unforum

[bill]

Dave's new book

[Hojo]

I also had the chance to interview Dave before the big announcement. Article is posted over at ARGInsider.

[aliendial]

I see that in addition to Dave himself, our own (OK, ARGN's own) vpisteve gets a nod in the PR release.

Dave is the one who (with much help from his friends) put on Chasing the Wish (last year) and Urban Hunt (this fall). (The latter being the game the rest of UF was playing while I was answering payphones...)

[Alzheimers]

It's an interesting interview. The part I found most dissapointing is where Dave's pretty brutal in criticizing the Grassroots games. I was shocked to see his scathing opinions of small, indepedent games that try get by on a zero-dollar budget:

[cabalagent23]

Not Quite Correct

[Alzheimers]

Thanks for taking the time to reply. As someone who has potential interest in a "Grassroots" level gaming, forgive me if I took some of your comments personally.

While I don't know everything you've ever done, I was aware you were responsible for several games, and for that I congratulate you. Urban Hunt is largely responsible for my interest in the world of Alternate Reality games. However, as such a Senior member of the community I would think your role would be in supporting new and inexperienced gamers and PMs, not dismissing their work and effort.

This is my main issue with how I read your statement. With one hand you emphasise your role as a Friend to the Community, and the other you dismiss out of hand anything that makes the mistake of not coming across as "Real Enough". And your criteria for making this decision is: a top level domain?

While I'll be the first to admit that more professional-looking sites "feel" better, I find it disturbing to dismiss less 'independent' sites as irrelevant. Did ILB's Dana using "ilovebees.blogspot.com" make her posts any less important? Was ProjectGateway any less a success because it's rabbithole was "Projectgateway.tripod.com"? Should we, as a community, shun those sites as tools for the lazy or the cheap, using them as indicators as to the quality of the final product?

Any experienced ARGer should be willing to add just a touch of Suspension of Disbelief when "Agent Z of Shadowy Government Agency X" contacts them personally. Does it take that much more to ignore the fact that Agent Z uses Gmail and they're posting their encrypted messages on a geocities page? Is the limit of our imagination that an AI can teleport itself back from the future and crashland on someone's (hosted!) webserver, but God forbid it's address is Ilovebees.MSN.com!

As for the timing of the game; it's hard to say. As I commented to someone a few weeks ago that it felt like unless you were talking about Aware, Pandora Next, or Sygyzy, you were being ignored. But look: there's Demonworks, there's Adramelech, there's StrangeDreams and Slumberil. I was wrong about that. Do these other games generate as much attention? Probably not. But considering they're not advertising anything either (though Slumberil may be connected with Matrix Online), and there was little to no buzz *before* launch, that's to be expected. Some games create their own Buzz -- ProjectGateway was immensely popular despite it's non-marketing, unannounced origin.

And as someone who ran a successful campaign opposite what was the most popular ARG ever, I'm surprised that you would say

[bill]

Minor press:

http://techfocus.org/comments.php?shownews=4751&catid=8

[vpisteve]

Less minor press :

http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/01/11/1529208&tid=192&tid=10

[MageSteff]

[Alzheimers]

I totally understand the need for realism when you're talking about games designed for a large audience. I totally agree that when a game has it's own domain, it's much more ... attractive? ... to casual players.

My point was I didn't like the way Dave sounded dismissive of any game that *didn't* meet this criteria. It isn't the price issue that bothers me. It's the way he offered his opinion on the subject -- I'm tired of this. This turns me off. It's condescending, and borderline arrogant. But they're his opinions, and he's allowed to feel however he wants.

But to be so dismissive of the sort of Grassroots efforts he claims to be the champion of seemed very...dissapointing. Especially to me, who really appreciates his work and what he's done for the community. It's like Barry Bonds telling three-year-olds not to play T-Ball because it's not against real pitchers so it's doesn't help you train for a career in baseball.

For the record, I have posted relevant questions in the PM forum, with mixed results to these exact sorts of issues. Bill from Deaddrop.us pointed out that there is some free services available for starting PMs (I don't believe Domain Names were part of that though). I even received an offer from Nash Carey for financial and technical assistance should I need it.

No offer ever came from Dave, btw.

[Varin]

[SpaceBass]

[Alzheimers]

I'm not trying to debate opinions. Everyone is entitled to their own opinions. The ARG community will decide what it likes and what it doesn't. Games with unpopular design elements will fade away, because no one will play them.

What I'm saying is, a disservice is being done every time someone's effort to create something for the community is judged not on quality, but on something as arbitrary as a URL. What I read in that interview sounded like Dave declaring that he's the greatest thing to Grassroots gaming since the invention of the keyboard, but oh by the way these games trying to get by on the cheap aren't worthy of existence.

Even worse is the public flogging of anonymous PMs who dared to not meet your standards. You have every right not to agree with their style. You have every right not to play the game. But to use your position in the community to announce your own opinions as fact ("This game is hosted on Tripod -- I decree it CRAP IN A BUCKET!") without knowing a thing about it is wrong. It does a diservice to every one who ever spent a month of late nights trying to put together something for the community that wouldn't become a financial risk. Lets face it, not all games are as good as others. But should someone, as a new PM, have to pay to get their feet wet?

Or, should the ARG community start charging for "PM Licenses" to separate half-hearted efforts from the true hopefuls? Should the criteria be that you have to have at least one corporate sponsor before you release a game, to ensure professional quality?

If Unfiction is really so buried under the weight of crap games, maybe it should require PMs to pass a written competency test before they get their own forum! Or better yet, you already know who would make a good PM. Just limit the games featured to their work and screw the rest. Who cares about that new, random game? It can't be good -- they're not even paying for a host!

Is that what we've come to?

That's all I have to say about this. There's no need for this forum to devolve into a flamepit. To keep things civil, if you would like to continue the converstation feel free to PM me.

[C_Brennan]

After review of this thread a couple times, I've finally gotten up some of the nerve to reply to this thread.

I too have read Dave's interview in preparation for his new book (which I have already saved the money for and I am anxiously awaiting because I want to read all of the past ARGs in one sitting as well as get some PMing tips from the person who I look up to as a great PM) and I was as well stunned by his comments. Especially when I believed (I may be wrong about this) he was speaking of Project Gateway and my behavior with that game. So, of course, if any ears were perked up after that interview, mine certainly were.

I am the first to admit Project Gateway had alot of things in it that I was not pleased with. First off, I agree with Dave all the way when he said I should have planned it out before hand. My idea there was to make a game that would follow the players to the "T" and be able to flow around their actions. It ended up being more of a Nightmare than the title "Project Gateway into Nightmares" said it would be. But, also, this is how I write. I write in quick bursts over time, and I am by nature horrible at planning. Something I am working to correct with my endeavor into Wildfire Industries and own other personal endeavors with other things.

Second, as I have apologized in the past, I apologize for treading on thin ground with character interaction. My players know that I was banned from Unforums twice for breaking the board's concept of characters not posting on these boards and since I have incurred SpaceBass's wrath from that point out. At first I didn't know it was illegal to do character interactions on Unfiction. Then, as I went further into PG, I learned from Mr. Nash Carey and Mr. SpaceBass about the two different ideas of character interaction that UF and IU had.

When I posted the second time in character, as a mocking Rowen Darkblade who was laughing at the players as the time to the firing of the Nightmare Cannon slowly ticked down, Mr. SpaceBass quickly deleted my single mocking post on UF's Project Gateway board and banned my account the second time. Once again, he is right with what he did. I, at the time, did not understand that characters couldn't participate ANYWHERE on UF.

Lastly, I attempted in all possible measures to make sure that my "free websites" made sense. I was well aware, as should any PM when they use free websites, that the reality makes sense. In the words of my characters:

Stephen Roberts - "I stuck Project Gateway on Comcast with the hopes of it not being noticed by the Shadow Government. I also knew that the program would flourish in the interconnected environment and slowly spread to other websites, gaining more and more of a chance for CyberStrike to awaken from his locked state and send out a call of help."

Emily Freedman - "I'm just a 15 year old girl with a site I like to put music on, and I don't have much money, so I use Freewebs."

Father George - "We're just getting up with this Internet business. And the Order isn't exactly rich because we don't exactly have 1 million active practicioners... so we had Brendan throw us a simple website on an affordable server... which means its free..."

And the last website, Information Cyclone, was paid for and done more professionally than the rest because it was programmed by CyberStrike himself and run by two upper-class brothers.

But, overall what I'm trying to say through all of this and all of this mentioning of my own work is to try not to judge the work by how much money or time is put in. In the end, Project Gateway had happy people leave its doors and others have told me over time that they wished they had jumped on the PG bandwagon because it seemed interesting and fun. That is the goal of my work, to make some people happy and keep them entertained for as long as I can. But, I am merely a college student who used some leftover funds from his book money to create a small alternate reality game by himself with no team involved. I tried my best at an art I was new and unfamiliar with and with an empty pocket.

Of course, after that Mr. Nash Carey was kind enough to offer me resources and funds to produce what everyone knows here as Wildfire Industries. And with Wildfire in production, I look forward to correcting some of the mistakes that Project Gateway contained. And above all, I look forward the most to bringing people a world of excitement, intrigue, and black comedy. And a world where there's no free websites. Thanks again for your support Nash!

I am far from in competition with anyone. Each ARG offers it's own style and unique interactions. So, really, you're not splitting the audience as much as you might think. You're giving people the opportunities to do what they wish to do. If they love cults, they can rush on over to the Cult of Cult of Adramelech. If they dig the supernatural, maybe Josh's Strange Dreams is up their alley or they want to sell their soul to Sable & Shuck. Interdimensional adventure? Move to Perplex City! Wacked out black comedy in the world of business? Wildfire Industries is for you! More realistic depiction of business? AWARE II is what you seek. Wanna be a spy? Pandora Next and Agent Disco are on the scene. Red Pill or Blue Pill? Slumberil all the way! Evil demons? DaemonWorks: All Saints' Day!

If anything, by increasing diversity among ARGs, you are increasing a player's morale and interest. Sure, it splits the population. But happy people tell other people to get in on the action. Happy people bring their friends and relatives because they are so impressed by what these games are doing that they want others to get in on it. And that results in a population increase.

This is turning into the Uber Rant and I apologize for being so long. And once again, these are my opinions, and you don't have to agree with them. But I see something good coming out here.

[The Watcher]

C_Brennan, well said. I wish I had gotten a chance to play Project Gateway.

I,too, would have to be a little critical of Dave.
To put things into perspective, I greatly enjoyed Urban Hunt. Urban hunt was obviously not nearly as commercial as ilovebees- but it was nevertheless a major $2,000(If i remember correctly) project.

Did the dozens of domains registered for the game make it any more realistic and immersive? Maybe. More fun? Definitely not.
Would puzzles have been any less mind boggling if they were hosted on a geocities page? Would we have replied to the characters' e-mails with "We don't believe you, you're e-mailing from a @yahoo.com address"

The point is that yes, professional domains do add a nice touch to the game. But their absence certainly does not take anything away.

To finish with an analogy:
Urban Hunt is to ilovebees as "grassroots game I put on my personal webspace coded only in Notepad" is to something like Project Syzygy. But ask players which one of these games is the best, and you will get differing opinions,

And a little tip for future PM's?

www.dot.tk offers free .tk top-level domains. It's not a .com, but it's close.