Alternate Reality Games Grab Mindshare

An nonymous reader points to articles at the New York Times and on the BBC about online games that require a lot more audience participation and curiosity than conventional games do. "Known as ARGs or Alternate Reality Games, these immersive experiences mix real world clues, phone calls, voicemail, email chatter-bots, real people playing roles in real life and a bevy of bogus and legit websites, to create a fully rounded gaming experience that bleeds over into everyday life. With central sites like ARGN, Unfiction, and endless forums and Yahoo groups, the BBC claims that this is not only a quickly emerging gaming trend, but that it may also have real-world applications like group dynamics and problem solving. Chasing the Wish claims to already have a few thousand people worldwide playing since it opened for play on Feb. 28. One sure sign of having people's attention is the fact that it's already spawned a parody site, Chasing the Fish."

Comments

So this is why THAT game didn't work?

[foniksonik]

Does anyone else think it was the most unfortunate timing possible for THAT game? You know that one about being a 'terrorist' or 'anarchist' or anti-whatever with these types of communique experiences going on....

It seemed like the 'killer-app', of the century, for gaming at least.

Anyways, I'm giving up moderation for this post so be nice... ;-p

Wait just a minute!

[Gefiltefish]

Using web sites, email, voice mail, and mysterious in-person communications to piece together a puzzle in order to figure out what the hell is going on...

This isn't a game, it's my real life!! Why would I want to play a game that made me feel like I was at work?

Did you ever consider..

[xtal]

That people might do it.. just because it's -fun-? I'd be quite happy if I did nothing but play computer games, talk to my friends, golf, race cars, and play around with my other hobbies.

There's nothing wrong with doing things for no other reason than fun. If people like Everquest, and they have fun doing it - more power to them. The point of it is that it isn't productive at all.

Re:Did you ever consider..

[fusiongyro]

There's nothing wrong with doing things for no other reason than fun.

This is true. But at the same time, the atmosphere in America (at least from where I'm sitting) is getting so passive that the thought of sitting down and actually doing something is really getting foreign to us. Why bother making a game, you can just wait for the next one to come out? Why bother writing? You can just wait for another novel to come out. Why bother learning an instrument? You'll never be as good as your heroes.

The bar has been raised so far it's effectively beyond the reach of your average person, unless they dedicate their lives to it.

Strangely enough, a lot of people like that wind up really good at games, because it's just something they find themselves in front of long enough to excel at. I think that's kind of the point of the parent poster. If instead of saying, "fuck it, I'll go play EQ" they said, "I'll spend an hour on my guitar tonight, and an hour writing, and an hour beating off" they are quite likely to eventually find themselves very good at guitar and writing. You can't help but improve if you do something enough.

And there are two good reasons to have your fun doing something "productive" as you put it.

1. You'll feel better about yourself. When you're laying in bed awake at night wondering what you're doing with yourself, it's easier to remember your skill with whatever you've been doing. It helps your memory ("remember when I was totally pathetic at Python? That was four years ago!"). You're not going to remember that you made it to level 30 in EQ after losing countless hours to the game.

2. You improve the world for other people. Commercialism pervades television, radio and is a visual nuissance in basically every direction you can look. Originality is unheard of on TV and the radio. Bringing some originality to the world is something community doesn't forget. You make friends, you make fans, you grow in vision and perspective. None of these things happen on EQ, except perhaps for making friends, and you'll be lucky if you can retain an EQ friend outside of EQ.

Also, to specifically knock EQ, I haven't met anyone yet who claims that EQ was a "pure joy." The players are confrontational, the company is disinterested, etc. At least with a pen-and-paper role playing game you're spending time with people you honestly enjoy and exercising your imagination.

All that said, if you spend all day being "productive" I understand if you don't want to do it at night. But in my experience, we put a little too much faith in the power of money to make us happy. It shouldn't be about that.

--
Daniel

Re:warning signs

[knobmaker]

What's the point of playing games that aren't interesting enough to "start bleeding into real life?" Any game worth playing is worth taking seriously.

Do you think that chess players never think about their games when they're doing other stuff? Do football players never watch a game on TV?

You want to know when you might need counseling? It's when you display excessive concern about the mental health of folks whose hobbies you don't understand. I personally don't play computer games much, but it's not my business to criticize the mental stability of those who do. We'd all be better off if we gave a lot more attention to our own business and a lot less to other people's.