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 Forum index » Archive » Archive: General » Old News & Rumors
[Trailhead] I'm Sorry
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Kyra's Vengeance
Boot

Joined: 10 Apr 2009
Posts: 30

 		Loose Ends
I wonder if we could clear up a few loose ends.

-What was the point of all the Freemasonry references? They did not seem to fit into the story yet using Jacques de Molay got us feeling all Dan Brownish inside.


-I thought the writing was high level...I knew it was done by a professional. But curious why you chose to use "the One" and "the Oracle" as characters, given that those character names were already in use by a fairly popular movie trilogy. If you had ever had plans to publish, wouldn't that little detail have made it tough?


-A character named Holly showed up after a Capt Holly posted lots of what turned out to be Dreamsend inspired OOG material. Did you name your Holly after that one?

-Speaking of Dreamsend, you say he contacted you. In what way? He never posted any such correspondence...would be very interested to know what was said.

-Dreamsend did suggest Matheny was behind this. Did you ever hear from Matheny or contact him to clarify things?

-You grew frustrated about people leaving, yet your attempt to win them back (one at least) was to send email explaining the nature of the project and encouraging them not to leave despite the shaky start. Yet you used an in-game character name (Bernard Starr) to do this. Didn't that seem a little counterproductive?

-Speaking of Starr, why use a real person's name whose real life identity was not that different from the character? Starr's page. It is an unusual name, so this seems like a risky choice, since Google goes right to him. A psychologist who even wrote a book called "Escape Your Own Prison"? Why subject the man to arg-inspired lunacy? I am quite surprised he was not contacted more than he was, though I never heard anyone say they had gotten a response back from him.

-At times in the game there were suggestions of gamejacking such as with the posters. Grady Martin never saw those posters anywhere, though another player who showed up for just a couple posts, found them and supposedly "altered" them. Were the posters all taken down by coincidence right after they were "discovered" on this forum?

-Why use obvious references to Donnie Darko in that poster? Again, didn't you think that might lead to some confusion? And again, you used that rabbit image in conjunction with a plotline about a deadline for the world to end. You are a good writer, so why borrow elements like that...especially given how often args are used as movie marketing now? Did you WANT us to think this was a Darko tie-in?

- Who was Diana Madden? Was she really your mom (didn't we confirm this with genealogy searches)? She died in 97 or so, right? Am I the only one who found the use of your late mom in a plotline about molestation at a theatre to be particularly disturbing? And am I understanding this right? You had a ticket from the Curran Theatre from 1990 with your mom's name on it and it didn't creep you out to add the blood and involve your mom in that way?

- Was the entire purpose of the As a Man Thinketh book just the numbers on the Bible verse cards? What is the inscription on the wedding ring (can't quite read it in the photo).

- Finally, you say 2 of 5 computers were hacked. How did you know they were hacked and not just broken or virus infected? Was that what led to the question mark symbols on your Bricker page? They looked like encoding errors yet they were sprinkled all over the html of your Bricker page. Why would someone do that? Of course, that would have had to have been a server hack, not a computer hack so what did the hackers do to your computers? Oh, and why did you need 5 computers to run this game?

In short, (too late for that, I guess), I think there are an awful lot of loose ends here, at least in my mind. Care to tie any of them off for us?

PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 1:08 pm
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Kyra's Vengeance
Boot

Joined: 10 Apr 2009
Posts: 30

 		Synchro-generating...
Some args, focusing the attention of many people into a shared but fictional reality, can lead to all sorts of coincidences and synchronicities. One that got this arg off track was an early reference by "TT" to Lunar Park, a novel by Brett Easton Ellis. Now that we see how this has played out, it is clear BB borrowed the idea of a fictional construct featuring a character who also happens to be the author (not the first such, of course).

Brett Easton Ellis also is, according to a rather misspelling laden blurb in Variety, the screenwriter for the upcoming Theresa Duncan biopic. So that is partly how that got started. Oddly, though is no real confirmation that such a film is being made.

A film version Lunar Park itself is, according to IMDB, in preproduction for a 2011 release. There is also listed an untitled production as well.

Combine this with an early Beck reference (Loser Baby), Beck figured very heavily in the Duncan story, and the rest is ARG history...such as it is.

PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 1:54 pm
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Kelvinator
Boot

Joined: 05 Apr 2009
Posts: 31

 		Loose Ends?
attihurl182 wrote:
Mr. Bricker, you sir are a genius Very Happy


I appreciate your comment...but I find it hard to agree! I'm just a writer who loves the concept of alternate reality experiences. Thanks, though!

Kyra's Vengeance wrote:
A lot of questions sprinkled with what seems like vague animosity and suspicion.


Wow. Where to begin? I guess at the beginning.

This entire story and game came from my life, my experiences and my imagination. So there are many parallels to be drawn - which shouldn't surprise anyone.

I am and always will be a Master Mason but have been inactive in the Lodge for a number of years. Including the Masonry references was both a nod to that organization as well a great way for Rage to initially draw interest to the game.

I have been writing the TGATT story off and on since the late 70s and included the terms "Oracle" and "One" about 1988. Once The Matrix came out and became popular I figured that if I ever published this I'd deal with it at that point.

In the original story Holly was named Kelly...but since the Kelly bit had accidentally been found with the W.T. Hatch blog I had to change the name. Holly sounded like Kelly. I think that's all there was to that, although there was a Captain Holly in Watership Down.

Dreamsend contacted me through the Oraclewatch site. I can't answer why he kept that private and I felt no need to disclose it.

I never contacted Matheny - or saw a reason to - although for a brief time (if I remember correctly) I noticed him following one or more people who were following or involved in the game. He never made any attempt to contact me.

As for encouraging people to stay using IG characters - it seemed like an interesting idea at the time and I knew that I could tie it into the story later if need be.

Oddly, my fictional psychologist was named Bernard Starr long before I discovered a real psychologist named Bernard Starr. In fact, I found the real guy during the course of this game and by then it was too late to change it.

There were flyers placed in Union Square -- but they were already altered when placed since the alteration was part of the game. I never made any attempt to remove them.

I think that Donnie Darko is a work of genius and included the references to tie some cool pop culture into the story. I actually never really thought about plot parallels on any deep level, knew nothing of the new S. Darko movie and never thought that this game would be tied in any serious way to that franchise.

My goal going into this entire project was to see if I could create a good, fun, and playable ARG that would be inexpensive, based on characters and interactions instead of a maze of websites and tons of puzzles, codes, and actors. My goal was to spend less than $100 on the game. Had I not gone to Portland or had computer problems, I would have succeeded! The involvement of real life elements (a) fit the story since Bricker was a character, and (b) helped with time and money because they already existed. The ticket, the photos...everything was real and just worked into the story. As for using my mother's name in a "disturbing" plotline about molestation at a theater or adding blood to a real theater ticket to obscure her name...all were just convenient ways to move the story. And since my mom has been dead for awhile, I don't think she minded. Laughing I actually found Rage's relationship to his sister to be much more disturbing than the parts that involved my mother!

As A Man Thinketh was used first to add depth to Port's character and secondly to provide the clues for what would be the final puzzle. It was the most worn looking book that I owned and thought that it would play the part well. I think the inscription on the ring was just the gold content or the manufacturer or something. All in all a valuable bit of swag for Wulf74 - if he hasn't already shipped it off to Cash-4-Gold!

As for the computers...I'm a luddite. Truly. I used five computers out of convenience. Three at home and two elsewhere. And when two of them started losing files and stopped working I called a Geek who informed me that they had been "hacked". I understood that word, paid for whatever he did and moved on. Is it possible that he was trying to sell me software and service? Absolutely!

In addition, I had Lunar Park on my bookshelf and in reading the back immediately saw the parallels with with this already active game and thought it would be fun to throw it in the mix.

As for Beck...or any of the music in this game really...I just included stuff that I liked or that had lyrics/meaning to the storyline. I mean, I just had to use John Denver's "I'm Sorry" right? I had never even heard of the Theresa Duncan story until it was brought into this game from the outside.

I hope I've answered your questions around these topics. I think it was a fun game with a good story and based on the other comments on here that's how it will be remembered.

That's all I can ask for.
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Responsible for: I'm Sorry

"When I die, I want to go peacefully in my sleep like my Uncle Feezel did. Not screaming like everyone else in his car."

PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 2:31 pm
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classical
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 		Hm.
So how was it meant to be read that you had the knowledge of all that was happening? Or, blah, you meaning you as a character. Is it that the writer somehow instated all the characters and the plot between them in our reality simply by writing them down... or were the characters intented to be "real" people and the writer was merely really good at predicting their actions? (Or is there really a difference? Am I making sense today? Haha.)
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 3:26 pm
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Kelvinator
Boot

Joined: 05 Apr 2009
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classical wrote:
Am I making sense today? Haha.


Just because I don't understand your questions doesn't mean that you're not making sense. Wink

I guess you could say there was a crossover - from the fictional to the real. I think that the writer was no longer able to effectively predict actions once the characters became real and made their own choices.

Or perhaps it was all fictional and you were the ones who crossed over from the real. That's a cool perspective that I hadn't thought of! Of course...isn't that what happens whenever we go to movies, read books or play games?

Clear as mud now, right?
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Responsible for: I'm Sorry

"When I die, I want to go peacefully in my sleep like my Uncle Feezel did. Not screaming like everyone else in his car."

PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 3:34 pm
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classical
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Kelvinator wrote:
Clear as mud now, right?


Crystal, Captain! :3
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 3:37 pm
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Kyra's Vengeance
Boot

Joined: 10 Apr 2009
Posts: 30
Thanks for the reply
You are an interesting fellow..a Luddite with three computers, a Master Mason who links a real life scary story of Masonic murder into his arg, and for someone who takes 30 years to complete a novel, a rather quick creator of content to boot.

I suggested the Ellis material and the rest was part of the synchronicity machine args sometimes turn out to be (Matheny played with this concept explicitly in his own material). But the level was pretty high with this one. Even the timing...an arg that started with Masonic references so central to Dan Brown's simplistic "secret history" mythos, ends only 6 days before the release of Brown's new book...about Freemasons in America (one can only hope it is Illuminati free, this time.) Even the book's tattooed bad boy has resonance, his name is Malakh or something like that. Supposed to mean "angel". Between you and me, and I mean this sincerely, you are a much better writer than Dan Brown. I liked his ideas better when they were in Foucault's Pendulum and written by Umberto Eco.

But this is all part of a longer running storyline including incredibly sophisticated and sustained hoaxes (Priory of Sion) made more powerful and dynamic by the internet and conspiracy culture. You obviously know this as you suggested the original Masonic references were designed to attract attention. But now you know that introducing these themes into an online community is, simply put, a "weird magnet". I acknowledge that I am part of the weird that got attracted.

And within this context, the virtual substrate provided by Matheny's very longrunning Ong's Hat project (which still lives on in some ways) could not help but be noticed by anyone with a sense of arg history. Even Port's starting location was rife with meaning. Ong's Hat is in New Jersey, for example. Many of the characters in that whole storyworld are real people as well. Matheny of course. NIck Herbert, Hakim Bey, etc.

I thought much of this would be of interest to arg players, if not arg designers. Matheny was inserting himself into his own storylines (via online content and comic books) well before Ellis did so in Lunar Park, and continues to do so in ways most people aren't even aware of. His new project I guess never got off the ground, though (called Citizen Y about a mental institution or something like that...not clear how that relates to the filming he did recently at the Manson family ranch in CA). It was supposed to have filmed this summer and blur lines in new ways....the crew would be part of the story, for example. To my knowledge there was no Oracle involved. Razz

There is a whole community of memetic architects out there who can do this sort of thing in their sleep, and while I suppose I do find it a little hard to believe that a first time arg designer could be unaware of all that and still have created this complex project, I suppose maybe you just stumbled into it. you should read the history...spend some time googling Ong's Hat. Your project is far more in that tradition than some of the more carefully delineated (no pm posting in a discussion forum type rules) args of today. Not saying that you didn't break any new ground...only that you have rediscovered some old ground as well.

Oh, one last question...what was the significance of the date on the Dali crucifixion picture? Or that pic in general?

PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 3:38 pm
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Kelvinator
Boot

Joined: 05 Apr 2009
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Thanks for the reply
Kyra's Vengeance wrote:
You are an interesting fellow..a Luddite with three computers, a Master Mason who links a real life scary story of Masonic murder into his arg, and for someone who takes 30 years to complete a novel, a rather quick creator of content to boot.


Now that you put it that way I seem a bit odd, don't I?

I really appreciate your perspective on both this game and the other games/stories/communities that you have experience with. And for saying that I write better than Dan Brown. I'll have to print that out and stick it right under his fat nose the next time we have dinner!

Kyra's Vengeance wrote:
Not saying that you didn't break any new ground...only that you have rediscovered some old ground as well.

Oh, one last question...what was the significance of the date on the Dali crucifixion picture? Or that pic in general?


Oddly, I really wasn't attempting to break new ground with I'm Sorry, or even to be controversial, I just wanted to run the type of game that I would enjoy playing. And the Dali picture was one of those subtle puzzle-starters that I was hoping someone would follow. The painting was Ayn Rand's favorite and the numbers on the photo corresponded to her birth and death. The Fountainhead is a book I enjoy very much and I had built part of a puzzle structure jumping from that photo to Rand to The Fountainhead and to the CIA group trying to stop the Watchers in my story.

Puzzles in I'm Sorry - because they never really shouted "Hey! I'm a puzzle!" - were more like a fishing trip for me. I'd put a puzzle-starter out and either people ran with it or they didn't.

Man, even with all the weirdness and stress, I loved this game.

Now I miss Rage and Port and Jenny...and everyone who took the time to read and participate.
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Responsible for: I'm Sorry

"When I die, I want to go peacefully in my sleep like my Uncle Feezel did. Not screaming like everyone else in his car."

PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 4:24 pm
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classical
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Kelvinator wrote:
Man, even with all the weirdness and stress, I loved this game.

Now I miss Rage and Port and Jenny...and everyone who took the time to read and participate.


Haha, aww. I'm sure I'm not alone when I say I miss it, too!
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 6:00 pm
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Wulf74
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 		Brian - I do have one question that I guess has been with me since the beginning.
Towards the start of the game, I was supposedly in a chat with you in an iRC channel. At the time, I guess a bunch of irrelevant and not-game related information was given.

I did ask tho, why not just write an ending to the book? And at the time I was told something along the lines of it wouldn't work that way, or something. Was that you? Did I ask too soon?
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 7:31 pm
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Kelvinator
Boot

Joined: 05 Apr 2009
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Wulf74 wrote:
I did ask tho, why not just write an ending to the book? And at the time I was told something along the lines of it wouldn't work that way, or something. Was that you? Did I ask too soon?


Any iRC discussions that occurred with the writer were either Eric, Ron or (once) me under direct duress from Ron (where he was directing my responses). Neither Eric (who was working on a "game") or Ron (who was a government agent working to stop you all) had enough vision to see that finishing the novel could help to end the situation.

Your logic was right on, Wulf...but until the real writer understood the importance of your solution, nothing could be done about it. Thus the occasional clues saying that without the writer you would all fail.

As some after-the-fact-fun, if you guys are successfully able to discover how One For The Brood... Will Lead You To the One Who Did All Of This - then I will disclose the little error that completely changed the face of this game. It's some fun trivia!
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Responsible for: I'm Sorry

"When I die, I want to go peacefully in my sleep like my Uncle Feezel did. Not screaming like everyone else in his car."

PostPosted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 8:08 pm
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classical
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Kelvinator wrote:
As some after-the-fact-fun, if you guys are successfully able to discover how One For The Brood... Will Lead You To the One Who Did All Of This - then I will disclose the little error that completely changed the face of this game. It's some fun trivia!


Weeelll... I did find this.

from the image description wrote:
Treg Bricker, Daisy's brother. AKA Uncle Feezle. He played guitar and fiddle with Bill Monroe and the Virginia Mountain Aires.


"Uncle Feezel", which was the attached image on that post, is actually a guy named Tregoning, who was a brother of the Daisy this page is about. According to this page, Treg was put into an orphanage at a young age and adopted... by a "Dr. Bricker and family".

Quote:
About the "Uncle Feezel" photo...Shirley Coleman MacKinnon informs me that Treg played both guitar and fiddle in the Country Western style (so did another of Daisy's brothers, George). Apparently, Treg and family came down for a weekend from St. Louis and they all got together. A kind of family reunion was held in Carbondale almost every summer. They would have "hoedown" in the yard. Treg played (for how long I don't know) with Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys "around Depression time." Treg also played on KMOX radio as Uncle Feezel. He also was close friends with a Roy Queen band (from south St. Louis)


Quote:
The next series of photographs begins Lee Hubert Hill's (Hubert hereafter) relationship with Daisy Hogue. Daisy was Hubert's first wife; as far as I know, he was her first husband. They were married on Christmas day, 1920, in Cairo, Illinois, Alexander County. It was a double ceremony; Daisy's brother Tregoning and his wife Edith Bricker were married with them. I know next to nothing about Hubert's second marriage to Nell (Lastname); according to his daughter, Sue Casper, Hubert's daughter with his second wife, died at birth or shortly thereafter, and so did the marriage. I found the grave marker for their daughter, born and died in August 1940, at Oakland Cemetery in Carbondale Illinois. I don't know yet where the second marriage took place. Hubert had a sister, Dessie Mae, who married a man named McCleod, and he had a younger brother, Herbert Lee, who died as a youth. The first photo of Hubert and Daisy bicycling shows them fitting together quite well on a bicycle built for two. The other couple could be Treg and Edith. The four were married in a double wedding. The Bricker's firstborn son was William, about the same age as Lee H. Hill Jr. Lee Hill Jr. and Bill Bricker both went on to serve in the navy.


William Bricker. The same William Bricker who married a woman named Diana C Madden, yes?

Uncle Feezel's your grandfather, isn't he?
TregUncleFeezel.jpg
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 15, 2009 11:11 am
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Kelvinator
Boot

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classical wrote:
Uncle Feezel's your grandfather, isn't he?


Bravo, Classical! Although you were one generation off, I'll still give it to you. My family decided to confuse you by having two William Brickers...my father and grandfather. Treg was actually my great grandfather.

You win. I'm heading into a meeting right now, but when I get back to the computer I'll post the dumb mistake that I made in I'm Sorry that actually made the game more interesting for all of us.
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Responsible for: I'm Sorry

"When I die, I want to go peacefully in my sleep like my Uncle Feezel did. Not screaming like everyone else in his car."

PostPosted: Tue Sep 15, 2009 11:24 am
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classical
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Kelvinator wrote:
Bravo, Classical! Although you were one generation off, I'll still give it to you. My family decided to confuse you by having two William Brickers...my father and grandfather. Treg was actually my great grandfather.


Ah! Well that is confusing. :B I knew your mother was married to a William, so I just ran with that.

Also:
International6.jpg
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 15, 2009 11:28 am
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Kelvinator
Boot

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contents of green 512MB lexar firefly
Grady Martin wrote:
the drive has a cute little smiley drawn in felt-tip i've included all 8 files from the jump drive in the attached zip.

contents:

~WRL0190.TMP
~WRL0781.TMP
~WRL2467.TMP
~WRL3768.TMP
~WRL3997.TMP
DRMv1PM.lic
join us.jpg
photothumb.db

TMP files are WORD docs - The Great and The Terrible - a novel by b.d. bricker


So although I designed this game based on the TGATT storyline and characters and was going to ultimately (read "at the end of the game") lead players to me, I never intended to release the manuscript. This was a complete boneheaded mistake made by a guy who had never even heard of hidden temp files.

So imagine my surprise when I got home after planting the thumbdrive in San Francisco to find that Grady had not only found it...but had extracted these shadow files.

It was at that point that I had to make a decision - either just end the game due to my stupidity...or jump in with both feet and make the rest of the manuscript as well as me part of the game.

The I'm Sorry that you ended up playing and enjoying was due solely to that goofy tech error and my on-the-fly recalibration of the whole project.

Almost everything from the moment that Grady posted those manuscript pieces until September 8th was not what I had originally planned.

Boy am I glad that it went so wrong!
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Responsible for: I'm Sorry

"When I die, I want to go peacefully in my sleep like my Uncle Feezel did. Not screaming like everyone else in his car."

PostPosted: Tue Sep 15, 2009 1:04 pm
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