Author Archive

Adrian Hon, Perplex City

Thursday, May 5th, 2005
With recent developments surrounding 333 mysterious parcels being delivered to people around the world, and more specifically with the speculative meaning in the contents thereof, many questions were raised about the direction this game was taking. Perplex City is an ambitious project, first announced in February of 2004. In pre-game teaser episodes, it has run the standard alternate reality gaming gauntlet, from email puzzles and blogs to mysterious videos and live one-time events. These episodes have built a steady following among the ARG community over the past year. When a recent puzzle solution led to a sign-up page to receive a posted package, which turned out to contain a set of puzzle cards along with assorted Perplex City swag, chaos ensued as players tried to determine how they fit with the game so far.

Of course, the most obvious route to enlightenment was through Adrian Hon, currently known as "Executive Producer and Director of Play, Mind Candy Design" and the joint lead PuppetMaster behind this alternate reality game. It is unknown whether Mr. Hon was required to relinquish his duties as "Acting Ambassador Plenipotentiary to Perplex City" in order to take up his new post but we're hoping that, at the very least, the pay is better. Anyway, the point is he probably knows a thing or two about stuff and we figured he could set us straight.

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I Love Bees Wins Webby!

Tuesday, May 3rd, 2005

Well, in spite of the valiant efforts of the Beekeepers and the ARG community in general, the relentless onslaught of Gamespotters sent the People's Voice award to Gamespot instead of I Love Bees. But thankfully, the Webby judges saw the light and awarded the main Game-Related Webby to our favorite Haunted Apiary! Check out the results of all the other categories at the official Webbys website.

Congratulations to 4orty2wo and the entire I Love Bees team!

Prove Your Worth

Tuesday, May 3rd, 2005

What is Zoe's World? We're pretty sure it has something to do with the following missive, which was delivered to us via email a couple of days ago:

The residents of “3rd” live along side us, and watch our every move but also keep their distance. The populous of “3rd” are there to protect us and watch over our interests. Occasionally holes (or leaks) are found in the boundary between dimensions and sometimes “3rd” is seen by us, but normally mistaken as paranormal activity.

The 5th dimension is a dangerous place, and houses the demons and evils in our lives. 5th is usually safely contained, however some problems are occurring and holes are appearing.

Time is limited, and the residents of our secret neighbour need our help.

PROVE YOUR WORTH.

I Love Bees Nominated for Webby

Tuesday, April 12th, 2005

The I Love Bees ARG has been nominated for a 2005 Webby award in the Games-Related category. ARGN has the scoop about how you can vote for the People's Voice award for this mind-bogglingly popular game.

April Events

Tuesday, April 12th, 2005

There are a few events of note to the ARG world coming up in the next few weeks.

From April 19 through the 23, New Langton Arts in San Francisco will be presenting a week-long exhibit by artists Greg Niemeyer, Dan Perkel and Ryan Shaw called Organum, centering around Organum: The Game, a non-traditional form of videogame.

Organum: The Game is a collaborative video game in which three or more players sing into different microphones to control the three axes of movement (x, y, and z) on the game screen. Together, the players represent a grey sphere “character,” which they must navigate through an increasingly complicated path, hitting a series of targets as they travel through a luminous digital representation of the inside of the voice box.

Jane McGonigal assisted in development of Organum: The Game, and will be present at the 3 p.m. brown bag lunch to discuss development practices and collaborative methods.

Admission is free from 12-6 on weekdays and 12-8 on Saturday.

Those of you who are too far south to make it to the brown bag lunch at Organum, head over to Chimayo in Huntington Beach to party with Steve Peters of ARGN and Kristen Rutherford (aka Melissa, Durgan, the Sleeping Princess) of ILoveBees, along with whoever else might show up.

The gig's at 7:30 p.m.

Then back in San Francisco on Tuesday, April 26th, the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) is holding a meeting and mixer at 7:00 p.m. in the Action Theater, on the 2nd floor of the Sony METREON. Jordan Weisman, Sean Stewart, and Jim Stewartson will be presenting on the topic, "Thinking Outside the (X)Box (or 'How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Bees')."

If this presentation were on Saturday the 23rd instead, I'd be seriously torn over which to attend, it or the party on the beach!