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[LindbergMTL]

About Losing Track of the Curtain...

[Daeld]

In the News & Rumors Page, have you seen the thread on:
Spooky Video- You will never catch me.

Some ppl wanted to call the police and report the "murders". Some ppl still think they should.

[Nighthawk]

The currently running Junko Junsui game has blurred the line numerous times already. People who were most obviously the puppetmasters have become "in game" characters. Websites and agencies that at first appeared only to be the creators of the content (Flash designers, for example) are now "in game" by providing clues on their own website. And then there have been the personal attacks on players, myself included, that transcend the bounds of the game environment.

And that's not to mention the Facebook messages they are posting taking credit or assigning blame for terrorist attacks, posts that are very eerily close to the time at which they actually take place.

-=-

Also, FYI... recently there was a game that was just starting. The PM sent out a mass mailing to an email list supposedly of all players.

Unfortunately, that list also included, among other emails...

1) The webmaster of the Department of Justice website
2) The webmaster of the White House
3) Two United States Senators

Considering the content of the email was alluding to a future terrorist threat, all hell broke loose and the game ended quickly.

[LindbergMTL]

Daeld and Nighthawk, your replies shed some light on blurring the curtain.

Has anyone wondered if the phone call, or the email, or even the person you met on the street is or isn't related to a game you're playing?

It would be great if I could get a story where a player went really far down one path before realizing he or she was in the game, or the reverse, it actually had nothing to do with the game.

[Nighthawk]

Well I don't know how much it relates to the ARG, but there was this incident in the "Tropic Hunt"...

In case you don't know, the "Tropic Hunt" is a yearly event put together by Dave Barry and the Miami Herald, and it consists of a series of puzzles spread out across an area. The players have to go to each puzzle, solve it based on the information they acquire there, and then at the end take all the answers plus one more given to them at the end and win the game.

Needless to say, this event requires a lot of cooperation from the hosting city, because it essentially involves hundreds of people running back and forth over an area that could be several blocks wide. And these people will scrutinize ANYTHING they see, trying to decide if it's part of the "game" or not.

One year it was in Coconut Grove, and there was one puzzle right on Main Avenue in front of CocoWalk. At the time, people didn't know what the puzzle was about (there was a reference to "body heat"; they were broadcasting a message on radio frequency 98.6). So the players, unsure of what to do, began exploring...

At the time, right next to Cocowalk, was an elementary school. Wondering if there was some sort of clue in there, people BROKE IN TO THE SCHOOL, on a Sunday no less. Pretty soon the herd followed, and there was a line of people plowing through the school looking for information that simply wasn't there.

People were called out and flooded the school to get everyone out. Dave Barry had to himself go on scene, and they had to post visual signs as well as broadcast on the air that "the school is NOT part of this game!"

[LindbergMTL]

Wow, do we lose our judgment when we play ?

In my synopsis, I am imagining a player on the street talking to strangers as she thinks there may be an actor who is waiting for a player, with an important message.

One dude tells her that he doesn't understand what she's talking about, and when her back is turned, he tries to zap her with a botfighter type of program on his phone.

The world, for a player, can become a world of suspicion and intrigue... and you don't know who or what is game or reality.

Another question: has there been false endings in ARGs, such as the news that the ultimage puzzle has been solved, and later finding out that it was false?

[ndemeter]

Two quotes that might hopefully put this matter to rest:

[Giskard]

Re: About Losing Track of the Curtain...

[Mos]

I remember a case back in 2004 where we had a player that refused to treat a character as if they were really a character. It was a teenage girl talking to what was supposed to be a ruthless, manipulating female antagonist. The ARG was innovative in that a very substantial portion of the story was told through direct player-character interaction. Said player fell in love with the female antagonist, taking her as a role model for every day life. She began divulging all of her secrets and thoughts and emotions, convinced that the PM behind the character were one and the same. Incidentally, multiple PMs were playing that particular character.

It was an interesting, uncomfortable, and ethically puzzling. We ultimately decided to break character with her (repeatedly). There is a limit to TINAG, and I think you draw that line when people allow themselves to become so emotionally connected to the game that it ceases to actually be a game to them.