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[miss_seph]

OFFTOPIC

[konamouse]

[Phaedra]

[Phaedra]

[Omnie]

So, I've played a grand total of two full games (I'm not including the bunch that I didn't see through until the end) - MU and Synagoga (sorry, I just don't feel like I could sincerely say that I played WI - same universe, different...bubbles. I'm sure there's a better word for it. The bubbles burst eventually, but that doesn't change the fact that they were bubbly for the vast majority of my playing time). Ever since Syn ended, I've been trying to gather my thoughts on why the two (Syn and MU) seemed so different. Apologies if I keep using direct examples here, and I hope I don't offend anyone (I liked both games! They were both awesome! Happy PM love!) but I don't really feel qualified to talk in generalizations. Now, I think that there is a fundamental difference at the heart of the matter, if only because I can confidently say that I played a game called Synagoga, but I read/followed/participated in the experience called MU. I mean, I "played" MU, sure, in the sense of "playing" the G in ARG, but the word takes on a different meaning when I use it there. Essentially, I think the two ARGs took an entirely different approach to their "game" nature, and that maybe it wouldn't be too farfetched to extend that difference to cover traditional ARGs vs. the new-fangled AIMy, interaction-heavy guys.

Let's start with MU. At the most basic level, I saw MU as a novel. There's the in-game world, the characters, the plot, all existing as they do in any good work of fiction. Then there were the elements that made it an ARG - lots of realistic-looking webpages, the various obligatory puzzles, some real-world contact, etc. It wasn't in our world, but it was an alternate reality that coexisted with our own. The various webpages and other interfaces served as our windows into that world. See, I have a mental image of a store display. The players are standing outside, looking at all the stuff going on in the display windows. Sometimes the window opens, sometimes holes appear in the window, and through those we can interact with the display. That's not a great description - there are more than holes. Maybe there are those tubey rubber glove things like in those movies about contagious diseases where you can't touch the test tubes with your bare hands and so you have to manipulate them by reaching in with the heavy rubber things and trying not to stab anything with a needle for fear of starting a worldwide epidemic and killing off the human race. …anyway. The important point is that we are not inside the store. We are watching it, we are interacting with it at times, but we are not part of it, not really. Hence, a novel. A very unusual novel, but nonetheless.

Then there was Synagoga. From the start, Syn didn't seem to be telling a story so much as it was allowing the players to be part of the in-game world. In keeping with my little metaphor, we were frolicking inside the store like mad, window glass be damned. What window glass? We were a direct part of the universe. We were all characters, in the sense that we seemed to have the potential to affect events as much as the in-game characters themselves (I mean, I don't know how much was planned out in advance, but that's the way it felt to me, and that's really all I can comment upon). It wasn't strictly role-playing because we could be ourselves, sure, but if we chose not to adopt a different persona, all that meant was that our real persona was playing in the game. We weren't being given a peek into this alternate universe, we were being set loose within it. Syn was a game in the sense that we were in it, we were playing it. I can't drag the novel analogy within 50 ft. of this ARG – it doesn't apply. The point was not to watch the story, it was to be immersed in the in-game universe.

After MU ended, I arranged the whole game into a "re-readable" narrative. The game was not linear, but it could be arranged as such. I can't even begin to imagine doing something like that with Syn – it just wouldn't work. I'm not saying that one is better or worse than the other; I just think that they're different animals. "Traditional" ARGs can be read, on some basic level, as a story. Newish gAIMes are played…like a game. By its very nature, the second sort does not encourage lurkers or players who don't want to or can't "play" the way the game expects you to.

Does the argument hold outside of my two examples?

[imbri]

Wow, I really have so many thoughts running through my head about this thread and I just have no clue of where to start or where to take them. Before I get going though, I must say that I really enjoy the discussion/debate going on and had no clue that my little moodiness would lead to such a lenghty thread. I also want to say that this thread reminds me just how much I enjoy this community. There have been a number of places where it could have easily been derailed on other forums but cooler, more mature heads, have prevailed here just as they usually do. Really, isn't that awesome.

Now... hmmm...

[NashCarey]

I must say that Omnie's post did a great job of clearing that up! Yay Omnie for an intelligent and a very non-generalized post spoken from experience instead of heresay. We need more like you!

Edit to expand: One thing I can't do when lurking a game is really connect to the characters. That, for me, comes with interaction. So lurking a game (to me) will not really let me connect to the characters and the story line like the game was really designed for. ARG's are meant to be interactive, and yes, lurking is an art, but I find that people who lurk a game never have the same insight as those who played the same game. Thus the reason I can not really say much about ILoveBees.

Lurkers mean a lot to the genre, I forgot that early on, but lurkers aren't everything. Without the players, the lurkers would really have nothing to lurk.

Omnie I trust your perspective above anyone else who has tons to say about what they term gAIMs since you truly experienced the two styles.

Colin says the best thing about Poetry is you can't define it. Can that be the best thing about ARG's?

[C_Brennan]

Hell no, I said the worst thing about poetry was that you couldn't define it. DAMN YOU POETRY!!!! DAMN YOU!!!

But, heh, that same definition works great for ARGs. I agree. Just I still hate poetry.

[miss_seph]

Does Lettuce Maketh The salad?

[yanka]

Re: Well said

[Nightmare Tony]

Imbri: for Synagoga, Omnie does put some interesting points as to how it felt, but it also DID have a puzzle structure and an unfolding story. Each night in chat, it would be silly and goofy and somewhere along the line, she would say something which would help prove a clue. And then within minutes, a new puzzle would appear. we would attack it like mad. When solved, it gave us part of a recording log, which helped shape and show us the situation Syn was in. So the storyline was unfolded there primarily, not so much by our chats, though some storyline work did jell within the chats.

Colin: Until the merge, I still considered WIU/Syn to be two completely seperate universes, each with their own rhythmns. that is why you had so much asploding that night

[Wolf]

[strife777]

To put it bluntly, this is why I haven't like any of the gAIM's as of yet. And yes, I've never finished one, but I don't need to eat a whole cup of chili to realize that's a finger and not meat.

1) It never delivered the hot thesbian action it seemed to promise. The characters had holes the size of lower Kenneybunkport, and yeah, I can ignore them, but whats the point? I know when I'm talking to someone who's lying, and as much you can write out who and what your character is, unless you're a real good con artist, it comes off as phony to me.

2) I felt it was restrictive towards what I had to do in real life. Some days/weekends, I wasn't around when these "chats" were going on, and thats why I really quit the game. It's boring to read the day after chats. Gouge my eyes out with a mattress boring, and yet, it was the only way to catch up to the story. ILB's did one thing right in this regard, all the "Live Interaction" opened up interesting media for everybody else. So if you couldn't hit a payphone, or missed an axon day...you wouldnt really fall behind. The Live chats with Melissa was great for those that got it, but not necessary for enjoyment of the plot-line. Usually AIM based games are. (Note: AIM based games, not games that use AIM as a method, AIM BASED. So don't say well this game used AIM, but also used 40 other methods to appease everyone else. Different thing.)

3) The characters come off as fake because of being too trusting. This is actually a big problem I have with ARG's on both sides of the virtual line we're discussing. Hell, you're imming me for the first time, and you're spilling all these major world-breaking secrets before even checking if I'm a sex-bot in disguise? I mean I guess there has to be an easy break-down in the characters walls to let people in and progress the game, but the characters have no blocks up what-so-ever. (Insert counter-argument that shows same point with non-AIM oriented game).

4) AIM is one of the worst mediums to express emotion or to generate feeling, ever. It absolutely sucks. This isn't the fault of the PM's, its just intrinsicly built in. I personally hate blogs, with a major passion, but at least when the characters are trying to express something major, it flows. AIM is like fragments coming through, and it just ruins any grip the text itself has on you. Even when my friends IRL have issues and try to talk to me on AIM, I ask them to call me. Emotional attachment, whether its like or dislike for a character, is what keeps me attached to an ARG. AIM makes me apathetic.

On another note, I'm starting to not-understand what the point of this thread is anymore. Are we trying to define what an ARG is? Are we trying to determine if a gAIM is an ARG? Was this all just a ploy to see Scarpe's tushie?

[NashCarey]

In case anyone missed it, Hugh Briss of ARGTalk has something to say too.

http://www.argtalk.squarespace.com/argreviews/2005/4/7/the-art-of-args.html

I hope he doesn't mind me putting this here.

[krystyn]