New email from Spearman - "Instructions" (09.11.09)

SemiColon wrote:Would have made it more clear that it was going to be a time trial, as previously when they've told us things are going to happen over the weekend etc, we've had at least 24 hours to complete the task.

Most of the ARGs I've seen, eventually have some kind of situation where you have to be the first person to answer correctly (or the first X number of people, etc). It had to happen sometime.

I think if you'd given people 24 hours to do this task, it would have been a serious madhouse as 100+ people scramble to log into a website with a limited number of connections.

I'm just glad I'm not the only one that failed to work it out! I'm not as computer savvy as some on here, but will still help all I can if I am allowed to progress even if I am not a keyholder

emiiily wrote:

soloser wrote:

emiiily wrote:From Monday afternoon I didn't really get "You will have about half an hour in order to do this & it will be at a specific time."

To be fair, the instructions went out about 4pm... which gave us all almost two hours to do what needed to be done.

If you were conducting this ARG, how would you have improved this part of the game, while still making it an interesting and fair competition?

I'm not an ARG designer, I wouldn't even know where to begin planning one!

Just because e-mails went out 2 hours before it doesn't mean people were able to act on them or even do so much as read them.

It will be a shame if this is the first of many processes of elimination, I hope there will be another chance!

I didn't even get to read the email till 7 last night which made it worse. But nope, 2 hours wasn't long enough! At least start it at 4pm but give those that finish work at later a chance to get home and stuff, just leave the "window of opportunity to participate" a bit longer for others to have a go at least and not on a first come first serve basis, have some way of everyone getting "a key" for example (with a number attached to it) and then pick those people randomly. I don't think people would be upset if it were made fairer that way.

soloser wrote:I think if you'd given people 24 hours to do this task, it would have been a serious madhouse as 100+ people scramble to log into a website with a limited number of connections.

Hi Soloser, welcome to the forum

I have to admit, i thought the 2 hour warning was a little tight - I finish work at 5pm and have an hour drive (if traffic is OK) to get home, so it was quite a stressful journey knowing i MIGHT get home in time... having said that, it did help build the excitement, and fitted in well with the story: we would only have a short window while Lox was offline to achieve our task, and we had to rely on our team mates to do it if we weren't able to.

Perhaps Spearman's email could've reassured the people who didn't get a code more - if he had explained that he couldn't give any more than 2 hours notice due to the tight window of opportunity, and the key to this task would be to have as many people monitoring the sites as possible so when we got the signal at least one of us could jump on it, then it would've felt more like a team effort perhaps?

Just a thought

colinrocks wrote:

soloser wrote:I think if you'd given people 24 hours to do this task, it would have been a serious madhouse as 100+ people scramble to log into a website with a limited number of connections.

Perhaps Spearman's email could've reassured the people who didn't get a code more - if he had explained that he couldn't give any more than 2 hours notice due to the tight window of opportunity, and the key to this task would be to have as many people monitoring the sites as possible so when we got the signal at least one of us could jump on it, then it would've felt more like a team effort perhaps?

Just a thought

A good one at that Colin. Totally agree.

PS - I'd love to design an ARG... i'd have players nominating and electing each other for tasks, encouraging team work by giving different clues to different people... and stuff like that

Edit: ooh ooh and I'd make up like fake fliers and in-ARG junk mail to post to people, and stuff like that Haha i'm gonna start a new thread... soloser you've got me thinking...

colinrocks wrote:PS - I'd love to design an ARG... i'd have players nominating and electing each other for tasks, encouraging team work by giving different clues to different people... and stuff like that

Edit: ooh ooh and I'd make up like fake fliers and in-ARG junk mail to post to people, and stuff like that Haha i'm gonna start a new thread... soloser you've got me thinking...

If I start receiving weird junk mail, I'll know who the culprit is!

colinrocks wrote:PS - I'd love to design an ARG... i'd have players nominating and electing each other for tasks, encouraging team work by giving different clues to different people... and stuff like that

Edit: ooh ooh and I'd make up like fake fliers and in-ARG junk mail to post to people, and stuff like that Haha i'm gonna start a new thread... soloser you've got me thinking...

so would I! I'm loving this

If you lot want some more info on current/old ARG's, then Unfiction should be your first port of call:

http://forums.unfiction.com/forums/index.php?f=10

There's also lots of hints & tips for budding puppetmasters and mistresses.