unforum

[Shawn David Struck]

I stumbled across this while browing Websnark archives...

[catherwood]

I remember reading that article, which came out rather early in the game. I'd say that the rest of October pretty much diffused any worries about factions ruining the group experience.

[thebruce]

exactly, and I don't think you can find anyone who things that ILB spelled the death-knell for arg's now... at least not unless the person didn't like ILB . ARG's are always different, evolving, and ILB helped it evolve, opened the door to show other methods, other tricks and styles. By this article, pretty much any ARG should 'spell the death knell of args', because the best args are unpredictable, different. The only similarity is a set of minimal guidelines for how to act within an arg... otherwise, free-game

[Anton P. Nym]

I seem to recall that the authour of that came over here and posted in a thread that came as close to "heated" as I've seen in my limited experience here. (In the interests of a peaceful forum, I shall link no links.) edit: It was already heated when the authour came over... I did not intend to imply that he inflamed the debate by posting.

When I read the article back then, I came to the conclusion that it was a typical doomsayer-style post ("This change will bring ruin to us all!") and brushed it off as more alarmist than useful.

-- Steve's pretty sure that conclusion still holds up... after all, the game resolved pretty well, didn't it?

[Nightmare Tony]

I remember that. And look at us now. We all had a real great time, the boundaries of the ARG have taken on new directions, and for the future, there are so much more possibilities.

[weephun]

Yah, and as far as I can remember, that "one player" (what was his name, I've forgotten now ) seems to have been included just fine into the collective even after helping the create the "death knell" for ARGs. Things learned for all and a lot of discussion (some heated) to get there, but I know I grew because of the experience, and I think a lot of ARG questions were answered because of it (use of OOG information, where to draw that line, etc).

It was amazing (even to the PMs) to watch the fact that this group could create "factions" among themselves while all the time striving for a common goal. Many of us had many different routes we wanted to take to get to that goal, but the end was the same. And fortunately for us, we had PMs gifted enough to roll with the punches we sent their way and create new and marvelous tasks for us to accomplish. Without our first week of "freeing the SP", I wonder if we would have ever been able to put together the kind of coordination we needed in the end to finally capture her again and reach the end of the game in the manner we did.

Was it the "death knell"? No
Was it difficult to get through? Yes (especially hard for some)
Did it add a whole new dimension to ARG playing? I think so. Ask anyone who ended up on the "crew" or recognized otherwise and I'm sure you'll get the same answer.