ARG Stats

Compiled by Christy Dena, 2005-2008

Last Updated: 23rd Feb, 2008

The following list provides information about the uptake, impact and awards garnered from ‘alternate reality games’ (ARGs). I have gathered this information from published sources, preferencing of course information provided by the producers of the projects. Rather than list ‘top ARGs’, I’ve included whatever ARG I was able to find data on. I list them alphabetically because any grading of ARGs will be according to a set of criteria that is highly subjective. It is not a definitive list, but hopes to provoke one. Please let me know of any information I can add or alter. And, in the end, may this information be used for good and not evil. :)

ARGs covered in this compilation: The Art of the Heist; The Beast; Chasing the Wish; Heroes Evolutions/360 Experience; Hope is Missing; I Love Bees; Jamie Kane; Last Call Poker; Lockjaw; The Lost Experience; Majestic; Metacortechs; The Ocular Effect; Perplex City; Push, Nevada; ReGenesis Extended Reality Game I & II; Urban Hunt; World Without Oil; Year Zero.

THE ART OF THE HEIST/THE ART OF THE H3IST

Art of the Heist: Commissioned by McKinney Silver for the US launch of the AudiA3 in 2005.

‘At the heart of the narrative were six new A3s containing coded plans for the largest art heist in history; however, one car contained the key to decrypting the information hidden in all the others, and the mystery surrounding the “heist” unfolded in real time over three months across the country. The Heists final chapter was played out in front of a live audience at the Viceroy Hotel in Los Angeles, where we finally discovered who the real villain was.’ (Campfire, no date)

STATS:

  • Length: 90 days (stats for those 90 days)
  • Media: Television, Newspapers, Outdoor, Commuter Rail, Magazines, Websites, Blogs, Live Events, Email, Podcasts, Films, Seeding, Online Advertising, Direct Mail, Radio, Wild Postings, Voicemail
  • Targeting: ‘Highly affluent ($150K+), stylish, tech-savvy, web-addicted young men (ages 25-34) who are extremely active and mobile’ (Campfire, no date)
  • 45 million+ PR impressions (McKinney-Silver, 2005)
  • 2 million AudiUSA.com visitors (Campfire, no date)
  • 500,000 story participants (McKinney-Silver, 2005)
  • 10,000 leads to dealers (McKinney-Silver, 2005)
  • 4,000+ test drives of Audi (McKinney-Silver, 2005)
  • 1,025 cars sold (Campfire, no date)
  • By May 9, there were 125,000 followers of the websites and probably cost about $3-4 million (Kiley, 2005)
  • By Day 22: 203,000 visitors to StolenA3.com over the length of the campaign, staying for an average of 5 minutes (McKinney-Silver, 2005)
  • Online advertising generated 91,000 participants. 31% of this traffice was “buying indicator”. “This percentage represents the most qualified online-ad generated audience of any Audi car launch.” (McKinney-Silver, 2005)
  • By Day 60 of the campaign, close to 2 million unique visitors to AudiUSA.com, 5 times the average. (McKinney-Silver, 2005)
  • By Day 60, over 16,000 A3 shopping indicator queries, including 13,363 quick quote requests (McKinney-Silver, 2005)
  • “buying indicator” activity on the website (like requesting info from a dealer) by 73% over prior marketing efforts (Clark, 2005)
  • 200,000+ people became involved with the search for the stolen A3 in a single day (bill, 2005; bouquet et al, 2005)
  • Online buzz for the A3 has quadrupled (bill, 2005)
  • Within the first few days of the campaign launch, seven fan sites were created (bill, 2005)
  • “After a person clicks an online advertisement to investigate the program, 34 percent of user page views were to A3 buying indicator pages (configurator, dealer locator, payment estimator, request a quote) on the Audi brand site. That is a 79 percent increase in “qualification” over previous launch efforts.” (bill, 2005)
  • As of 2nd Nov 2005, there were 204,622 posts to the Unfiction Forum for the game.

AWARDS:

  • Gold for New Product Launch, IAB/AdWeek Mixx Conference, 2005
  • Gold for Online Integration, IAB/AdWeek Mixx Conference, 2005
  • Silver for Viral/Word of Mouth, IAB/AdWeek Mixx Conference, 2005
  • Best in Show award, IAB/AdWeek Mixx Conference, 2005

SOURCES:

bill (2005) ‘Art Of The Heist Declared A Marketing Success’, DeadDrop.us, 9 June [Online] Was Available at: http://deaddrop.us/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=232. Last accessed: 4th March, 2006.

Campfire (no date) ‘Case Studies: Audi - The Art of the Heist’, Campfire, date published unknown. [Online] Available at: http://campfirenyc.com/category/case-studies/?id=2. Last Accessed: 10th August, 2007.

Clark, B. (2005) ‘Post subject: good questions!’ Immersion Unlimited Forum, 8 July [Online] Was Available at: http://immersionunlimited.com/viewtopic.php?t=1911. Last accessed: 4th March, 2006.

McKinney-Silver (2005) ‘Art of the H3ist: An Audi Project’, Mc-Kinney-Silver. [Online] Was Available at: http://www.mckinney-silver.com/A3_H3ist/. Last Accessed: 4th March, 2006.

Kiley, D. (2005) ‘A New Kind of Car Chase’, BusinessWeek Online, 16 May [Online] Available at: http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/may2005/nf20050516_9437_db016.htm. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

THE BEAST

Warner Brothers commissioned game played before Steven Spielberg’s A.I.: Artificial Intelligence, 2001. Introduction by Sean Stewart and Cloudmakers (player) archive.

‘Starting with a fictitious credit on the film’s marketing one-sheet, the audience soon found themselves immersed in a murder mystery. Involving thousands of webpages, as well as phone lines, fax machines, email accounts, and live events, the campaign immersed players in the world of AI and created frenzied anticipation for the opening of the film.’ (42 Entertainment,a)

  • 3 million+ players all over the world (42 Entertainment, b)
  • Attracted audience of 1mill+ (Hon, 2005a)
  • Around 2.5mill players (Lee in Meadows, 2003)
  • 100,000 users in the first 3 hours (Lee in Meadows, 2003)
  • 48 hours after Cloudmakers was launched there were 153 new members (McGonigal, 2003a)
  • Within 48 hours of the Cloudmakers forum launching, 150 registered (Gosney, 2005, 6)
  • At the end of the game Cloudmakers had 7480 members (McGonigal, 2003a)
  • By the end of game, 7,400 members of Cloudmakers (Gosney, 2005, 6)
  • 43,000 player messages (Stewart, 2001)
  • Messages in Cloudmakers: 42,209 messages (McGonigal, 2003a)
  • “The Beast’s producers (Microsoft and DreamWorks) now estimate that more than one million people from around the world played the game, many of whom formed large online groups.” (McGonigal, 2003a)
  • More males than females at the beginning (Sean Stewart in Miller, C.H. 2005)
  • 50% of new players in the last 6 weeks were women (Sean Stewart in Miller, C.H. 2005)
  • Described by Internet Life magazine as the “Citizen Kane of online entertainment” (Stewart, 2001)
  • With well “over 300 million impressions through coverage in mainstream media” such [as] Time Magazine, CNN, and USA Today, as well as from niche outlets such as Slashdot, Wired, and Ain’t it Cool News (42 Entertainment, b)
  • Gained international media attention in CNN, ABC, BBC, New York Times, USA Today (Hon, 2005a)
  • “If The Blair Witch Project was a shot heard around the interactive world, then A.I.: Artificial Intelligence is D-Day” (Adweek quoted in McGonigal, 2003b)

AWARDS:

  • Best Idea, New York Times Magazine (42 Entertainment, a)
  • Best Website, Entertainment Weekly (42 Entertainment, a)
  • Best Advertising Campaign, Time Magazine (42 Entertainment, a)

SOURCES:

42 Entertainment (a) ‘The Beast’, 42 Entertainment [Online] Was Available at: http://www.4orty2wo.com/casestudy_ai.html. Last Accessed: 4th March, 2006.

42 Entertainment (b) ‘The Beast’, 42 Entertainment [Online] Available at: http://www.42entertainment.com/beast.html. Last Accessed: 30th Nov, 2007.

Gosney, J. (2005) Beyond Reality: a Guide to Alternate Reality Gaming, Thomson Course Technology PTR, Boston, MA.

Hon, A. (2005a) ‘The Rise of ARGs’, Gamasutra, 9 May. [Online] Available at: http://gamasutra.com/features/20050509/hon_01.shtml. Last Accessed: 30th Nov, 2007.

McGonigal, J. (2003a) ”This Is Not a Game’: Immersive Aesthetics and Collective Play’ presented at MelbourneDAC, the 5th International Digital Arts and Culture Conference, RMIT, Melbourne, Australia, May 19 - 23, published by School of Applied Communication, RMIT [pdf] Also Available at: FineArtForum

McGonigal, J. (2003b) ‘A Real Little Game: The Performance of Belief in Pervasive Play’ presented at Digital Games Research Associaton (DiGRA) “Level Up” Conference, November, published by AvantGame.com [pdf]

Meadows, M.S. (2003) ‘Game Complement to A.I. (loosely called The Beast or Cloudmakers) [Interview with Elan Lee and Adrian Hon]‘ in Pause & Effect: The Art of Interactive Narrative, New Riders, Indianapolis, Ind., pp. 131-138.

Miller, C.H. (2004) Digital Storytelling: A Creator’s Guide to Interactive Entertainment, Focal Press, Amsterdam; Boston.

Stewart, S. (2001) ‘December 2001: A Very Busy Year’, seanstewart.org, Dec. [Online] Available at: http://www.seanstewart.org/news/. Last Accessed: 30th Nov, 2007.

CHASING THE WISH


Chasing the Wish, independent, Feb 27-Aug 28, 2003

‘It began in 2003 as little more than a dream, a crazy idea to tell a story in a new and different way. What if the fictional characters of the story you were reading suddenly began to contact you, through phone calls, email and instant messages, and even at actual real world meetings? What if they presented themselves as real and involved you in their lives and struggles, so that you actually changed the world in which they lived? What if there were items that you found or that arrived at your home that were important to those characters and their stories, and vital to the things they were trying to achieve?’ (Chasing the Wish website)

  • 1,000+ players registered 1 month before the game started (Szulborski, 2005, 150)
  • 2,700 players registered (Szulborski, 2005, 152)
  • Cost $1,000 (Szulborski, 2005, 152)
  • 8,000-10,000 unique IPs to various sites (Szulborski, 2006)
  • 7,975 posts to Unfiction forum, not counting the forum postings at Collective Detective (Szulborski, 2006)
  • 18,000 Google hits to “chasing the wish”, includes upcoming comic though (Szulborski, 2006)
  • Duration: 8 months/240 days (Szulborski, 2006)
  • Cost about $2,000, but $1,000 made back (Szulborski, 2006)

SOURCES:

Szulborski, D. (2005) This Is Not A Game: A Guide to Alternate Reality Gaming, New Fiction Publishing.

Szulborski, D. (2006) ‘Comment on Top ARGs, with stats’, Cross-Media Entertainment, 13 March. [Online] Available at: http://www.cross-mediaentertainment.com/index.php/2006/03/04/top-args-with-stats/#comment-93

HEROES EVOLUTIONS/360 EXPERIENCE
NBC Jan 2007/…

“Heroes360″ launched on January 22nd on a number of platforms including online and mobile and continue to roll out and evolve. The full breadth of the campaign includes a number of non-NBC branded websites including www.primatechpaper.com, www.corinthianlasvegas.com, www.9thwonders.com and www.samantha48616e61f.com, several WAP sites including one for “Heroes” and one for Primatech Paper, SMS interactivity and an interactive phone tree (1-800-PRIMA16). (NBC, 2007)

STATS:

  • Between January 22 and March 22 of 2007, the Heroes 360 Experience had more than 48 million page views and 27 million video downloads (Hurst, 2007, 49; NBC, 2007)
  • Since launch, the “Heroes” WAP site has seen over 200,000 page views, followed by the Primatech Paper WAP site with over 150,000 page views (NBC, 2007)

SOURCE:
NBC (2007) ‘NBC.Com delivers with ‘Heroes360′: 48 million page views and over 27 million video streams in just eight weeks’, NBC press release published at The Futon Critic, 22 March [Online] Available at: http://www.thefutoncritic.com/news.aspx?id=20070322nbc05. Last Accessed: 17th Nov 2007.
Seth Hurst, Brian (2007) ‘The Birth of Cross-Media Production: Adventures in Storytelling’, Produced By, Fall, pp: 48-52

HOPE IS MISSING

Hope is Missing, ARG created to raise awareness of Lance Weiler’s Head Trauma feature film.

STATS:

  • Over 2 million views across myspace, stage 6, xbox and other sites
  • Average play time of 8 hours based on an end game poll of 350 players – in some cases the hardcore players logged close to 40 hours
  • Estimate 20,000 heavy players
  • Over 4,000 emails from players
  • Over 500 phone calls to the Hope is Missing hotline

SOURCE:

Weiler, L. (2007) ‘BTS: Cinematic Games when the Audience Become Collaborators’, When the Workbook Project, Oct [Online] Available at: http://workbookproject.com/?p=413. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

I LOVE BEES (aka HAUNTED APIARY)

I Love Bees (aka Haunted Apiary), Microsoft commissioned 42 Entertainment to create an ARG for the Halo 2 launch, 2004. Video at 42Entertainment

‘Based on the Halo fiction, ilovebees was an original radio drama that was deconstructed and delivered to consumers over an unlikely broadcast medium: ringing payphones. ilovebees was a giant multi-player, multi-platform story, immersing players in the world of Halo2 in the four months leading up to the title’s record shattering launch.’ (42 Entertainment,a)

  • 10,000+ participated in the pervasive missions (real world challenges) (42 Entertainment,a)
  • 3/4 million active participatns (42 Entertainment,a)
  • 2.5 million casual participants (42 Entertainment,a)
  • 3 million+ players (Handy, 2005)
  • 600,000 online players (McGonigal, 2005a)
  • 10,000-20,000 serious players (42 Entertainment cited in Handy, 2005)
  • “For more than 16 weeks, some half a million players engaged” (Jenkins, 2004)
  • ILoveBees.com logged 80 million hits (Mucha, 2005)
  • Internet traffic 10x The Beast (Jim Stewartson cited in Shachtman, 2004)
  • 250,000+ visitors to ilovebees.com on the day it opened in August (Jim Stewartson cited in Shachtman, 2004)
  • 500,000 gamers returned to the site every time the game was updated (Jim Stewartson cited in Shachtman, 2004)
  • 2.3 million people watching (McGonigal, 2005a)
  • 1 million+ tracked blog and forum posts and comments (McGonigal, 2005a)
  • Over 1.5 million forum posts (McGonigal, 2005b)
  • 500,000+ unique hits on ilovebees.com per day (Beekeepers)
  • 2,000,000+ recorded unique hits on an update day (Tuesdays, Sundays and Fridays) (Beekeepers)
  • 1,000s comment in in-game blog: Dana’s (Jane McGonigal cited in Handy, 2005)
  • Answered over 40,000 payphones in 50 states & 8 countries, over 4 months (McGonigal, 2005b)
  • “[w]idespread coverage in the gaming press and beyond, including stories in the New York Times, CNN, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Wired, La Presse, and the London Times” (42 Entertainment,b)
  • Sold 2.38 million units [of Halo 2] in the 24 hours in the United States and Canada (Becker, 2004)
  • $125 million opening day [of Halo 2] eclipsed “Spider-Man” record for biggest opening weekend box office take (Becker, 2004)
  • 100,000 page views of a forum page 36 hours after first phone call event (Miller, J. 2004)

AWARDS:

  • Best Games-Related Site, Webby Award, 2005
  • Innovation Award, Game Develops Choice Awards, Game Developer Awards, 2005

SOURCES:

42 Entertainment (a) (no date) ‘I Love Bees’, 42 Entertainment [Online] Available at: http://www.42entertainment.com/bees.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

42 Entertainment (b) (no date) ‘I Love Bees’, 42 Entertainment [Online] Was Available at: http://www.4orty2wo.com/casestudy_bees.html. Last Accessed: 4th March, 2006.

Handy, A. (2005) ‘The Buzzmakers’, East Bay Express, 18 May [Online] Available at: http://www.eastbayexpress.com/issues/2005-05-18/news/feature.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Becker, D. (2004) ”Halo 2′ clears record $125 million in first day’, News.com, 10 Nov [Online] Available at: http://news.com.com/Halo+2+clears+record+125+million+in+first+day/2100-1043_3-5447379.html?tag=nl%20article. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Beekeepers (2005) ‘The Beekeepers’, We Love Bees [Online] Was Available at: http://www.welovebees.com/about.html. Last Accessed: 4th March, 2006.

Jenkins, H. (2004) ‘Chasing Bees, Without the Hive Mind’, Technology Review, 3 Dec. [Online] Available at: http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/04/04/wo_jenkins120304.asp?p=1. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

McGonigal, J. (2005a) ‘I Love Bees: A Buzz Story’ presented at AD:TECH, San Francisco, 25-27 April, published by Avantgame [pdf]

McGonigal, J. (2005b) Alternate Reality Learning, Creative Design panel at the E3 Education Arcade, Games in Education Conference, Los Angeles, 16 May, video published @ Education Arcade; pdf of ppt available at avantgame.com

Miller, J. (2004) ‘I Love Bees’, Miramontes Studios, July [Online] Available at: http://www.miramontes.com/studios/museum/project/6.php. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Mucha, T. (2005) ‘Luring Gamers Like Bees to Honey’, Business 2.0, 1 Jan [Online] Available at: http://money.cnn.com/magazines/business2/business2_archive/2005/01/01/8250218/index.htm. Last Accessed: 30th, Oct. 2007

Shachtman, N. (2004) ‘Sci-Fi Fans Are Called Into an Alternate Reality’, New York Times, 14 Nov [Online] Available at: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/04/technology/circuits/04bees.html?ex=1141621200&en=84fbfc8a6db63b8f&ei=5070. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

JAMIE KANE

Jamie Kane, BBCi, 2005/…(single player replayable)

‘Jamie Kane is the new online adventure from bbc.co.uk It’s part game, part drama, part murder mystery…’ (BBC’s Jamie Kane ‘How to Play’ page)

  • About 11,000 players signed up as of Nov 2005 (source undisclosed, 2005)
  • Gender ratio about 70:30 (female:male) (source undisclosed, 2005)
  • Cost was more than 250,000pounds (Losowsky, 2005)
  • “I’m aiming for in excess of 100,000 players in the first year” (Sophie Walpole quoted in Losowsky, 2005)

SOURCES:

Losowsky, A. (2005) ‘BBC’s teen dream a risky business’, Guardian Unlimited, 23 June [Online] Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/computergames/story/0,11500,1512131,00.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

LAST CALL POKER

Last Call Poker, 42 Entertainment for Activision’s release of their ‘GUN’, 2005. Video at 42 Entertainment.

‘Built around an online poker site, Last Call Poker undertook the challenge of making westerns relevant to today’s gamer FPS audience through an interactive narrative featuring six stories of quintessential American violence, tracking back in time from present to past, and ultimately leading to the time of Activision’s fall 2005 release, GUN. Players and press followed trails of blood from virtual poker tables to the ultimate Last Call: real graves and graveyards around the country. Over half a million players actively participated during the 8 week campaign.’ (42 Entertainment, no date)

STATS:

  • 500,000+ participated in the 8 weeks (42 Entertainment, no date)
  • “We got lots of feedback from Activision both in the early phases of design and as the game went on. They were quite pleased at the game’s ability to reach an audience traditional marketing would not be able to.” (Elan Lee in Wells, 2005)
  • “A dozen live-action puzzles and 20 persistent real-world missions (completed over 500 times by players all over the world).” (McGonigal, 2005)
  • 60 people participated in the finale event (Terdiman, 2005)

SOURCES:

42 Entertainment (no date) ‘Last Call Poker’, 42 Entertainment [Online] Available at: http://www.42entertainment.com/poker.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

McGonigal, J. (2005) ‘Graveyards are the new payphones’, AvantGame.com, 1 Dec [Online] Available at: http://avantgame.blogspot.com/2005/12/graveyards-are-new-payphones.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Terdiman, D. (2005) ”Last Call Poker’ celebrates cemeteries’, CNET News.com, 20 Nov [Online] Available at: http://news.com.com/Last+Call+Poker+celebrates+cemeteries/2100-1043_3-5963346.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Wells, K. (2005) ‘Last Call Poker PM Chat Transcript’, ARGN.com, 30 Nov [Online] Available at: http://www.argn.com/archive/000347last_call_poker_pm_chat_transcript.php. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

LOCKJAW

Lockjaw, independent, 2002
PMs: Andy Aiken, Bruce Cain, Clay Chiment, Derek Jensen, Brooke Thompson and Krystyn Wells
Players: Jawbreakers

  • At its peak, the yahoo group registered about 700 players (Thompson, 2006)
  • During Lockjaw, players formed ARGN and Unfiction (Thompson, 2006)
  • Unique IP visits to website around 10,000 (Thompson, 2006)
  • “Lockjaw inspired and spawned fansites (guysguise.com, gentel janitor), fan fiction (Moot Point, Outside Phoenix, One Life Down), post-game ponderings (cui-bono), genre-based websites and discussion boards (unfiction.com, argn.com), and even a very, er, um, stirring artistic performance (vunnnn!).” (Peters, 2002)

SOURCES:

Peters, S. (2002) ‘Jawbreakers Guide: Epilogue’, vpmusic.com [Online] Available at: http://www.vpmusic.com/jawbreakers/guideindex4.htm#epilogue

Thompson, B. (2006) ‘ARG & Stats’, personal email to Christy Dena, Received March 5th, 2006.

THE LOST EXPERIENCE

May-Oct, 2006. Alternate reality game part of ABC’s Lost. ABC in US, Channel 4 in UK, Yahoo!7 in Australia.

‘In what’s being hailed as the largest interactive challenge based on a TV series, ABC and 19 other networks stretching across five continents are introducing “Lost Experience” — an Internet game that will feature a parallel story line that will give insight into the top-rated show.’ (ABC, 2006)

UK Component (Channel 4)

  • 50,000 calls to initial phone line (Hi-ReS!, no date)
  • 50,000 unique players (Hi-ReS!, no date)
  • 7 terrabytes of traffic per month (Hi-ReS!, no date)
  • 6 million + search results on Google during the game (Hi-ReS!, no date)
  • 100’s player-created blogs updating on clues and playing the game (Hi-ReS!, no date)
  • Over 30,000 unique users regularly interacted with the alternate reality game (Hi-ReS!, no date)

AWARDS:

  • ‘Cross Media Project’ award to Lost Experience Channel 4, 2007 UK Association of Online Publishers Awards. Described as: “Highly creative and imaginative with an innovative approach to connecting more deeply with fans of the TV series. An immensely deep experience. Truly cross-media.” (UK Association of Online Publishers, 2007)

Australian Component (Yahoo!7)

These stats are from a talk delivered by Cricket Wardein, Marketing Director, Yahoo!7, ‘Extended Entertainment Experiences‘. They are for May 14th onwards for the Australian part of the multi-country ARG-style project.

  • After launch video broadcast (advertisement) with a call to action to ring a number: 15,000 calls were received (Wardein, 2006)
  • 900,000 unique users (Wardein, 2006)
  • 7.6 million page views (Wardein, 2006)
  • 1.9 million video streams (Wardein, 2006)
  • 200,000 forum messages (Wardein, 2006)
  • average time spent online: 12 mins (Wardein, 2006)

Sprite (Coca Cola) Involvement

In The Lost Experience, there were also many advertisers. The following information about the involvement of Sprite is sourced from Word of Mouth Marketing Case Studies cited below.

“The LOST Experience is an Alternate Reality Game (ARG) designed to bring consumers closer to the fictional world of the ABC TV show, LOST. The ARG features 4 advertisers embedding clues into their online & offline properties for consumers to discover more information about the show’s characters. Sprite began on May 10th by placing the new Sublymonal.com URL into a faux TV commercial that ran in primetime during the ABC network show LOST. The URL drove consumers to a puzzle solely related to the show with the only brand mention being the actual URL. Afterwards, the ARG transitioned to a scavenger hunt with embedded DJ podcasts, videos, and hidden memos within Sublymonal.com. A final component includes embedded codes in print ads in Entertainment Weekly and People Magazine. The codes can then be used to unlock further content online.”

Results:
1. Sprite web traffic up 400%
2. Average visit time up 275% and +300% vs benchmark
3. 500K valid codes entered … and climbing!

Credit Information
————————————–
Client: Coca-Cola North America
Agency: AKQA
Budget: <$150,000 excluding media
Date of Campaign: May - September 2006 (Word of Mouth Marketing, no date)

SOURCE:

ABC (2006) ”Lost’ Game Lets Fans Hunt for Clues’, ABC News [Online] Available at: http://www.abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=1881142. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Hi-ReS! (no date) ‘The Lost Experience’, Hi-res.net [Online] Available at: http://archive.hi-res.net/thelostexperience/. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

UK Association of Online Publishers (2007) ‘AOP Awards Winners 2007 in Full’, UK Association of Online Publishers [Online] Available at: http://www.ukaop.org.uk/cgi-bin/go.pl/news/article.html?uid=1633. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Wardein, C. (2006) ‘no title’, presentation at Extended Entertainment Experiences, Australian Film Television and Radio School Seminar, Chauvel Cinema, Paddington, 24th Nov.

World of Mouth Marketing (no date) ‘WOMMA’s Case Study Library’ [Online] Available at: http://www.womma.org/casestudy/examples/create-a-viral-campaign/spritelost-experience/. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

MAJESTIC

Majestic, Electronic Arts, 2001

  • 800,000 started registration process (Morris, 2001)
  • 100,000 signed for the free pilot (Miller, C.H., 2005)
  • 71,200 completed the registration (Morris, 2001)
  • 10,000 to 15,000 subscribed (Morris, 2001)
  • 13,500 subscribed (Miller, C.H., 2005)
  • Cost between $5 and 7million (Morris, 2001)
  • “[R]eportedly cost $10 million in development” (Hon, 2005a)
  • Cost estimate is $10 million (Miller, C.H., 2005)
  • $600,000 revenue earned (Miller, C.H., 2005)

AWARDS:

  • “Best Original Game” 2001 E3. Described by Associate Chairman of the Game Critics Awards, Rob Smith, as:

‘In an industry dominated by sequels and franchises, creating the truly unique gaming experience is an increasingly rare occurrence. This category, therefore, is an important one for the industry at large, and EA’s Majestic perfectly highlights the potential that current technology represents for building compelling games. By blending common desktop programs such as Instant Messengers, the Web, chat rooms and streaming audio and video, and blurring the lines between game-created conspiracy content with that already inhabiting the web, Majestic builds a spooky, intense and original game on the familiar precepts of adventure and puzzle games. It’s a bold and compelling step into a whole new area of game design, and richly deserves to be recognized as a mark of original creativity.’ (Smith, 2001)

  • Featured in “Game Innovation Spotlights”, 2002 Game Developers Choice Awards

SOURCES:

Hon, A. (2005a) ‘The Rise of ARGs’, Gamasutra, 9 May. [Online] Available at: http://gamasutra.com/features/20050509/hon_01.shtml. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Miller, C.H. (2004) Digital Storytelling: A Creator’s Guide to Interactive Entertainment, Focal Press, Amsterdam; Boston.

Morris, C. (2001) ‘Innovation at risk?’ CNN Money, 19 Dec [Online] Available at: http://money.cnn.com/2001/12/19/technology/column_gaming/. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Smith, R. (2001) ‘2001 Winners’, Game Critics Awards [Online] Available at: http://www.gamecriticsawards.com/2001winners.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

MEIGIEST

Independent ARG. The following Meigeist statistics are all sourced from: ‘MeiGeist Placement and Research Report’, Diffractions, 2007 [pdf ]

  • Gender: 56% male, 41% female, 3% unknown (note: stats from only 30 respondants)
  • Age: 37% aged 30-38, 28.5% aged 20-27, 27% aged 40-47, 7.5% aged15-19 (note: stats from only 30 respondants
  • Country: 47% USA, 44% UK, 6% Canada, and 3% Germany (note: stats from only 30 respondants)
  • Visitors to main ingame website by country: 40.73% Other; 21.8% United States California; 18.6% Great Britain; 14.48% United States Virginia; 4.93% United States > Arkansas.

METACORTECHS (aka PROJECT MU)

MetaCortechs, independent [Project Mu credits]

  • 1.3 million hits on the metacortechs.com website in the first month (Peters, 2007)
  • 123,000+ unique IPs through the course of the game (8 weeks) (Peters, 2007)
  • Active player base ~12,000 (Peters, 2007)
  • Players from 115+ countries participated (Thompson, no date)
  • “It became the most successful Arg ever, with around 12,000 players and visits logged from 118 different countries.” (Losowsky, 2003)
  • By end of game the mailing list had 8,300 members (metacortechs pms, 2003a)
  • 1,000 players were called for the Halloween event (metacortechs pms, 2003a)
  • 14,500 IPs logged by Little-Boxes (metacortechs pms, 2003a)
  • 10,500 MC screensavers were downloaded (metacortechs pms, 2003a)
  • Media coverage in The Guardian, The Scotsman, Yahoo Movies, Movie City News, etc. (metacortechs pms, 2003b)

SOURCES:

Losowsky, A. (2003) ‘Puppet Masters’, Guardian, 11 Dec [Online] Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4815979-110837,00.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Metacortechs PMs (2003a) ‘Project MU Credits: Players’, Metacortechs.com/mumowmow [Online] Available at: http://www.metacortechs.com/mumowmow/. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Metacortechs PMs (2003b) ‘Project MU Credits: FAQ’, Metacortechs.com/mumowmow [Online] Available at: http://www.metacortechs.com/mumowmow/. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Peters, S. (2007) ‘Comment on ARGs, with Stats’ Cross-MediaEntertainment.com, 5 Sept [Online] Available at: http://www.cross-mediaentertainment.com/index.php/2006/03/04/top-args-with-stats#comment-41393. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Thompson, B. (no date) ‘Alternate Reality Gaming: MetaCortechs’, Mirlandano.com [Online] Available at: http://www.mirlandano.com/portfolio/arg/metacortechs/index.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

THE OCULAR EFFECT (aka FALLEN ALTERNATE REALITY GAME)

‘The Fallen Alternate Reality Game was designed and created by Toronto-based Xenophile Media, and Los Angeles-based Executive Producer Matt Wolf of Double Twenty Productions as an interactive tie-in for the ABC Family television movie, Fallen, which premiered in July, 2006.’ (Baker, 2007)

‘The Fallen Alternate Reality Game (also known as “The Ocular Effect”) began with a mysterious puzzle ball called the Oculus (www.oculareffect.com) that appeared online weeks prior to the July 2006 broadcast premiere of the television movie Fallen. Unlocking the Oculus reveals the story of a young girl named Faith Arella who undertakes a journey in search of her origins. Shot at various locations around the world, Faith travels from her home in Seattle to California, Florida, Australia, India and Turkey, all the while guided by an online community of players participating in an international scavenger hunt for clues.’ (Baker, 2007)

STATS:

  • 2.8 million people visited the website (Baker, 2007)
  • 250,000+ people from around the world played the game (Baker, 2007)

AWARDS:

  • 2007 Primetime Emmy(R) Award for Outstanding Creative Achievement in Interactive Television
  • 2007 South by Southwest Award (Best Experimental Project)
  • 2007 Banff World Television Award (Best Interactive Program)

SOURCES:

Baker, D. (2007) ‘Canada’s Xenophile Media Wins Primetime Emmy(R) Award for the Fallen Alternate Reality Game’, CNW Group, 10 Sept [Online] Available at: http://www.newswire.ca/en/releases/archive/September2007/10/c7183.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

PERPLEX CITY

Perplex City, Mind Candy, March 21st, 2005-Feb 2007 (credits)

  • 55,000 registered users (Hon, 2007)
  • 850,000 cards sold (Hon, 2007)
  • 1mill+ pageviews per month (Hon, 2007)
  • 100,000 unique visitors per month (Hon, 2007)
  • 50/50 gender split (Hon, 2007)
  • Players by Country: UK: 50%, US: 41%, Canada: 3%, Australia: 2%, Germany: 1%, Other: 3% (Hon, 2007)
  • Mainly non-ARG players (new to ARGs) (Hon, 2007)
  • 500,000 words written (by game writers) (Hon, 2007)
  • 15,000 emails sent to in-game characters (from players) (Hon, 2007)
  • 40,000 registered players since April to Aug (Smith, 2005)
  • About 160,00 packs of cards sold in the UK as of Feb 2006 (Takahashi, 2006)
  • 1.5 million cards created (Adrian Hon in ARG Fest DVD, 2005b)
  • Around 30 fictional websites created (Hon, 2007)
  • 100,000pounds/ US$200,000 reward
  • 17,000+ players registered on Leaderboard as of March 2006
  • Listed in FHM’s Top 50 Websites, March 2006
  • Some players have also written books to gain access to a library where the solution to a puzzle is (Frauenfelder, 2006)
  • Live Event run on 25th Feb at Trafalgar Square, London attracted 220 players (almost 1,000 applied to play). People drove hours and came from Ireland, Barcelona and Hong Kong to play. The event activity included 971 texts and 176 photos received, 3627 texts sent out and a 127 person conga line. (Perplex City News, 2006)
  • Media: websites, SMS, phone calls, emails, podcasts, music, live radio, live events.

SOURCES:

Frauenfelder, M. (2006) ‘More on Perplex City’, Boing Boing, 2 Feb [Online] Available at: http://www.boingboing.net/2006/02/02/more_on_perplex_city.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Hon, A. in (2005b) How Do You Like Your Reality?: ARG Fest NYC 2005, Abacus Video Productions, 2005.

Hon, A (2007) ‘How to Make an Alternate Reality Game or Perplex City: A Look Behind the Scenes’, Google Tech Talk, 5th March [Online] Available at: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6352536437357912484&hl. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Perplex City News (2006) ‘London Live Event Summary’, Perplex City News, 2 March [Online] Was Available at: http://www.perplexcity.com/events/london/liveevent.html. Last Accessed: 4th March, 2006.

Smith, D. (2005) ‘Game snares real world in virtual web’, Guardian Unlimited, 28 Aug [Online] Available at: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,1557923,00.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

Takahashi, D. (2006) ‘Review: Perplex City And The Rise Of The Alternate Reality Game’, A & E Interactive, The Mercury News, 6 Feb [Online] Available at: http://blogs.mercurynews.com/aei/2006/02/review_perplex_.html. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

PUSH, NEVADA

Push, Nevada, LivePlanet, Sept 12-Fall 2002

  • 600,000 actively played (ABC; ABC cited in Miller, C.H., 2005, 297)
  • 200,000 participated in the online portion (ABC)
  • 100,000+ viewers of the TV show (Miller, C.H., 2005, 297)
  • 60,000 downloaded the “Deep Throat” book (Miller, C.H., 2005, 297)
  • Prize money $1,045,000 (Miller, C.H., 2005, 296)
  • ABC discontinued the show after 7 episodes (Miller, C.H., 2005, 296)
  • Final clue given during Monday Night Football was solved in 2 minutes (ABC; Miller, C.H., 2005, 296)
  • 500 people called within 20 minutes of the final clue (ABC; Miller, C.H., 2005, 295)
  • 10,000 people had called by the end of the day (ABC; Miller, C.H., 2005, 296)
  • About 200,000 visited the websites (Miller, C.H., 2005, 296)
  • About 10,000 users in the forum & many other forums created (Thompson, 2006)
  • “The Push, Nevada Game was the largest TV and online game of skill ever played in America (for a prize of over 1 million dollars).” (ABC)
  • According to ABC’s calculations: “one of the largest online games in history” (ABC; ABC cited in Miller, C.H., 2005, 296-7)
  • Most TiVoed shows of the fall season (Miller, C.H., 2005, 297)

SOURCES:

ABC ‘Push, Nevada’, ABC [Online] Was Available at: http://abc.go.com/primetime/push/. Last Accessed: 4th March, 2006.

Miller, C.H. (2004) Digital Storytelling: A Creator’s Guide to Interactive Entertainment, Focal Press, Amsterdam; Boston.

Thompson, B. (2006) ‘ARG & Stats’, personal email to Christy Dena, Received March 5th, 2006.

REGENESIS EXTENDED REALITY GAME (SEASON) 1

ReGenesis Extended Reality Game, Xenophile Media for The Movie Network and Movie One, 2004.

  • “we are very happy with the results of the first season…we did find that a large number of people signed on to ReGenesis and remained lurkers” (mysteryjones aka Evan Jones, 2005)
  • Forum members as of 6th March 2006: 1,027

AWARDS:

SOURCES:

mysteryjones aka Evan Jones (2005) ‘ReGenesis Extended Reality Wraps Up’, DeadDrop, 1 Feb [Online] Available at: http://www.deaddrop.us/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=210. Last Accessed: 30th Oct, 2007.

REGENESIS EXTENDED REALITY GAME (SEASON) 2
These stats from a talk delivered by Evan Jones, then Creative Director of Xenophile Media, ‘Extended Entertainment Experiences‘, 24th Nov, 2006, Paddington, Australia.

  • First ARG linked to a full television season
  • 2 hours exclusive footage
  • 9 distinct websites
  • Included email, telephone, SMS messaging
  • 6 months to build
  • 30 people on the team at Xenophile
  • Ocktopods (hardcore players) = 1-2,000 players
  • 6 fan websites were created
  • Cost significantly less than on episode of TV
  • All those that registered their email and did the survey said they watched all 13 episodes of the TV show
  • Average age 29 years
  • Male and female players
  • 1/3 of audience international

AWARDS:

  • Internationl Interactive Emmy Award (Best Interactive Program)
  • Gemini Award (Best Cross-Platform Project)
  • Canadian New Media Award (Excellence in Cross-Platform)
  • Banff World Television Award (Best Interactive Program)

URBAN HUNT

Urban Hunt, independent, 2004 [ARG Community: unfiction forum]

  • Media coverage, including the New York Times (Szulborski, 2005, 182)
  • First ARG to include an actual in-game book (Szulborski, 2005, 182)

SOURCE:

Szulborski, D. (2005) This Is Not A Game: A Guide to Alternate Reality Gaming, New Fiction Publishing.

WORLD WITHOUT OIL

World Without Oil, 30th April - 1st June, 2007. Full Credits. The following quotes and statistics all sourced from Ken Eklund:

World Without Oil: the first major “Serious ARG,” WWO is a massively collaborative (”crowdsourced”) future simulation of a realistic global oil crisis. The gamemasters sketched out the framing parameters of the oil crisis, in terms of fuel prices and availability; the players responded with in-game personal chronicles of how the oil crisis was manifesting itself in their lives; the gamemasters aggregated these chronicles and incorporated their themes and ideas into the official narrative of the oil crisis, updated daily. Now archived at www.WorldWithoutOil.Org, with operations underway to construct teaching aids and lesson plans for high school teachers to use the material.

The game is very trans- or cross-media, and community-oriented and “Web 2.0,” as the gamemaster and player chronicles appear as blogs, video blogs, images, podcasts, audio files, and so on, and invite comments and crosslinking by other players.

Principal puppetmasters: Dee Cook, Ken Eklund, Marie Lamb, Jane McGonigal, Michelle Senderhauf, Krystyn Wells. Webmaster and puppetmaster: Mark Bracewell. Site Design: Sarah Rainwater. Outreach: Erik Wohlgemuth. Podcasters and Puppetmasters: Corrina McFarlane. Bonnie Primbsch, Cait Zorn. Videographers: Kiyash Monsef and Jonty Collyer.

STATS:

  • Announced March 2, 2007 at the ARGFest in San Francisco (Eklund, 2007)
  • Game launch on Monday, April 30, 2007 (Eklund, 2007)
  • Game went for 33 days, concluding on June 1, 2007 (Eklund, 2007)
  • 1,850 players registered at the WorldWithoutOil.Org website, from all regions of the USA plus a dozen other countries (Eklund, 2007)
  • Over 60,000 unique visitors to WorldWithoutOil.Org by June 1, spending an average of 6 minutes on the site per visit (Eklund, 2008)
  • Over 1,500 in-game stories created by players, as blog posts, video and image uploads, audio files, voicemails and email posted all over the Internet (Eklund, 2007)
  • In early June, a Google search for “World Without Oil” returned over 100,000 hits pertaining to the game (Eklund, 2007)
  • The game archive continues to draw about 6,000 visitors a month. As of November 1, 2007, the game has now drawn over 90,000 unique visitors (Eklund, 2008)
  • “I thought World Without Oil was amazing and groundbreaking. The way it gets a grassroots movement designed to think about important problems and builds it around narrative inspiring.” JESSE ALEXANDER (executive producer of Heroes, LOST, Alias) as reported by Alice Taylor in her Wonderland blog (Eklund, 2007)
  • Jane McGonigal (WWO’s Participation Architect) talked pre-launch about WWO in several presentations, most notably her keynote at the Serious Games Summit at the 2007 Game Developers Conference. She and Creative Director Ken Eklund have talked about WWO many times for print and broadcast, including interviews for the BBC, for Future Tense and To The Best Of Our Knowledge at National Public Radio, and for The Story at American Public Media. (Eklund, 2007)
  • Worldwide press and buzz: articles about World Without Oil appeared in Le Monde, Der Standard, The Wall Street Journal Online, CNET, WIRED Online, and many other print and web news and features. (Eklund, 2007)

AWARDS

  • WWO was the winner for the 2008 Interactive Award at the South By Southwest Festival, in the Activism category

SOURCE:
Eklund, Ken (2007) ‘Stats for “World Without Oil”, personal email to Christy Dena, received 17th Nov, 2007.

Eklund, Ken (2008) ‘Update for World Without Oil ARG stats’, personal email to Christy Dena, received 23rd Feb, 2008.

YEAR ZERO
Trent Reznor’s ARG which is part of Nine Inch Nails’ album Year Zero. I need more stats!

STATS:

  • “Every time a song was leaked, the message boards were swamped. By the time the album hit store shelves in April, 2.5 million people had visited at least one of the game’s 30 Web sites.” (Rose, 2007)

SOURCE:
Rose, Frank (2007) ‘Secret Websites, Coded Messages: The New World of Immersive Games’, Wired, 20th Dec. [Online] Available at: http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/magazine/16-01/ff_args