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thebruce
Dances With Wikis


Joined: 16 Aug 2004
Posts: 6899
Location: Kitchener, Ontario

 		"For Perplex City, did everyone knows that you are the puppet master, why you reveal itself? Moreover how to know if Adrian Hon is not a character of fiction?"

Sounds like Adrian may have be talking to a dumb AI Razz

now for some real fun, translate to a different language, then translate the translation to english... Laughing
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 23, 2005 11:46 am
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vpisteve
Asshatministrator


Joined: 30 Sep 2002
Posts: 2441
Location: 1987

 		*cough*

just remember, these reporters (who are usually very nice) very often peruse these forums. Wink
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 23, 2005 1:00 pm
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thebruce
Dances With Wikis


Joined: 16 Aug 2004
Posts: 6899
Location: Kitchener, Ontario

 		*shifty eyes*

Wasn't intended as a dis to the reporter - we know the 'english' is translated from another language, it's the translation that's funny Wink
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PostPosted: Thu Mar 24, 2005 12:06 am
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beano³
Veteran


Joined: 24 Oct 2004
Posts: 135
Location: Liverpool Docks

 		Guardian 4th April 2005
Clocked this morning with an interesting image of one Tanners Cube's claiming it to be 'The Cube' OMG! Tanner's in-game!

The game with no aim

As the latest interactive puzzle hits the streets and the web, Paul Carr meets the man behind Perplex City - a cult in the making

Monday April 4, 2005
The Guardian

So this is what an undisclosed location looks like. It is a balmy March evening and I am standing on the 5th floor of an anonymous office building in south London. I am here to meet the man - if indeed he is a man - behind Perplex City, the puzzle game that is gearing up to become the interactive phenomenon of the year. Secrecy is everything at Perplex City. Secrecy and flat-screen monitors, scores of which are crammed into the small room that acts as the top secret headquarters for the game's controllers.

The first anyone knew about Perplex City was when cryptic adverts were placed in newspapers around the world (including the Times and the Guardian) asking for help in finding a mysterious missing object known as "the Cube". No contact information was given - just a link to a site called perplexcity.com. Meanwhile around the world, hundreds of postcards simultaneously appeared in clubs, bars, shops and other public places, all containing subtle clues that led to the same website.

To someone who casually stumbles upon it, this all seems pretty meaningless. But for anyone familiar with the world of 21st century puzzles, the cards, the cryptic adverts, the site - they only mean one thing. The start of a brand new "alternate reality game".

But first some background. When history looks back and considers the phenomenon of early-21st century film hype, two letters will stand out like towering, disappointing giants. The letters are "AI". Make no mistake, Steven Spielberg's 2001 robo-flick, Artificial Intelligence: AI, was by far the most grotesque example of over-hyping and under-delivering ever to be discharged from the Hollywood creative sewer. But to be fair to Spielberg, it is hard to imagine how any film could possibly live up to the very special kind of hype that preceded its release. While most films make do with a poster campaign and a tightly-edited, deep-voiced trailer, the AI team asked Microsoft to create a truly ground-breaking type of interactive advertisement. Codenamed The Beast, it was not so much a game as a totally immersive on-and-offline adventure that grabbed players by the throat and threw them in to a fantasy world of murder, intrigue and seemingly unsolvable puzzles.

What those bemused players in 2001 did not realise, as they trawled for clues on the web and waited for late-night phone calls from fictional characters, was that they were witnessing the birth of the alternate reality game, or ARG - defined on a leading fan site as "an obsession-inspiring genre that blends real-life treasure hunting, interactive storytelling, video games and online community." The success of the Beast led to an avalanche of similar ARGs, to promote everything from "urban" T-shirt brands to pulp spy novels. But the level of round-the-clock commitment required by players meant that most of the copycats vanished without trace, with only a handful - like Electronic Arts' Majestic and Nokia's Nokia Game - registering as more than a passing blip on the cultural trend radar.

For a couple of years it looked as if ARGs were destined to join Letsbuyit.com and Barcode Battlers in the e-dustbin of nice ideas that never really caught on. But then two things happened. First came the broadband explosion, creating a vast army of people who spend hours online every day looking for something to do. And then, not long afterwards, Dan Brown's book The Da Vinci Code shot to the top of the bestseller charts, introducing those very same people to the world of extreme puzzle solving. High-speed internet access, a horde of puzzle freaks - it was only a matter of time before ARGs were back with a vengeance.

The first signs of the ARG revival came when Microsoft launched an ingenious game called I Love Bees, to promote Halo 2 on the Xbox. Like AI, the game began with a weblink hidden in an advertisement. Initially the link appeared to lead to the blog of an amateur beekeeper, but before long the site was "hacked" and replaced with chapters of a story. Of course, this being an ARG, the chapters were, in fact, ingenious clues which led players to real-life payphones scattered across the world. Anyone who went to one of the phones at a pre-arranged time, answered it and gave the correct password, would unlock a new chapter and a new set of clues. The game was a huge online hit, winning its creators a prestigious Game Developers Choice Award and spawning a whole new base of fans who flocked to ARG fan sites like ARGN.com to eagerly await the next game to arrive on the scene.

Which brings us to Perplex City, and me to south London, for a meeting with the as-yet-unidentified mastermind of this year's most talked about ARG. For the purposes of this story, I will call him Michael Smith. He may share a name, and a face, with the 30-year-old founder of gadget e-tailer Firebox.com, but that is where the similarities end. Because in Perplex City, Michael is the puppetmaster - the leader of a team of full-time puzzle-makers whose job is to ensure that the clues that make up Perplex City are so mind-bendingly difficult that even the collective brains of thousands of players will struggle to solve them.

The team's most recent wheeze was to lead players to the famous zebra crossing at Abbey Road where, at a precise time, a character would hand over envelopes containing clues to the next phase of the game. But only if the players worked out the secret password in time. "About 20 people turned up and hundreds more watched via the Abbey Road webcam," says a clearly delighted Smith. "It's amazing". Indeed it is. But what is even more amazing is that none of the players had any idea why they were there or what they were playing for. There are persistent rumours of a big cash prize for whoever locates the mysterious "cube", but Smith remains tight- lipped about the exact aim of the game. Not that the players seem to care - for dedicated ARGers it is the taking part that counts. Smith does, however, hint that the current phase of the game is only the beginning - a trailer, if you will, for something even bigger and even more exciting. But what? "You'll have to play the game to find out." Of course. Sorry I asked. But whatever the next phase of the game turns out to be, it is certainly going to be vast - the walls of the Perplex City office are plastered with artist's impression of game characters, only a fraction of whom have so far been revealed to players.

"Who's the one who looks like Harold Shipman?" I ask, pointing to a sinister-looking chap with a beard - but Smith ignores me, with a smile. Suddenly I am paranoid. What if they are not characters at all - what if they are just red herrings to put me off the scent? If I come back tomorrow will this office even still be here? Who is Agent Smith working for? Is he the Matrix? And that is when I understand the brilliance of ARGs - like no other type of entertainment they create a constant sense amongst players that literally anything is possible. Smith says: "I'm absolutely convinced that ARGs are going to be a major new area of the entertainment industry - affecting film, TV, print publishing and video games. Big companies in Hollywood and the video game industry are starting to wake up to their potential. It's still very early days but I think the growth of ARGs over the next few months and years will be explosive."

But for now world domination will have to wait - the puppetmaster has more immediate concerns. While we have been talking, players have discovered the next phase of the game - an online newspaper called the Perplex City Sentinel (perplexcitysentinel.com). Already the fan forums are abuzz with theories on what lies behind the mysterious subscription-only wall and what it all means for the search for the cube.

One player even suggests that the Guardian might be involved in some way - after all is not Sentinel another word for Guardian? By God, he is right. I scribble down the URL on the back of Harold Shipman, slip him into my back pocket and make my excuses. I have to get a computer. The clock is ticking - and the cube is not going to find itself.

-------

And that's that ---- folks registered to the media guardian online can check the article out here or the Media supplement of the Guardian is available around the globe.

Back to the grind with me...

/me opens shady explorer window for ARG's Wink
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< ^BonoVox^> From the forum: Cube player at Ar holds up message to webcam: "Dinah, bring beer we are parched"

PostPosted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 4:57 am
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tanner
Entrenched


Joined: 21 May 2003
Posts: 875
Location: (x,y,z,t,i, ...)+

 		haha --- my card cube is famous Very Happy Very Happy Very Happy
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PostPosted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 5:44 am
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tanner
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Joined: 21 May 2003
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 		edit -- repeated post
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PostPosted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 5:44 am
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Paul Carr
Guest


 		Re: Guardian 4th April 2005
beano³ wrote:
Clocked this morning with an interesting image of one Tanners Cube's claiming it to be 'The Cube' OMG! Tanner's in-game!


Hi there,

Paul Carr here. Just dropped in to clarify the cube picture that was used to illustrate my feature on Perplex City. It seems a Guardian picture editor got carried away on Google Image Search, assumed that the card cube was in fact The Cube and dropped it in to the article. I didn't find out until I saw the published article this morning. Sorry for any confusion caused.

Best,

Paul
paulSPLATthefridayproject.co.uk

[EDIT: Splatted Paul's e-mail. yanka. ]

PostPosted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 5:55 pm
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tanner
Entrenched


Joined: 21 May 2003
Posts: 875
Location: (x,y,z,t,i, ...)+

 		oh well -- no-ones gonna be looking for my cube anymore -- and i was gonna flog it on ebay Very Happy Very Happy Very Happy Very Happy Very Happy
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tanner³ -- Join the PXC team on SETI@home
"And the princess and the prince discuss what's real and what is not,
But it doesn't matter inside the Gates of Eden" - BD

PostPosted: Tue Apr 05, 2005 10:12 am
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thebruce
Dances With Wikis


Joined: 16 Aug 2004
Posts: 6899
Location: Kitchener, Ontario

 		My local nespaper - the KW Record had an editorial on PPC... so the question is, where is the author Naomi Powell? Is eh on these forums? hmm...

sorry, the record's site is pay-only subscription Razz it sucks... but I'll quote it here if y'all want... nothing too special, and for some reason it sounded like another article I read, but I guess when you keep reading general overviews of ARGs and PPC, it's hard to find them unique Smile
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PostPosted: Tue Apr 19, 2005 2:53 pm
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SpaceBass
The BADministrator


Joined: 20 Sep 2002
Posts: 2701
Location: pellucidar

 		I'd like to see that article, thebruce, if you don't mind transcribing it. Smile
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PostPosted: Tue Apr 19, 2005 3:35 pm
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Alex Smith
Decorated


Joined: 30 Jul 2004
Posts: 162
tanner wrote:
oh well -- no-ones gonna be looking for my cube anymore -- and i was gonna flog it on ebay Very Happy Very Happy Very Happy Very Happy Very Happy


HOAX!
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PostPosted: Tue Apr 19, 2005 4:11 pm
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thebruce
Dances With Wikis


Joined: 16 Aug 2004
Posts: 6899
Location: Kitchener, Ontario
Quote:
Real world and fictional world collide in Internet game
NAOMI POWELL
(Apr 19, 2005) link

I have fallen down the rabbit hole. At the bottom? A parallel universe, a city called Perplex and a spectre named Sente.

Now that I'm here, I'm not sure how to get out.

I'm talking about Perplex City, the latest creation in the burgeoning genre of "Alternate Reality Gaming."

ARGs (as they are known among my more web-literate friends) are essentially mysteries that unfold online. Players attempt to solve the mystery by unscrambling puzzles and deciphering clues.

What makes these games truly unique however, is that their tentacles quite often reach out of the Internet and into the "real world."

A game character might call you in the middle of the night to give you a cryptic message. An advertisement might appear in the newspaper containing instructions to meet a particular character in a real location in a major city.

"It's interactive fiction on steroids," said Steve Peters, a founder of the Alternate Reality Gaming Network, a site dedicated to the genre. "A book is static on the page, but ARGs allow the real world and the fictional world to collide. It blurs the lines between the real and the unreal."

All of which is a little creepy, but strangely addictive. I know this because I have stayed up many, many hours past my bedtime trying to crack the story.

As far as anyone knows so far, Perplex City is a parallel universe. One of its most prominent citizens is Sente, chair of the Perplex City Academy and father of Scarlett Kiteway, a journalism student and blogger. Sente is leading the search for "The Cube," a Perplex City artifact that was lost somewhere on Earth.

In true ARG form, the first mention of the cube appeared in the "Notices" section of USA Today.

"LOST. The Cube," it read. "Reward offered. Not only an object of great importance to the city, but also a technological wonder."

Now, if you weren't part of the game, this particular ad would mean nothing to you. If you are a player or ARGer, however, you would recognize it as an essential clue. You would grasp the paper in your hands, rush to your computer and immediately consult your online community or "collective detective" on what it means.

A recent clue led players to the Abbey Road Studios website, which features a live webcam pointing at the famous Abbey Road crossing in London, England. Players were instructed to meet a character named Dinah at the crossing at 1 p.m. on March 19.

About two dozen ARGers from the area showed up at the crossing while tens of thousands of others watched the scene unfold on the VIA webcam. Dinah handed out envelopes filled with clues.

And so the story opened up a little more.

If all of this sounds confusing, it is, because Adrian Hon designed it that way. Hon is the London-based "puppetmaster" or controller of the game and at 22, he is something of a god in the world of ARGs.

When searching for a team to help run Perplex City, Hon posted a riddle in the jobs section of several major newspapers.

"There's no way to advertise a job like this," he said. "And I needed the right people."

In addition to Perplex City, Hon has also written an online guide to one of the biggest ARGs so far: the Beast, which ran in 2001 as a marketing vehicle for Stephen Spielberg's A.I.

And here, at long last, is the catch. Almost all ARGs are marketing vehicles of some kind. More specifically, they are guerrilla marketing vehicles -- the kind that get their message out by creating word-of-mouth.

Although Hon won't say what sort of vehicle Perplex City is or how he plans to bring his sponsor into the game, it is sure to emerge sooner or later.

In the meantime, at least we've finally found a form of advertisement that doesn't appeal to our most base instincts. ARGs don't prod at our insecurities or secret desires, they ask us to use our brains to figure out the story.

"It doesn't feel like an ad," says Peters. "It's a cool game that keeps you wondering what's a clue and what's not. Everybody's satisfied at the end."

Satisfied, and a little paranoid.

"Is this interview a clue?" I asked Hon.

"It could be."


I wanna know if she's on these forums Razz
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PostPosted: Tue Apr 19, 2005 5:58 pm
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SpaceBass
The BADministrator


Joined: 20 Sep 2002
Posts: 2701
Location: pellucidar

 		Thanks tb. Smile
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PostPosted: Tue Apr 19, 2005 6:49 pm
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Rolerbe
Unfettered


Joined: 01 Mar 2005
Posts: 330
Location: North America
thebruce wrote:
I'll quote it here if y'all want...


Why not just send the link to Scarlett (our off-world news truffle hound) and let her quote it for all of us? Wink
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PostPosted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 10:01 am
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Mikeyj
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Joined: 18 Oct 2004
Posts: 1847
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 		Well..seeing as no-one mentioned it yet...there was a lovely juicy section on the Culture Show, BBC2 7:00 pm UK 12th may 2005, presented by Thinking Man's Crumpet TM Mariella Frostrup and a lovely scottish lady who lurks and finds our posts very amusing *MikeyJ Waves and invites a post* Wink
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PostPosted: Thu May 12, 2005 4:49 pm
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