Most of you would be aware that the Halo 3 ARG has begun. It has received quite negative reviews from many gammer-community-ARG-crossovers. It seems that the ARG is breaking design techniques such as: progressive disclosure, choreography of the rollout, audience tiering and player-production facilitation. Conversely, alot of the posts seem to be by people who are not conversant with ARGs or are not utilizing the player-created resources. This tiering issue is one that I address in a paper that may be out early next year. But, as I’ve haven’t delved too far into the most recent ARG yet, this isn’t the point of this post. (If you’re interested in playing or lurking though, check out The Bruce’s guide for the ARG.) Instead, I just wanted to flag how that it appears the Halo ARGs — I Love Bees and now this one — have provoked the most ARG parodies I’ve seen. I’m not aware of other parodies of ARGs (tell me if you know of them) and so the fact that there are 2 (that I know of) is more than any others! Here are the 2:
Penny Arcade comic about the lastest Halo 3 ArG
And then there is also the site that is a very clever grafting of another storyworld into the I Love Bees ARG:
Is it because of the convential gaming communities involvement in the ARG scene or is it something in the Bungie-commissioned ARGs or is it their high-profile status that lends it these parodies and supplements? Seems to me a mix of all of these factors.
Thanks Leslie for pointing out the pennyarcade comic. 🙂
Lockjaw had GuysGuise, a parody of the Grrl-e-Grrl site.
Chasing the Wish had .
Last Call Poker had Fast Mall Joker.
Hmm, apparently I borked the link. That should read “Chasing the Wish had Chasing the Fish.”
Ah, so each ARG, irrespecptive of whether they’re independent or not has a parody. Good to know. Thankyou so much SpaceBass. 🙂