_ARGs If anybody feels like spreading the love and the knowledge, that would be a *most excellent* place to do it! -- Andrea Phillips http://www.deusexmachinatio.com Words * Culture * Interaction From mmonello at campfirenyc.com Wed Jan 14 14:05:11 2009 From: mmonello at campfirenyc.com (Mike Monello) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 11:05:11 -0800 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On 1/14/09 1:23 PM, "Steve Peters" wrote: Strong Disagree! :) I don't believe mj was saying that ARGs don't work, but that there is some sort of consensus beginning to emerge amongst people on the peripheral (i.e. Clients, journalists) that ARG's don't work, too difficult, no ROI, etc. I believe that observation is true. Anyone who actually believes that ARGs don't work probably isn't on this list! Steve you are right about metrics, but the truth is clients don't care about fun and creativity, and in the end, that's OUR job, not theirs. But figuring out which metrics and how to measure is essential, and there is plenty of data to prove the point. Art of the H3ist cost about 1/2 what Audi spent on a model launch the previous year and drove significantly more dealer leads. If you know which traditional metrics you want to move the needle on, it's fairly simple to design the program to do that and still be creatively interesting and fun for people to play. And I love this: On 1/14/09 1:23 PM, "Steve Peters" wrote: We're still at Kitty Hawk, guys. And despite the fact that future experiences will have fuselages of carbon fiber and on-board wifi and free drinks instead of two propellers and fabric wings...they'll still fly! And someday soon we'll be able to found our own airlines that don't depend on us plastering billboards on the sides of the jets to pay for the fuel! :) --- Mike Monello Partner, Campfire 62 White Street, 3E New York, NY 10013 212-612-9600 http://www.campfirenyc.com From mmonello at campfirenyc.com Wed Jan 14 14:09:20 2009 From: mmonello at campfirenyc.com (Mike Monello) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 11:09:20 -0800 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On 1/14/09 2:05 PM, "Michael Monello" wrote: I don't believe mj was saying that ARGs don't work, but that there is some sort of consensus beginning to emerge amongst people on the peripheral (i.e. Clients, journalists) that ARG's don't work, too difficult, no ROI, etc. I believe that observation is true. Errr, let me clarify - I agree that there is a perception issue, and I disagree with that perception! Yikes, I need some caffeine. Or bourbon. --- Mike Monello Partner, Campfire 62 White Street, 3E New York, NY 10013 212-612-9600 http://www.campfirenyc.com From dan at sixtostart.com Wed Jan 14 14:10:51 2009 From: dan at sixtostart.com (Dan Hon) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 19:10:51 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6366A964-FAA3-4641-ABD7-D482C343303D@sixtostart.com> > > Yikes, I need some caffeine. Or bourbon. Or both :) Dan From bclark at gmdstudios.com Wed Jan 14 14:21:17 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 14:21:17 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <002001c9767d$467593b0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Mike wrote: "Steve you are right about metrics, but the truth is clients don't care about fun and creativity, and in the end, that's OUR job, not theirs." You've got the worm biting its own tail there, though, Monello. If someone comes to one of us for a marketing campaign, then they came to us for a marketing campaign. Ipso facto: AOTH was designed around marketing efforts, but BWP wasn't (it was repurposed for marketing efforts), in much the same way "Nothing So Strange" was but very different than "Freakylinks" was. Conversely, EE is conceptualized around product development goals, with nothing to market yet at all, but all five of those examples share design and engagement methodologies. It begs the question, does the label "ARG" describe the design and engagement methodologies ... which, to me at least, is a very different question than "are all five of those ARGs"? -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Mike Monello Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 2:05 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? On 1/14/09 1:23 PM, "Steve Peters" wrote: Strong Disagree! :) I don't believe mj was saying that ARGs don't work, but that there is some sort of consensus beginning to emerge amongst people on the peripheral (i.e. Clients, journalists) that ARG's don't work, too difficult, no ROI, etc. I believe that observation is true. Anyone who actually believes that ARGs don't work probably isn't on this list! Steve you are right about metrics, but the truth is clients don't care about fun and creativity, and in the end, that's OUR job, not theirs. But figuring out which metrics and how to measure is essential, and there is plenty of data to prove the point. Art of the H3ist cost about 1/2 what Audi spent on a model launch the previous year and drove significantly more dealer leads. If you know which traditional metrics you want to move the needle on, it's fairly simple to design the program to do that and still be creatively interesting and fun for people to play. And I love this: On 1/14/09 1:23 PM, "Steve Peters" wrote: We're still at Kitty Hawk, guys. And despite the fact that future experiences will have fuselages of carbon fiber and on-board wifi and free drinks instead of two propellers and fabric wings...they'll still fly! And someday soon we'll be able to found our own airlines that don't depend on us plastering billboards on the sides of the jets to pay for the fuel! :) --- Mike Monello Partner, Campfire 62 White Street, 3E New York, NY 10013 212-612-9600 http://www.campfirenyc.com _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From wendeth at wendydespain.com Wed Jan 14 14:21:36 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 11:21:36 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <44007a57a720d357c073c877dbe3f566.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> I think the marketing world goes through cycles. They latch on to the latest, greatest thing and build up buzzwords. For a while, if you're not doing that buzzword, you're just not keeping up. Then they all reject that buzzword, saying it was never as great as everyone thought it was and they need to innovate. Then they cast around for a new buzzword to latch onto. After a while, the core elements of the original buzzword becomes just another tool in their toolbox, but that takes a while. Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Wed, January 14, 2009 11:09 am, Mike Monello wrote: > > > > On 1/14/09 2:05 PM, "Michael Monello" > wrote: > > > I don't believe mj was saying that ARGs don't work, but that there is > some sort of consensus beginning to emerge amongst people on the > peripheral (i.e. Clients, journalists) that ARG's don't work, too > difficult, no ROI, etc. I believe that observation is true. > > Errr, let me clarify - I agree that there is a perception issue, and I > disagree with that perception! > > Yikes, I need some caffeine. Or bourbon. > > --- > Mike Monello > Partner, Campfire > 62 White Street, 3E > New York, NY 10013 > 212-612-9600 > http://www.campfirenyc.com > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From bclark at gmdstudios.com Wed Jan 14 14:37:30 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 14:37:30 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <44007a57a720d357c073c877dbe3f566.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> References: <44007a57a720d357c073c877dbe3f566.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> Message-ID: <002b01c9767f$8ac8f640$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Yes, but by that time, you're a marketer's discarded buzzword and you need to find a new less-reviled label ... or to painfully reclaim the old one. How many of you tell people to visit your "homepage"? -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Wendy Despain Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 2:22 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? I think the marketing world goes through cycles. They latch on to the latest, greatest thing and build up buzzwords. For a while, if you're not doing that buzzword, you're just not keeping up. Then they all reject that buzzword, saying it was never as great as everyone thought it was and they need to innovate. Then they cast around for a new buzzword to latch onto. After a while, the core elements of the original buzzword becomes just another tool in their toolbox, but that takes a while. Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Wed, January 14, 2009 11:09 am, Mike Monello wrote: > > > > On 1/14/09 2:05 PM, "Michael Monello" > wrote: > > > I don't believe mj was saying that ARGs don't work, but that there is > some sort of consensus beginning to emerge amongst people on the > peripheral (i.e. Clients, journalists) that ARG's don't work, too > difficult, no ROI, etc. I believe that observation is true. > > Errr, let me clarify - I agree that there is a perception issue, and I > disagree with that perception! > > Yikes, I need some caffeine. Or bourbon. > > --- > Mike Monello > Partner, Campfire > 62 White Street, 3E > New York, NY 10013 > 212-612-9600 > http://www.campfirenyc.com > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From scarpegrosse at gmail.com Wed Jan 14 14:37:55 2009 From: scarpegrosse at gmail.com (Jackie) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 14:37:55 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <002001c9767d$467593b0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> References: <002001c9767d$467593b0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: <3fed77880901141137x5212bf2drd7286767ac767cae@mail.gmail.com> Brian Clark wrote: "It begs the question, does the label "ARG" describe the design and engagement methodologies ... which, to me at least, is a very different question than "are all five of those ARGs"?" Personally, I've been leaning in the direction of thinking of ARG as a Toolbox more than it's own subject. I don't think we're entirely at that point yet, but I think it's becoming easier to think of it as such. To draw my totally stupid analogy, 10 years ago, molecular biology was it's own subject matter. Currently, it's a set of tools used in every biological subject to tell stories about physiology. I'm starting to wonder if ARG might have a similar lifespan. Of course, as I say this, I'm quite comfortable with the idea that I might look back in a few years and decide that when I wrote this, I was farting out of my face. J On Wed, Jan 14, 2009 at 2:21 PM, Brian Clark wrote: > Mike wrote: "Steve you are right about metrics, but the truth is clients > don't care about fun and creativity, and in the end, that's OUR job, not > theirs." > > You've got the worm biting its own tail there, though, Monello. If someone > comes to one of us for a marketing campaign, then they came to us for a > marketing campaign. Ipso facto: AOTH was designed around marketing efforts, > but BWP wasn't (it was repurposed for marketing efforts), in much the same > way "Nothing So Strange" was but very different than "Freakylinks" was. > Conversely, EE is conceptualized around product development goals, with > nothing to market yet at all, but all five of those examples share design > and engagement methodologies. It begs the question, does the label "ARG" > describe the design and engagement methodologies ... which, to me at least, > is a very different question than "are all five of those ARGs"? > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] > On > Behalf Of Mike Monello > Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 2:05 PM > To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is > your favourite ARG and why? > > On 1/14/09 1:23 PM, "Steve Peters" wrote: > > Strong Disagree! :) > > I don't believe mj was saying that ARGs don't work, but that there is some > sort of consensus beginning to emerge amongst people on the peripheral > (i.e. > Clients, journalists) that ARG's don't work, too difficult, no ROI, etc. I > believe that observation is true. > > Anyone who actually believes that ARGs don't work probably isn't on this > list! > > Steve you are right about metrics, but the truth is clients don't care > about > fun and creativity, and in the end, that's OUR job, not theirs. But > figuring > out which metrics and how to measure is essential, and there is plenty of > data to prove the point. Art of the H3ist cost about 1/2 what Audi spent on > a model launch the previous year and drove significantly more dealer leads. > If you know which traditional metrics you want to move the needle on, it's > fairly simple to design the program to do that and still be creatively > interesting and fun for people to play. > > And I love this: > > On 1/14/09 1:23 PM, "Steve Peters" wrote: > > We're still at Kitty Hawk, guys. And despite the fact that future > experiences will have fuselages of carbon fiber and on-board wifi and free > drinks instead of two propellers and fabric wings...they'll still fly! > > And someday soon we'll be able to found our own airlines that don't depend > on us plastering billboards on the sides of the jets to pay for the fuel! > :) > > > --- > Mike Monello > Partner, Campfire > 62 White Street, 3E > New York, NY 10013 > 212-612-9600 > http://www.campfirenyc.com > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > -- http://stumble.intellinuts.com From bclark at gmdstudios.com Wed Jan 14 14:52:42 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 14:52:42 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <3fed77880901141137x5212bf2drd7286767ac767cae@mail.gmail.com> References: <002001c9767d$467593b0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> <3fed77880901141137x5212bf2drd7286767ac767cae@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <003301c97681$aa126200$6600a8c0@Tricorder> I think the difference between your two examples, though, is that ARG is largely a pastiche -- there just aren't that many "new" toolbox elements it brings to the party, instead it eager appropriates into its pastiche tools from boxes that traditionally had nothing to do with narrative or gameplay. Experience Design is similar: it accepts that it is borrowing from the rules of "best practice" in each of the experience types it appropriates from. I totally like your line of thinking and don't think you're farting out your face, but it seems that ARG is closer to "tell stories about physiology" in your comparative example. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Jackie Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 2:38 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast,which is your favourite ARG and why? Brian Clark wrote: "It begs the question, does the label "ARG" describe the design and engagement methodologies ... which, to me at least, is a very different question than "are all five of those ARGs"?" Personally, I've been leaning in the direction of thinking of ARG as a Toolbox more than it's own subject. I don't think we're entirely at that point yet, but I think it's becoming easier to think of it as such. To draw my totally stupid analogy, 10 years ago, molecular biology was it's own subject matter. Currently, it's a set of tools used in every biological subject to tell stories about physiology. I'm starting to wonder if ARG might have a similar lifespan. Of course, as I say this, I'm quite comfortable with the idea that I might look back in a few years and decide that when I wrote this, I was farting out of my face. J On Wed, Jan 14, 2009 at 2:21 PM, Brian Clark wrote: > Mike wrote: "Steve you are right about metrics, but the truth is clients > don't care about fun and creativity, and in the end, that's OUR job, not > theirs." > > You've got the worm biting its own tail there, though, Monello. If someone > comes to one of us for a marketing campaign, then they came to us for a > marketing campaign. Ipso facto: AOTH was designed around marketing efforts, > but BWP wasn't (it was repurposed for marketing efforts), in much the same > way "Nothing So Strange" was but very different than "Freakylinks" was. > Conversely, EE is conceptualized around product development goals, with > nothing to market yet at all, but all five of those examples share design > and engagement methodologies. It begs the question, does the label "ARG" > describe the design and engagement methodologies ... which, to me at least, > is a very different question than "are all five of those ARGs"? > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] > On > Behalf Of Mike Monello > Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 2:05 PM > To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is > your favourite ARG and why? > > On 1/14/09 1:23 PM, "Steve Peters" wrote: > > Strong Disagree! :) > > I don't believe mj was saying that ARGs don't work, but that there is some > sort of consensus beginning to emerge amongst people on the peripheral > (i.e. > Clients, journalists) that ARG's don't work, too difficult, no ROI, etc. I > believe that observation is true. > > Anyone who actually believes that ARGs don't work probably isn't on this > list! > > Steve you are right about metrics, but the truth is clients don't care > about > fun and creativity, and in the end, that's OUR job, not theirs. But > figuring > out which metrics and how to measure is essential, and there is plenty of > data to prove the point. Art of the H3ist cost about 1/2 what Audi spent on > a model launch the previous year and drove significantly more dealer leads. > If you know which traditional metrics you want to move the needle on, it's > fairly simple to design the program to do that and still be creatively > interesting and fun for people to play. > > And I love this: > > On 1/14/09 1:23 PM, "Steve Peters" wrote: > > We're still at Kitty Hawk, guys. And despite the fact that future > experiences will have fuselages of carbon fiber and on-board wifi and free > drinks instead of two propellers and fabric wings...they'll still fly! > > And someday soon we'll be able to found our own airlines that don't depend > on us plastering billboards on the sides of the jets to pay for the fuel! > :) > > > --- > Mike Monello > Partner, Campfire > 62 White Street, 3E > New York, NY 10013 > 212-612-9600 > http://www.campfirenyc.com > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > -- http://stumble.intellinuts.com _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From wendeth at wendydespain.com Wed Jan 14 14:54:42 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 11:54:42 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <002b01c9767f$8ac8f640$6600a8c0@Tricorder> References: <44007a57a720d357c073c877dbe3f566.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> <002b01c9767f$8ac8f640$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: <48095a20f6a1713ae51bf25f135aaabf.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> Ah, but my point is that websites (or homepages, as some called them then) were at one time the big buzzword and everybody had to have one. Then for a while there was a backlash - do we all really need to be on the internet? And the answer is of course, yes, but not everybody needs a heavy flash-animated, musical intro page. And while the language used has changed, the thing itself is just another item in the toolbox. I don't care what these things we're making are called. Call them ARGs, call them proto-ARGs, call them post-ARGs. I'll go along with whatever the community lands on. I'm just not that worried about the buzzwords. I'm worried about the thing itself. The buzzwords give us a starting point for a conversation, but that's it. Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Wed, January 14, 2009 11:37 am, Brian Clark wrote: > Yes, but by that time, you're a marketer's discarded buzzword and you > need to find a new less-reviled label ... or to painfully reclaim the > old one. > > How many of you tell people to visit your "homepage"? > > -----Original Message----- > From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org > [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On > Behalf Of Wendy Despain > Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 2:22 PM > To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which > is > your favourite ARG and why? > > I think the marketing world goes through cycles. > > They latch on to the latest, greatest thing and build up buzzwords. > For a while, if you're not doing that buzzword, you're just not > keeping up. > > Then they all reject that buzzword, saying it was never as great as > everyone thought it was and they need to innovate. Then they cast > around for a new buzzword to latch onto. > > After a while, the core elements of the original buzzword becomes just > another tool in their toolbox, but that takes a while. > > Wendy Despain > quantumcontent.com > > > > On Wed, January 14, 2009 11:09 am, Mike Monello wrote: >> >> >> >> On 1/14/09 2:05 PM, "Michael Monello" >> wrote: >> >> >> I don't believe mj was saying that ARGs don't work, but that there >> is >> some sort of consensus beginning to emerge amongst people on the >> peripheral (i.e. Clients, journalists) that ARG's don't work, too >> difficult, no ROI, etc. I believe that observation is true. >> >> Errr, let me clarify - I agree that there is a perception issue, and >> I >> disagree with that perception! >> >> Yikes, I need some caffeine. Or bourbon. >> >> --- >> Mike Monello >> Partner, Campfire >> 62 White Street, 3E >> New York, NY 10013 >> 212-612-9600 >> http://www.campfirenyc.com >> >> >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> ARG_Discuss mailing list >> ARG_Discuss at igda.org >> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss >> > > > Wendy Despain > quantumcontent.com > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From bclark at gmdstudios.com Wed Jan 14 15:05:46 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 15:05:46 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <48095a20f6a1713ae51bf25f135aaabf.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> References: <44007a57a720d357c073c877dbe3f566.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com><002b01c9767f$8ac8f640$6600a8c0@Tricorder> <48095a20f6a1713ae51bf25f135aaabf.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> Message-ID: <003401c97683$7d2156a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> I'm in total agreement with you on that, Wendy -- but we need some kind of phrase, and need to be able to describe what it means to others, or we run into the semantic confusion of statements like "In fact, I'm not sure anyone - including myself - has yet created a great ARG." To some people that might read as "All ARGs suck" ... to others it might read "No one has hit a prototype worth emulating" ... to others it might read "Oh, I don't want to commission one of those, then." -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Wendy Despain Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 2:55 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? Ah, but my point is that websites (or homepages, as some called them then) were at one time the big buzzword and everybody had to have one. Then for a while there was a backlash - do we all really need to be on the internet? And the answer is of course, yes, but not everybody needs a heavy flash-animated, musical intro page. And while the language used has changed, the thing itself is just another item in the toolbox. I don't care what these things we're making are called. Call them ARGs, call them proto-ARGs, call them post-ARGs. I'll go along with whatever the community lands on. I'm just not that worried about the buzzwords. I'm worried about the thing itself. The buzzwords give us a starting point for a conversation, but that's it. Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Wed, January 14, 2009 11:37 am, Brian Clark wrote: > Yes, but by that time, you're a marketer's discarded buzzword and you > need to find a new less-reviled label ... or to painfully reclaim the > old one. > > How many of you tell people to visit your "homepage"? > > -----Original Message----- > From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org > [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On > Behalf Of Wendy Despain > Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 2:22 PM > To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which > is > your favourite ARG and why? > > I think the marketing world goes through cycles. > > They latch on to the latest, greatest thing and build up buzzwords. > For a while, if you're not doing that buzzword, you're just not > keeping up. > > Then they all reject that buzzword, saying it was never as great as > everyone thought it was and they need to innovate. Then they cast > around for a new buzzword to latch onto. > > After a while, the core elements of the original buzzword becomes just > another tool in their toolbox, but that takes a while. > > Wendy Despain > quantumcontent.com > > > > On Wed, January 14, 2009 11:09 am, Mike Monello wrote: >> >> >> >> On 1/14/09 2:05 PM, "Michael Monello" >> wrote: >> >> >> I don't believe mj was saying that ARGs don't work, but that there >> is >> some sort of consensus beginning to emerge amongst people on the >> peripheral (i.e. Clients, journalists) that ARG's don't work, too >> difficult, no ROI, etc. I believe that observation is true. >> >> Errr, let me clarify - I agree that there is a perception issue, and >> I >> disagree with that perception! >> >> Yikes, I need some caffeine. Or bourbon. >> >> --- >> Mike Monello >> Partner, Campfire >> 62 White Street, 3E >> New York, NY 10013 >> 212-612-9600 >> http://www.campfirenyc.com >> >> >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> ARG_Discuss mailing list >> ARG_Discuss at igda.org >> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss >> > > > Wendy Despain > quantumcontent.com > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From mmonello at campfirenyc.com Wed Jan 14 16:00:32 2009 From: mmonello at campfirenyc.com (Mike Monello) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:00:32 -0800 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <48095a20f6a1713ae51bf25f135aaabf.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> Message-ID: On 1/14/09 2:54 PM, "Wendy Despain" wrote: I'm just not that worried about the buzzwords. I'm worried about the thing itself. The buzzwords give us a starting point for a conversation, but that's it. I totally disagree. Is it an "unborn child" or a "fetus?" Is it an "Estate Tax or is it a "Death Tax?" Language matters if you want to see something move forward or fail. --- Mike Monello Partner, Campfire 62 White Street, 3E New York, NY 10013 212-612-9600 http://www.campfirenyc.com From mj_williams at mac.com Wed Jan 14 16:09:54 2009 From: mj_williams at mac.com (mj williams) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 21:09:54 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <3fed77880901141137x5212bf2drd7286767ac767cae@mail.gmail.com> References: <002001c9767d$467593b0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> <3fed77880901141137x5212bf2drd7286767ac767cae@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 14 Jan 2009, at 19:37, Jackie wrote: > 10 years ago, molecular biology was it's > own subject matter. Currently, it's a set of tools used in every > biological > subject to tell stories about physiology. I'm starting to wonder if > ARG > might have a similar lifespan. Totally on with that. The King is dead! Long live the King! From wendeth at wendydespain.com Wed Jan 14 16:20:18 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:20:18 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: <003401c97683$7d2156a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> References: <44007a57a720d357c073c877dbe3f566.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com><002b01c9767f$8ac8f640$6600a8c0@Tricorder> <48095a20f6a1713ae51bf25f135aaabf.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> <003401c97683$7d2156a0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: That phrase might also read the way I meant it - that it's my opinion that none of us have created the ARG equivalent of Shakespeare yet, so there's still the potential for the next ARG to be the Romeo and Juliet of ARGs. Our greatest days are still ahead. When I wrote that sentence I thought it was going out to developers, not people in a position to commission ARGs. I'd say it a different way to a different audience, and I don't claim to never put my foot in my mouth. In fact, I seem to do it quite a bit in the ARG community. :-) What I'm trying to say about the buzzword ARG is that I'm fine with embracing it and going with it where it helps, and abandoning it where it doesn't. I just don't think we should automatically hate the phrase or try to divorce ourselves and our work from it. Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Wed, January 14, 2009 12:05 pm, Brian Clark wrote: > I'm in total agreement with you on that, Wendy -- but we need some > kind of phrase, and need to be able to describe what it means to > others, or we run into the semantic confusion of statements like > "In fact, I'm not sure anyone - including myself - has yet created > a great ARG." To some people that might read as "All ARGs suck" ... > to others it might read "No one has hit a prototype worth emulating" > ... to others it might read "Oh, I don't want to commission one of > those, then." > > -----Original Message----- > From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org > [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On > Behalf Of Wendy Despain > Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 2:55 PM > To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which > is > your favourite ARG and why? > > Ah, but my point is that websites (or homepages, as some called them > then) were at one time the big buzzword and everybody had to have one. > Then for a while there was a backlash - do we all really need to be on > the internet? > > And the answer is of course, yes, but not everybody needs a heavy > flash-animated, musical intro page. And while the language used has > changed, the thing itself is just another item in the toolbox. > > I don't care what these things we're making are called. Call them > ARGs, call them proto-ARGs, call them post-ARGs. I'll go along with > whatever the community lands on. > > I'm just not that worried about the buzzwords. I'm worried about the > thing itself. The buzzwords give us a starting point for a > conversation, but that's it. > > Wendy Despain > quantumcontent.com > > > On Wed, January 14, 2009 11:37 am, Brian Clark wrote: >> Yes, but by that time, you're a marketer's discarded buzzword and >> you >> need to find a new less-reviled label ... or to painfully reclaim >> the >> old one. >> >> How many of you tell people to visit your "homepage"? >> >> -----Original Message----- >> From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org >> [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On >> Behalf Of Wendy Despain >> Sent: Wednesday, January 14, 2009 2:22 PM >> To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG >> Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, >> which >> is >> your favourite ARG and why? >> >> I think the marketing world goes through cycles. >> >> They latch on to the latest, greatest thing and build up buzzwords. >> For a while, if you're not doing that buzzword, you're just not >> keeping up. >> >> Then they all reject that buzzword, saying it was never as great as >> everyone thought it was and they need to innovate. Then they cast >> around for a new buzzword to latch onto. >> >> After a while, the core elements of the original buzzword becomes >> just >> another tool in their toolbox, but that takes a while. >> >> Wendy Despain >> quantumcontent.com >> >> >> >> On Wed, January 14, 2009 11:09 am, Mike Monello wrote: >>> >>> >>> >>> On 1/14/09 2:05 PM, "Michael Monello" >>> wrote: >>> >>> >>> I don't believe mj was saying that ARGs don't work, but that there >>> is >>> some sort of consensus beginning to emerge amongst people on the >>> peripheral (i.e. Clients, journalists) that ARG's don't work, too >>> difficult, no ROI, etc. I believe that observation is true. >>> >>> Errr, let me clarify - I agree that there is a perception issue, >>> and >>> I >>> disagree with that perception! >>> >>> Yikes, I need some caffeine. Or bourbon. >>> >>> --- >>> Mike Monello >>> Partner, Campfire >>> 62 White Street, 3E >>> New York, NY 10013 >>> 212-612-9600 >>> http://www.campfirenyc.com >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> ARG_Discuss mailing list >>> ARG_Discuss at igda.org >>> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss >>> >> >> >> Wendy Despain >> quantumcontent.com >> >> _______________________________________________ >> ARG_Discuss mailing list >> ARG_Discuss at igda.org >> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss >> >> _______________________________________________ >> ARG_Discuss mailing list >> ARG_Discuss at igda.org >> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss >> > > > Wendy Despain > quantumcontent.com > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From wendeth at wendydespain.com Wed Jan 14 16:30:43 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:30:43 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: almost 8 years after the Beast, which is your favourite ARG and why? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <979822c84783c4f48c4c571b72795a83.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> Sure, language matters. I make a living as a writer. You don't have to convince me that words have power. :-) But in the context of a community of ARG creators, I think it's more important that we have a word - any word - than what that particular word is. I'd be just has happy to call these things "orchestrated synergistic experiences" as long as we can call them something. As I said, the buzzword is the starting point for a conversation. It's not the be-all, end-all of the conversation. I guess I'm still just thrilled to be part of a community instead of doing this kind of thing all on my own. The fact that we can have the conversation is the big deal to me. But then, PR never was my strong suit. Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Wed, January 14, 2009 1:00 pm, Mike Monello wrote: > On 1/14/09 2:54 PM, "Wendy Despain" wrote: > > I'm just not that worried about the buzzwords. I'm worried about the > thing itself. The buzzwords give us a starting point for a > conversation, but that's it. > > > I totally disagree. Is it an "unborn child" or a "fetus?" Is it an > "Estate Tax or is it a "Death Tax?" Language matters if you want to > see something move forward or fail. > > --- > Mike Monello > Partner, Campfire > 62 White Street, 3E > New York, NY 10013 > 212-612-9600 > http://www.campfirenyc.com > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From wendeth at wendydespain.com Wed Jan 14 16:44:28 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:44:28 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] Where ARGs are used? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <7bbfbde8360355a4d7ef96ca03305315.squirrel@webmail.wendydespain.com> Hi Martine, I think many sectors are interested in innovative techniques combining games, narrative and community. I'm not sure which of them are interested in calling them ARGs. :-) The phrase seems to have more acceptance in the videogame and education sector than others, but I think every time it's most useful to pitch your ideas as a whole without trying to pigeonhole them or fit them to some prototype. I think what matters is that it will accomplish your goals within budget. Focusing on the practical matters instead of the theoretical seems to make the best impression in my experience. Best of luck! Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com On Wed, January 14, 2009 10:41 am, Martine Parry wrote: > Hi - Where are ARGs used in the main? > I'm interested in taking a 'story-telling' line to various clients but > unsure which sectors or markets are receptive and want to use ARGs. > Can you > help? > MARTINE > www.applygroup.com > > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > Wendy Despain quantumcontent.com From wendeth at wendydespain.com Thu Jan 15 18:19:22 2009 From: wendeth at wendydespain.com (Wendy Despain) Date: Thu, 15 Jan 2009 15:19:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: [arg_discuss] an ARG for GDC09? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Hello folks, I'm coming to you now as the Chair of the IGDA Writing SIG. Last year our SIG worked with Jason Della Rocca to create a social game for the big IGDA party at GDC08. The idea was to create a fun social game that got people talking to each other, breaking the ice so to speak, but also showed off what a trained writer could bring to a game design. (One of the objectives of our SIG.) Our game last year wasn't perfect, but it was good enough to get us a "yes" when we asked Jason if we could do it again for the GDC09 party. We're excited about that, but Jason threw us a bit of a curve ball for this year. He's asked if we could incorporate some ARG-like elements into the game. Being an ARG-lover myself, I jumped at the chance. But I also thought maybe some people from this SIG would be interested in getting involved with at least that aspect of the party game. We're getting serious about figuring out exactly what the game will be, and I thought I'd invite the ARG SIG to participate. No pressure, just wondering if you want to be involved. We've got a very very small budget, so mostly this is for the fun of it. So... what do you think? Want to be involved? On a personal basis? On a SIG-wide basis? Let me know offlist or on. :-) Wendy Despain Writing SIG Chair From Bryan.Alexander at nitle.org Thu Jan 15 20:14:39 2009 From: Bryan.Alexander at nitle.org (Bryan Alexander) Date: Thu, 15 Jan 2009 20:14:39 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com><512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com> <9B3E51F6-FC4E-42B4-801C-CC91BA55850D@gmail.com> Message-ID: <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67868BA59@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> And there's always our paper: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Whitepaper/Antecedents_to_Alternate_Reality_Games -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org on behalf of Andrea A. Phillips Sent: Wed 1/14/2009 1:46 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs Brooke has pointed out that the conversation the last day or so has come up with a lot of stuff that are of interest to ARG developers, whether or not they could be qualified as ARGs themselves. And wouldn't you know, we do actually have a place in the SIG Wiki to record information like this, which was completely blank up until about *checks watch* two minutes ago: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Antecedents_to_ARGs If anybody feels like spreading the love and the knowledge, that would be a *most excellent* place to do it! -- Andrea Phillips http://www.deusexmachinatio.com Words * Culture * Interaction _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From bclark at gmdstudios.com Fri Jan 16 09:02:41 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Fri, 16 Jan 2009 09:02:41 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs In-Reply-To: <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67868BA59@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com><512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com><9B3E51F6-FC4E-42B4-801C-CC91BA55850D@gmail.com> <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67868BA59@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> Message-ID: <003c01c977e3$197e9f20$6600a8c0@Tricorder> But Bryan, I think that paper suffers from the same problems we're discussing here: it is a fairly arbitrary selection of items, missing out on many of what I see as the deeper influences. Because no one can seem to build a shared definition of what ARGs are, it is easy to point to ANYTHING as an antecedent ... and all you're really doing is revealing some wrinkle of your definition of what you think an ARG is. For example, I think the TINAG principle is really quite irrelevant (although I think there are interesting specific historical stories about why that phrase was created as an alternate to established phrases like "suspension of disbelief," as well as business cover that phrase provided certain practitioners.) Conversely, I think ARG derives quite a bit from practices like Nathan Shedroff's experience design and Augsto Boal's theater of the oppressed. But that's my perspective. What we lack as a community is a common perspective or a route to get to it, so the general public cemented their own definition instead. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Bryan Alexander Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2009 8:15 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG; Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs And there's always our paper: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Whitepaper/Antecedents_ to_Alternate_Reality_Games -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org on behalf of Andrea A. Phillips Sent: Wed 1/14/2009 1:46 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs Brooke has pointed out that the conversation the last day or so has come up with a lot of stuff that are of interest to ARG developers, whether or not they could be qualified as ARGs themselves. And wouldn't you know, we do actually have a place in the SIG Wiki to record information like this, which was completely blank up until about *checks watch* two minutes ago: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Antecedents_to_ARGs If anybody feels like spreading the love and the knowledge, that would be a *most excellent* place to do it! -- Andrea Phillips http://www.deusexmachinatio.com Words * Culture * Interaction _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From markus.montola at uta.fi Sat Jan 17 06:38:38 2009 From: markus.montola at uta.fi (Markus Montola) Date: Sat, 17 Jan 2009 13:38:38 +0200 Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs In-Reply-To: <003c01c977e3$197e9f20$6600a8c0@Tricorder> References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com><512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com><9B3E51F6-FC4E-42B4-801C-CC91BA55850D@gmail.com> <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67868BA59@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> <003c01c977e3$197e9f20$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: <4971C33E.5040900@uta.fi> Tracking direct descendants and relationships is usually hopeless, and creating timelines that imply causality can be counter-productive. But making lists of influences, inspirations and antecedents still makes sense. It is useful for: - practical design inspiration - to remember that "I" did not invent the wheel first - to remember that "I" did not invent my wheel from scratch - to elaborate and expand the understanding of the concept To say that A has influenced ARGs does not mean that A is an ARG, that any of the creators of ARG X were aware of A, or that B that is very similar to A was somehow less influential. Or that C that is very different from A couldn't influence ARG as well. Or that A was the first or only one of its kind. You have to understand that it's not like games influence games. It's like books influence chat in coffee room which influences a game that influences a movie that influences a web discussion that influences another web discussion that influences another movie that influences a book that influences a game. Only rarely you can obtain evidence that it was designer D:s experience of product E that influenced her work on ARG X. Even if you ask them, it's doubtful if they can analyze their processes sufficiently. Also, it's way cooler to be influenced by War of the Worlds than to be influenced by the little innovative promotion by the local shopping mall. It's still worthwhile to map those influences, but you should do that in an inclusive manner, without claiming direct causality where none can be seen. - Markus PS. Boal did not invent acting outside the stage. Candid Microphone did not invent pranks. Gary Gygax did not invent role-playing. Did The Beast / Publius Enigma / Blair Witch Project have a single genuinely new invention that was not a new permutation of something that had been done before? Brian Clark kirjoitti: > But Bryan, I think that paper suffers from the same problems we're > discussing here: it is a fairly arbitrary selection of items, missing out on > many of what I see as the deeper influences. Because no one can seem to > build a shared definition of what ARGs are, it is easy to point to ANYTHING > as an antecedent ... and all you're really doing is revealing some wrinkle > of your definition of what you think an ARG is. > > For example, I think the TINAG principle is really quite irrelevant > (although I think there are interesting specific historical stories about > why that phrase was created as an alternate to established phrases like > "suspension of disbelief," as well as business cover that phrase provided > certain practitioners.) Conversely, I think ARG derives quite a bit from > practices like Nathan Shedroff's experience design and Augsto Boal's theater > of the oppressed. > > But that's my perspective. What we lack as a community is a common > perspective or a route to get to it, so the general public cemented their > own definition instead. > > -----Original Message----- > From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On > Behalf Of Bryan Alexander > Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2009 8:15 PM > To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG; Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs > > And there's always our paper: > http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Whitepaper/Antecedents_ > to_Alternate_Reality_Games > > -----Original Message----- > From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org on behalf of Andrea A. Phillips > Sent: Wed 1/14/2009 1:46 PM > To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG > Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs > > Brooke has pointed out that the conversation the last day or so has > come up with a lot of stuff that are of interest to ARG developers, > whether or not they could be qualified as ARGs themselves. > > And wouldn't you know, we do actually have a place in the SIG Wiki to > record information like this, which was completely blank up until > about *checks watch* two minutes ago: > > http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Antecedents_to_ARGs > > If anybody feels like spreading the love and the knowledge, that would > be a *most excellent* place to do it! > > -- > Andrea Phillips > http://www.deusexmachinatio.com > Words * Culture * Interaction > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From andrhia at gmail.com Sat Jan 17 10:42:30 2009 From: andrhia at gmail.com (Andrea A. Phillips) Date: Sat, 17 Jan 2009 10:42:30 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs In-Reply-To: <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67868BA59@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com> <512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com> <9B3E51F6-FC4E-42B4-801C-CC91BA55850D@gmail.com> <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67868BA59@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> Message-ID: Is it shallow and awful of me to admit I just want a crowdsourced list of cool stuff to read/watch/wikiwalk on those red-letter days when I find myself with some spare time? ^_^ -- Andrea Phillips http://www.deusexmachinatio.com Words * Culture * Interaction From Bryan.Alexander at nitle.org Sun Jan 18 17:57:40 2009 From: Bryan.Alexander at nitle.org (Bryan Alexander) Date: Sun, 18 Jan 2009 17:57:40 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs In-Reply-To: <003c01c977e3$197e9f20$6600a8c0@Tricorder> References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com><512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com><9B3E51F6-FC4E-42B4-801C-CC91BA55850D@gmail.com><08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67868BA59@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> <003c01c977e3$197e9f20$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67801087A8E@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> I'd be delighted to work in Shedroff and Boal, especially as I don't know the former. Yes, there's a limitation effect due to my assumptions. This is pretty common in literary history, though, at all levels - think about, say, the Gothic's lineage, or (worse yet by far) science fiction's. But I don't have that much invested in my own set of assumptions, and would be glad to broaden 'em. This conversation has helped, although I regret lacking time this season to participate more constructively. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Brian Clark Sent: Friday, January 16, 2009 9:03 AM To: 'Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG' Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs But Bryan, I think that paper suffers from the same problems we're discussing here: it is a fairly arbitrary selection of items, missing out on many of what I see as the deeper influences. Because no one can seem to build a shared definition of what ARGs are, it is easy to point to ANYTHING as an antecedent ... and all you're really doing is revealing some wrinkle of your definition of what you think an ARG is. For example, I think the TINAG principle is really quite irrelevant (although I think there are interesting specific historical stories about why that phrase was created as an alternate to established phrases like "suspension of disbelief," as well as business cover that phrase provided certain practitioners.) Conversely, I think ARG derives quite a bit from practices like Nathan Shedroff's experience design and Augsto Boal's theater of the oppressed. But that's my perspective. What we lack as a community is a common perspective or a route to get to it, so the general public cemented their own definition instead. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Bryan Alexander Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2009 8:15 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG; Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs And there's always our paper: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Whitepaper/Antecede nts_ to_Alternate_Reality_Games -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org on behalf of Andrea A. Phillips Sent: Wed 1/14/2009 1:46 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs Brooke has pointed out that the conversation the last day or so has come up with a lot of stuff that are of interest to ARG developers, whether or not they could be qualified as ARGs themselves. And wouldn't you know, we do actually have a place in the SIG Wiki to record information like this, which was completely blank up until about *checks watch* two minutes ago: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Antecedents_to_ARGs If anybody feels like spreading the love and the knowledge, that would be a *most excellent* place to do it! -- Andrea Phillips http://www.deusexmachinatio.com Words * Culture * Interaction _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From bclark at gmdstudios.com Tue Jan 20 10:13:29 2009 From: bclark at gmdstudios.com (Brian Clark) Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2009 10:13:29 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs In-Reply-To: <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67801087A8E@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com><512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com><9B3E51F6-FC4E-42B4-801C-CC91BA55850D@gmail.com><08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67868BA59@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org><003c01c977e3$197e9f20$6600a8c0@Tricorder> <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67801087A8E@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> Message-ID: <020601c97b11$a7352bf0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Don't get me wrong, Bryan ... I think it is an excellent piece. I think often though, some of these early works end up being canonized as IDGA whitepapers or Wikipedia entries etc. Frequently, those can send the wrong message that one piece (as Marcus put it) "directly descends" from another. There was a thread last year that attempted to look at "personal influences" that really helped reveal how much broader those influences really well and how many different paths actually led simultaneous experimentation ending up in the same neighborhood. Shedroff's work is very interesting as a framework if you haven't encountered it ... both his website: http://www.nathan.com/ed/ and his 2001 book: http://www.experiencedesignbooks.com/ From my POV, "experience design" is an effective umbrella concept that contains "ARG" (but a critic might argue that "experience design" is constructed in such a way as to exist primarily as an umbrella concept for anything that is designed around the way people interact with it.) -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Bryan Alexander Sent: Sunday, January 18, 2009 5:58 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs I'd be delighted to work in Shedroff and Boal, especially as I don't know the former. Yes, there's a limitation effect due to my assumptions. This is pretty common in literary history, though, at all levels - think about, say, the Gothic's lineage, or (worse yet by far) science fiction's. But I don't have that much invested in my own set of assumptions, and would be glad to broaden 'em. This conversation has helped, although I regret lacking time this season to participate more constructively. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Brian Clark Sent: Friday, January 16, 2009 9:03 AM To: 'Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG' Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs But Bryan, I think that paper suffers from the same problems we're discussing here: it is a fairly arbitrary selection of items, missing out on many of what I see as the deeper influences. Because no one can seem to build a shared definition of what ARGs are, it is easy to point to ANYTHING as an antecedent ... and all you're really doing is revealing some wrinkle of your definition of what you think an ARG is. For example, I think the TINAG principle is really quite irrelevant (although I think there are interesting specific historical stories about why that phrase was created as an alternate to established phrases like "suspension of disbelief," as well as business cover that phrase provided certain practitioners.) Conversely, I think ARG derives quite a bit from practices like Nathan Shedroff's experience design and Augsto Boal's theater of the oppressed. But that's my perspective. What we lack as a community is a common perspective or a route to get to it, so the general public cemented their own definition instead. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Bryan Alexander Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2009 8:15 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG; Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs And there's always our paper: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Whitepaper/Antecede nts_ to_Alternate_Reality_Games -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org on behalf of Andrea A. Phillips Sent: Wed 1/14/2009 1:46 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs Brooke has pointed out that the conversation the last day or so has come up with a lot of stuff that are of interest to ARG developers, whether or not they could be qualified as ARGs themselves. And wouldn't you know, we do actually have a place in the SIG Wiki to record information like this, which was completely blank up until about *checks watch* two minutes ago: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Antecedents_to_ARGs If anybody feels like spreading the love and the knowledge, that would be a *most excellent* place to do it! -- Andrea Phillips http://www.deusexmachinatio.com Words * Culture * Interaction _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From adam.m.s.martin at googlemail.com Tue Jan 20 10:32:19 2009 From: adam.m.s.martin at googlemail.com (Adam Martin) Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2009 15:32:19 +0000 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: how long would you like your next ARG take to play? Message-ID: <06B15CD4-930C-410C-BFEB-29788B597A7B@googlemail.com> From Bryan.Alexander at nitle.org Tue Jan 20 10:59:43 2009 From: Bryan.Alexander at nitle.org (Bryan Alexander) Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2009 10:59:43 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs References: <0F4022B6-F64A-4B7B-8798-64161677B8B8@gmail.com><512CCCC9-A9AA-4D1D-9F2E-BB50A6120946@gmail.com><9B3E51F6-FC4E-42B4-801C-CC91BA55850D@gmail.com><08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67868BA59@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org><003c01c977e3$197e9f20$6600a8c0@Tricorder><08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67801087A8E@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> <020601c97b11$a7352bf0$6600a8c0@Tricorder> Message-ID: <08119B28F4B3FF46A5747921C9FAA67868BA6C@AA1EXCH06.office.share.org> Heh - let me know when canonization occurs. I hope I don't have to suffer a hideous, lingering death by torment, please! Seriously, I was pretty careful to not argue for a strict lineage. It was an exploratory paper, trying to open up multiple lines of connection, or a kind of imaginative space. As opposed to, say, the way Joe Haldeman's _Forever War_ is clearly a direct response to Heinlein's _Starship Troopers_, or Kim Stanley Robinson's "Down and Out in the Year 2000" being a response to cyberpunk fiction (both are excellent correctives, btw). It's partly the reflex of a serial lit teacher to make a syllabus. And thanks for both the nice words and the helpful pointer. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org on behalf of Brian Clark Sent: Tue 1/20/2009 10:13 AM To: 'Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG' Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs Don't get me wrong, Bryan ... I think it is an excellent piece. I think often though, some of these early works end up being canonized as IDGA whitepapers or Wikipedia entries etc. Frequently, those can send the wrong message that one piece (as Marcus put it) "directly descends" from another. There was a thread last year that attempted to look at "personal influences" that really helped reveal how much broader those influences really well and how many different paths actually led simultaneous experimentation ending up in the same neighborhood. Shedroff's work is very interesting as a framework if you haven't encountered it ... both his website: http://www.nathan.com/ed/ and his 2001 book: http://www.experiencedesignbooks.com/ From my POV, "experience design" is an effective umbrella concept that contains "ARG" (but a critic might argue that "experience design" is constructed in such a way as to exist primarily as an umbrella concept for anything that is designed around the way people interact with it.) -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Bryan Alexander Sent: Sunday, January 18, 2009 5:58 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs I'd be delighted to work in Shedroff and Boal, especially as I don't know the former. Yes, there's a limitation effect due to my assumptions. This is pretty common in literary history, though, at all levels - think about, say, the Gothic's lineage, or (worse yet by far) science fiction's. But I don't have that much invested in my own set of assumptions, and would be glad to broaden 'em. This conversation has helped, although I regret lacking time this season to participate more constructively. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Brian Clark Sent: Friday, January 16, 2009 9:03 AM To: 'Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG' Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs But Bryan, I think that paper suffers from the same problems we're discussing here: it is a fairly arbitrary selection of items, missing out on many of what I see as the deeper influences. Because no one can seem to build a shared definition of what ARGs are, it is easy to point to ANYTHING as an antecedent ... and all you're really doing is revealing some wrinkle of your definition of what you think an ARG is. For example, I think the TINAG principle is really quite irrelevant (although I think there are interesting specific historical stories about why that phrase was created as an alternate to established phrases like "suspension of disbelief," as well as business cover that phrase provided certain practitioners.) Conversely, I think ARG derives quite a bit from practices like Nathan Shedroff's experience design and Augsto Boal's theater of the oppressed. But that's my perspective. What we lack as a community is a common perspective or a route to get to it, so the general public cemented their own definition instead. -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Bryan Alexander Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2009 8:15 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG; Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs And there's always our paper: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Whitepaper/Antecede nts_ to_Alternate_Reality_Games -----Original Message----- From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org on behalf of Andrea A. Phillips Sent: Wed 1/14/2009 1:46 PM To: Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG Subject: [arg_discuss] Antecedents to ARGs Brooke has pointed out that the conversation the last day or so has come up with a lot of stuff that are of interest to ARG developers, whether or not they could be qualified as ARGs themselves. And wouldn't you know, we do actually have a place in the SIG Wiki to record information like this, which was completely blank up until about *checks watch* two minutes ago: http://www.igda.org/wiki/Alternate_Reality_Games_SIG/Antecedents_to_ARGs If anybody feels like spreading the love and the knowledge, that would be a *most excellent* place to do it! -- Andrea Phillips http://www.deusexmachinatio.com Words * Culture * Interaction _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss _______________________________________________ ARG_Discuss mailing list ARG_Discuss at igda.org http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss From sjoerdwennekes at hotmail.com Tue Jan 20 11:32:00 2009 From: sjoerdwennekes at hotmail.com (Sjoerd Wennekes) Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2009 17:32:00 +0100 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: how long would you like your next ARG take to play? In-Reply-To: <06B15CD4-930C-410C-BFEB-29788B597A7B@googlemail.com> References: <06B15CD4-930C-410C-BFEB-29788B597A7B@googlemail.com> Message-ID: How awesome would it be, if it would never stop. ... The game will even go on in the afterlife. ;-) I really would like to play that one!!! _________________________________________________________________ What can you do with the new Windows Live? Find out http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowslive/default.aspx From dbwall at mac.com Tue Jan 20 18:03:49 2009 From: dbwall at mac.com (D B Wall) Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2009 17:03:49 -0600 Subject: [arg_discuss] Coraline, anyone? In-Reply-To: <17906038.1144543723904.JavaMail.root@mswamui-andean.atl.sa.earthlink.net> References: <17906038.1144543723904.JavaMail.root@mswamui-andean.atl.sa.earthlink.net> Message-ID: <166254682196042624019003089398701286237-Webmail@me.com> Just a curiousity... does anyone know where any substantial information about the Coraline's Keys campaign might be found? From netwurker at gmail.com Tue Jan 20 22:56:23 2009 From: netwurker at gmail.com (mez breeze) Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2009 14:56:23 +1100 Subject: [arg_discuss] _Everything you know about ARGs is WRONG_ Message-ID: http://sixtostart.com/onetoread/2008/everything-you-know-about-args-is-wrong/ -- : http://augmentology.com : http://knott404.blogspot.com : http://netwurker.livejournal.com From dflor71 at gmail.com Wed Jan 21 00:31:21 2009 From: dflor71 at gmail.com (David Flor) Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2009 00:31:21 -0500 Subject: [arg_discuss] TOW: how long would you like your next ARG take to play? In-Reply-To: <06B15CD4-930C-410C-BFEB-29788B597A7B@googlemail.com> References: <06B15CD4-930C-410C-BFEB-29788B597A7B@googlemail.com> Message-ID: <4976B329.9040506@gmail.com> My first ARG, Looking Glass Laboratories, was eight days. Of course, I spent those eight days portraying a super-sentient artificial intelligence that never slept, so needless to say the were a whirlwind set of days. I brought it to a conclusion on the eighth day because it became unmanageable and I couldn't keep up. It's hard to keep something going for so long, especially when the cumulative power of your audience can solve problems instantly. Heck, during my 2nd ARG there were some puzzles that were solved before I even finished posting them. And a puzzle that took me five days to set up was resolved in less than ten minutes. Keeping that up for a long term is not as easy as it sounds. Adam Martin wrote: > > _______________________________________________ > ARG_Discuss mailing list > ARG_Discuss at igda.org > http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > From vladiweb at googlemail.com Thu Jan 22 05:06:18 2009 From: vladiweb at googlemail.com (Vlad Alex) Date: Thu, 22 Jan 2009 11:06:18 +0100 Subject: [arg_discuss] Introduction Message-ID: Good morning, My name is Vlad Alex aka Merzmensch (kosmopol at Unfiction), I'm Russian writer and literary scientist living in Germany. I came across ARG phenomenon being addicted 2007 as a player to Cloverfield ARG/ARE. After joining Unfiction and later ARG forum of ARGReporter I discovered for me the world of ARGs and became a passionate player. Later I was (co-)puppetmaster of some grassroot ARGs (3 stories till now). I write my German blog about ARGs from the player perspective: (http://merzmensch.blogspot.com). For me ARG is not only entertainment or marketing medium, but also a new kind of art, almost a gesamtkunstwerk (in avant-garde meaning) in its multimediality and globality. I joined this list because I am very interested in the ARG theory and in further developements. And in your opinions about it. P.S. And forgive me my terrible English please :-) Vlad Alex From dbwall at mac.com Thu Jan 22 18:26:58 2009 From: dbwall at mac.com (D B Wall) Date: Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:26:58 -0600 Subject: [arg_discuss] Commercial ARGs with learning outcomes In-Reply-To: <132A2233DD61A44DA1F1BC326DC2C8CF061EDF33@erd-chi-exmb3.corp.trb> References: <132A2233DD61A44DA1F1BC326DC2C8CF061EDF33@erd-chi-exmb3.corp.trb> Message-ID: <142158890638631253118827900899378808217-Webmail@me.com> Sorry to revive a 10-day old thread (and for nothing more than an anecdote)... the McDonald's discussion and the statement that they only want to educate in ways that lead to a sales reminded me of something. When I was a very little kid, MB sold a McDonald's board game where the goal was basically to fill a customer's order ticket correctly. Early job training, no? ... and here it is: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/game/15214 On Monday, January 12, 2009, at 02:05PM, "Mike Monello" wrote: >Marketers are only interested in the kind of learning that leads you to buy a product. Yes, these companies have altruistic aspects to them, such as the Ronald McDonald House, but if you are talking to the marketing department, they want to sell products, and any education they do leads to that sale. > >But I'm not even sure that the people you would want to speak to are inside those companies. For instance, I'm not sure anyone at Audi really understand how the story of Art of the Heist pushed players to educate themselves about the features and benefits of the A3 on their own terms. They just were not connected to it in that way. They would talk about the ads, and "engagement" and they might cite some results, but people like myself and Brian Clark actually owned that part of the campaign - built it, brought it to life, monitored the results, etc. All they would likely recognize was that people who engaged in the story went to the online car configurator and engaged with that. > >I'm willing to bet the same is true for most marketing campaigns - if you want to get into how and why it worked, go to the people who actually did it. > >-Mike > > >On 1/12/09 2:22 PM, "Nathan Mishler" wrote: > >It's possible. > >There's a problem with the thought that there are Games and then there are >Educational Games. Many people think that only learning comes out of games >that are specifically designed to teach. The thing is, ALL games teach. >Granted, much of what entertainment games teach is not useful or applicable >in any form in the real world. Okay, you learned how to avoid the alien's >attacks on level 8. That is very specialized knowledge. > >ARGs on the other hand tend to involve more "real world" knowledge, using >things that people already know (or can learn) as part of their puzzles. >They also tend to encourage players to go out into the world and doing this >learning on their own. Of course now I'm treading into a lot of things >discussed in Dave S's book about the differences between formal gaming and >the sort of hybrid game / storytelling systems that are in ARGs. And that's >a looooong discussion. > >I'd say go for it, but recognize that they might not care that they make >"learning" functions. Learning is part and parcel with the game, but they >might not be interested tuning their marketing args towards a "benefit of >all mankind" sort of thing. There's still a belief in some circles that >games are "just entertainment" and any attempt to "shoehorn" learning into >them will make the games unpopular. I think that's silly, seeing as games >are nothing BUT learning systems, but not everyone recognizes it. > >On the other hand, Mc Donalds for instance is part of the whole "Children's >Hospital" scene so it's not like they are entirely against the public good. >If you can get their backing you could do a bunch of cool stuff. > >On Mon, Jan 12, 2009 at 2:03 PM, Steve Vosloo < >steve.vosloo at shuttleworthfoundation.org> wrote: > >> The Foundation for which I work tries to innovate within the space of >> education (formal and informal) (amongst other spaces). I've suggested ARGs >> as an innovative way for youth to develop certain skills whilst they employ >> social media -- sometimes in a pop culture-based story context. >> >> The way that we work is that usually we pilot demonstration projects and >> then present the results to bigger stakeholders who can scale these >> projects, e.g. the Department of Education in South Africa. >> >> After having read Jane McGonical's /Why I Love Bees: A Case Study in >> Collective Intelligence Gaming/ and other pieces on the learning outcomes of >> ARG play, I'm asking this: if commercial companies use ARGs for marketing >> purposes, and players learn from them, then are these companies some of the >> stakeholders that the Shuttleworth Foundation should try to influence? Did I >> Love Bees turn Microsoft's gaming unit into creators of educational >> experiences? Did /The Lost Ring/ mean that McDonalds is not only in the fast >> food business, but in the business of education too? >> >> All thoughts would be much appreciated. >> >> Thanks, >> Steve >> >> -- >> Steve Vosloo >> Fellow, Communication and Analytical Skills Development >> The Shuttleworth Foundation >> >> Tel: +27 21 970 1240 | Fax: +27 21 970 1241 >> Web: www.shuttleworthfoundation.org >> Blog: www.innovatingeducation.wordpress.com >> >> Email disclaimer: wiki.tsf.org.za/EmailDisclaimer >> >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> ARG_Discuss mailing list >> ARG_Discuss at igda.org >> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss >> >_______________________________________________ >ARG_Discuss mailing list >ARG_Discuss at igda.org >http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > > > >--- >Mike Monello >Partner, Campfire >62 White Street, 3E >New York, NY 10013 >212-612-9600 >http://www.campfirenyc.com > > > > > >_______________________________________________ >ARG_Discuss mailing list >ARG_Discuss at igda.org >http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/arg_discuss > >