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My ARG work

So, a few years ago, I was introduced to the amazing world of Alternate Reality Gaming (ARG). I got my start with a game, released by EAGames, called Majestic. Majestic was a very early version of ARG, but it definitely hooked me seriously. I became very involved in the pregame community, and ended doing some help-the-newbie support after it launched. EA thanked me with a t-shirt of the game. The game didn't go as it was originally planned, due in part to the events of 9/11 occurring not long after the game was launched. Unfortunately, it wasn't a good time to make an entertainment venue regarding government conspiracies. But I think it was a great start to learning about the games, and probably got a lot of new gamers into it (Joey Pants doing a guest starring role didn't hurt).

My next major foray was Aware, which was developed by Nash Carey. Nash was a great puppetmaster, and really took the ARG game to a new direction. I became heavily involved in the first Aware, even to the point of creating several articles for a fake in game website, that was to be named, wehavenofear.com. The site didn't end up getting into the game after all, but some of the articles are listed below.

I also worked as a puppetmaster on Tranquil Valley, which was a smaller game originally developed by Ben Wochinski. That was a fun attempt for all of us, to develop something outside of Aware, and overall I think it went pretty well. My only regret is that I was working really late on some things near the end of the game, and I actually slept through the post-game puppetmaster chat. That was really disappointing.

Finally, I worked as a puppetmaster on the pregame for Aware 2, which never ended up leading into a new game. That was a trying time for me. My computer went down, and it took some time to get a new one. Plus, there were a lot of family/health issues which kept me from even being online at all during that time frame. I think I might have burned myself out to some degree, because I came to realize that ARG work can be incredibly addictive. I've debated on getting back into it, but that fact makes me hesitant. I guess next time, I'll just have to pace myself and see how it goes. :) I'm currently looking for anything I still have from Aware 2 or Tranquil Valley, but so far no luck. If I do find anything, it will go up here. I'm particularly disappointed that I can't find the Aware 1 recap, which I wrote for the Aware 2 pregame. It was a pretty thorough history of the original game. But hopefully it'll turn up somewhere (if anyone still has it, please let me know).

Aware 1/wehavenofear.com Articles

^{(On the original Aware game, wehavenofear.com was intended to be a misinformation site, that the Ideltech team was going to use against it's competition. It never ended up going live, but here's some articles I wrote for the site, and a cool flyer that was meant to end up as a stegged picture puzzle.)}

Writer Bios
Fake bios of the trio of writers who were supposedly writing for wehavenofear.com.

To Download or Not to Download
An early commentary on illegal downloading, and peer2peer file sharing. Though still not quite outdated.

How much wood could a woodchuck chuck? Depends on how many bytes he takes.
The first article developed specifically to Aware's purposes, a profile of TOBI (the artificial intelligence at the center of the game), and the players in the game. It actually serves as a pretty good overview to the game premise.

Extreme Measures
The second article developed specifically to Aware's purposes, giving the events that launched us from pregame to fully online. Personally, I'm particularly fond of this article, both for it's game purposes and the writing in general. :)

Voodoo Babe
A profile I wrote regarding one of the leads of the competing teams on Aware, Alecia Church, who headed up the Omniscient Eyes team. It also gives some background on her character, and her general behavior in the game.

We Have No Fear Presents
This flyer was designed to be a rave advertisement, that would be stegged as a fake game clue, to throw off the opposing teams. It came out pretty cool, even if it was never implemented.