Edge Arcade: Take pleasure in ARGs
Ian Davis
Issue date: 9/9/09 Section: The Edge
One thing I've always loved about video games are the marketing extravaganzas that sometimes accompany them. Months early pre-orders. Super Double Ultra Special Gamma Editions of games. Huge television campaigns that showcase commercials made with such care that they rival blockbuster summer movies in quality. The best though, are definitely marketing campaigns that involve viral marketing and ARGs, or Alternate Reality Games.
I don't claim to be an expert on the subject, and I don't always find out about campaigns like this 100 percent of the time, but when I do they stick with me for a long time. I've only participated in one actual ARG, and I couldn't even do it for very long.
ILoveBees.com, as it's known as now, was a very in-depth and detailed ARG that was put together for the release of "Halo 2" in 2004. I remember finding the first hint about the game in a "Halo 2" ad, which flashed the URL ILoveBees.com very quickly, almost subliminally. I went to the site and found that it looked like a regular Web site all about bees, but delving deeper quickly proved to be fruitful. A link that led deeper into the site would lead to corrupted areas, with strange messages and figures dotted all over.
That's as far as I ever made it into the game, as the complexity of it quickly spiraled upwards. Reading about it now, in retrospect, shows me just how complex it was. Map coordinates, real life phone calls from people posing as characters in the game and personal e-mails revealing parts of the story all became involved and eventually led to players dedicated enough to finish being treated to a sneak peak at "Halo 2."
A lot of other games have utilized marketing similar to this, albeit on a much smaller level. One that I remember distinctly revolved around the PS2 title "Shadow of the Colussus." "Authentic" news reports began popping up all over the Internet, detailing the uncovering of gargantuan statues buried deep in the ground by natural disasters and erosion. I followed these reports very closely too, because my nerdiness extends far beyond simple video games, and I thought some kind of monuments from an ancient civilization had been discovered.
I don't claim to be an expert on the subject, and I don't always find out about campaigns like this 100 percent of the time, but when I do they stick with me for a long time. I've only participated in one actual ARG, and I couldn't even do it for very long.
ILoveBees.com, as it's known as now, was a very in-depth and detailed ARG that was put together for the release of "Halo 2" in 2004. I remember finding the first hint about the game in a "Halo 2" ad, which flashed the URL ILoveBees.com very quickly, almost subliminally. I went to the site and found that it looked like a regular Web site all about bees, but delving deeper quickly proved to be fruitful. A link that led deeper into the site would lead to corrupted areas, with strange messages and figures dotted all over.
That's as far as I ever made it into the game, as the complexity of it quickly spiraled upwards. Reading about it now, in retrospect, shows me just how complex it was. Map coordinates, real life phone calls from people posing as characters in the game and personal e-mails revealing parts of the story all became involved and eventually led to players dedicated enough to finish being treated to a sneak peak at "Halo 2."
A lot of other games have utilized marketing similar to this, albeit on a much smaller level. One that I remember distinctly revolved around the PS2 title "Shadow of the Colussus." "Authentic" news reports began popping up all over the Internet, detailing the uncovering of gargantuan statues buried deep in the ground by natural disasters and erosion. I followed these reports very closely too, because my nerdiness extends far beyond simple video games, and I thought some kind of monuments from an ancient civilization had been discovered.
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