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ARGNet Insider - Issue 3.2

In which Michael joins yet another secret society, potentially trapped himself in a haunted video game, and talks with people about ARGs at great length

It's...been a year, hasn't it. Those of you who subscribed early might have noticed the newsletter has been silent for a few months. And for those who are new: welcome! I did promise infrequent updates!

While the newsletter has been on hiatus the website has kept on covering the evolving ARG space. So while it's still too soon for a year in review, there's a lot to cover so let's dive on in!

Hear Michael Ramble on About ARGs - In June, I gave a talk at Narrascope, an interactive fiction conference, called "They Like to Watch: Embracing Interactive Fiction as a Spectator Sport", elaborating on ARGNet's prior coverage on the subject.

Later on in October, I joined the Room Escape Divas to talk about the intersection of alternate reality games, escape rooms, and a handful of other related disciplines.
Unknown 9, Back From an Extended Hiatus The last newsletter implied Unknown 9 might be coming back from hiatus with a massive launch event at SXSW Interactive: for obvious reasons, that launch didn't happen, but Unknown 9 still made its triumphant return with a video game trailer, podcast, and rebooted alternate reality game in partnership with Alice & Smith.
Hi I'm Mary Mary Wraps Multi-Year ARG - Hi I'm Mary Mary concluded its multi-year run, focused around the titular Mary isolated in a house with a series of ghastly apparitions. In the post-series Q&A, the show's creator hid an easter egg leading to a moodboard for her next project. And yes, this is me bragging about solving that hidden puzzle.
A Few ARGish Books Hitting the Market - Tiller Press, the imprint at Simon & Schuster I work for, managed to roll out a few ARG-adjacent books in the past few months, as well. October saw the release of Video Palace: In Search of the Eyeless Man, a horror anthology "compiled by Maynard Wills", a folklore scholar investigating the horror at the heart of AMC's Video Palace podcast.

In November, Jay Bushman released Novel Advice: Practical Wisdom for Your Favorite Literary Characters. The book acts as a stealth puzzle book, with famous literary characters writing in to an advice column for help with their problems under pseudonyms, leaving it as an exercise to the reader to puzzle out who sent each request: one entry in particular contains a secret message, for the curious.

Last...Year at ARGNet: 2020 So Far

Ten Parcels Sends Me a Severed Hand

In the last newsletter, I wrote about JC Hutchins receiving a haunted doll in the mail. The anonymous sender thanked me for this by sending a severed hand, with the URL TENPARCELS.COM written on the palm using the Zodiac Killer alphabet. As the name implies, ten parcels went out to players in a meta-narrative inspired by John Fowles' equally meta novel The Magus.

PostCurious' Emerald Flame: Puzzle Art in a Box

PostCurious successfully crowdfunded its narrative puzzle box experience The Emerald Flame, raising $290K from over 3K backers for the highly aesthetic alchemical mystery. While the crowdfunding campaign is now over, the game is available for preorder for prices starting at $69.

Green Door Labs' Cryptozoological Romp

Green Door Labs also turned to Kickstarter to fund an "online ARG puzzle hunt", raising $17K from over 300 backers to imagine what would happen if an antiquated, cryptozoological version of the Audubon Society tried to translate their efforts into a digital age. The highly narrative puzzle trail is structured across individual "missions", available at TheASPMC.org.

Rise of the Influencer-Centered ARG

Dad Feels. I Am Sophie. Simulacra. Even Lonelygirl15. This article looks at the rise of alternate reality games told through the lens of influencers, and how that framing device lends itself to compelling storytelling, whether you grow to love or hate the figure at the story's center.

Taking in the HoloVista: the Corporate Onboarding ARG

In the leadup to the release of the mobile game Holovista, Aconite produced an ARG that introduced the fantastical architecture firm Mesmer & Braid that instigated the events of the game. One of the game's TikTok videos from an "urban explorer" trying to crack a cryptex went viral, further proving that context matters, even (and especially) when people don't have it..

BEN Drowned ARG Finishes...10 Years Later

Ten years ago, the creepypasta BEN Drowned leveraged machinima to tell a story of a haunted Majora's Mask console. The story evolved into an alternate reality game that concluded this October, finally offering an explanation about how BEN got sucked into the game in the first place, and whatever happened to the original series protagonist, Jadusable. The series reached a highly satisfying conclusion, even if I might have personally met a terrible fate thanks to a very ARGish Patreon perk..

Neil Patrick Harris Makes a Puzzle Game

Neil Patrick Harris created a narrative puzzle box that, on its surface, is a simple trivia card game, but evolves into something quite different the deeper you go into the game. It's a game designed with solo play in mind, and packs a surprising number of ARGish tricks into the box for the $29.99 price point.

ARGNet Insider: The Archives

Congratulations for making it all the way down here! Believe it or not, this overview of ARGticles since the last newsletter left out three pieces.

In July, Niantic announced their next augmented reality game, themed around the popular board game Settlers of CATAN. In August, RECON held a digital conference that attracted almost a thousand attendees, and featured an ARG embedded into the experience to induct attendees into a secret society. Most of the sessions are now uploaded to Room Escape Artist's YouTube channel. Finally, I received a trailhead to the Aeternus Center ARG. How is the game going? Good question! I have no idea where the players congregated to discuss it. If you find them, let me know!