I Heart Bees Again - Halo 3's Iris ARG

I Love Bees is regarded as one of the more successful alternate reality games (ARGs) ever run in the US. It should be no surprise, then, that the game's spiritual sequel entitled simply Iris , is causing quite a stir. It began on June 11th, with cryptic messages in the Bungie forums. Designed to take players through the history of the Halo world over the course of the summer, players have already uncovered some 'pre-game' information; for all intents and purposes the actual game hasn't started yet. Michael VanderZand probably wish it was already over, though: then he might have some peace and quiet. The climax is expected sometime on September 26th, the day after Halo 3 releases to stores.

Comments

Re:I love adolph hitler

[Dogtanian]

wish I could have been born earlier so i could have been a nazi. If you'd been born earlier, you'd have been killed as part of the Nazis' eradication of the mentally feeble.

New viral campaign: "Halo" by Lionel Richbee

[Dogtanian]

I've been alone with you inside my mind
And in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times
I sometimes see you pass outside my door
Halo, is it bees you're looking for?

I can see it in your eyes
I can see it in your smile
You're all I've ever wanted, and my arms are open wide
'Cause you know just what to say
And you know just what to do
And I want to tell you so much, I love bees...

Re:Viral marketing

[theStorminMormon]

I think the viral-marketing aspect of the push may be a bit over-rated. Bungie likes to tell big stories. Look at Marathon. Look at Myst. I think that they would have done I Love Bees (and will probably do Iris) for that reason alone. I Love Bees, for example, included hours of audio drama not in any way necessary to play or understand the ARG. It was a self-contained story that expanded the Halo universe. It provided great back story for Halo 2 (e.g. accounted for the arrival of the Covenant at Earth in the beginning of the game).

I'm not trying to portray Bungie (which I know MS owns) as some kind of artsy philanthropic venture, but I do believe that the culture at Bungie includes not only making games, but telling stories. They tell a pretty good story with Halo 1 and Halo 2, but they clearly enjoy telling that story through ARGs as well. So I'd see the ARG not only as marketing, but as just part of what Bungie does: tell stories.

As far as marketing goes, the point is not to get someone who wouldn't buy the game at all to suddenly buy the game. Whether or not someone picks up Halo 3 is dependent on a variety of factors and a lot of it is random chance. One huge variable will be the number of their friends who are excited about the release. Bungie clearly played to the multiplayer crowd with their multiplayer demo (which was also great for balancing, I suppose). Now they are going after those players who actually care about the story. I'm one. The result will be that the Halo fanbois will be super-excited, and that excitement will spill on down from Halo fanbois to Halo fans, to casual xbox 360 players, to those who don't even own an xbox. I doubt very many of the non-owners will invest in an entire console to play the game, but it should increase the propensity to buy the game all the way down the spectrum.

Whether or not it actually pays for itself, no one will ever know for sure(since it's impossible to tell who would have bought the game with no ARG campaign). But Halo 3 will make more headlines, fanbois will get psyched, Bungie will be yet more endeared to their fans (rep is important in this industry: look at Blizzard) and Bungie will also get to tell more of their story.

It's not like Halo 3 is going to barely break even or something. This one's a no-brainer.