The Hidden Elements

In my two previous entries on the subject I’ve tried to dispel some of the misconceptions about the ”Dark Side of Alternate Reality Games”, including the beliefs that they are inherently: a) evil, b) mind control exercises, c) hoaxes, d) corporate funded marketing campaigns, or e) any combination of the above.

I haven’t, however, addressed several critical questions that some people have asked me either via email or in the course of various presentations I have given about ARGs, questions that have obvious relevance to the topic at hand. Perhaps the most frequent question is this :

“If ARGs are so innocent, why are there so many things hidden within them, in web page source codes, inside of image files, and so on? Why do the creators keep even their identities hidden?”

My answer to this question starts with an admission.

Yes, ARGs and the things that they are made of – websites, documents, images, videos, and so on – quite often have messages or other information hidden somehow within them. Whether it’s something as simple as putting white text on a white background or placing messages as comments so that they only show up in the source code of a web page, there’s no denying that the history of ARGs is filled with examples of hidden content. I personally invented a few new ways to hide images and text within Word document files that had never been done before in the course of creating my games.

And yes, this could be potentially troublesome in the light of terrorist activity of the Internet that could theoretically employ similar methods to send covert messages and instructions. Or even to someone who firmly believes that subliminal messages are commonplace in mass media communications and sees these hidden elements as proof of the mind-controlling nature of ARGs.

But here the critical difference is intent.

ARG creators want their hidden content to be found.

If that’s the case, then why hide it at all?

In a large number of cases it’s done as part of a puzzle, where the hidden information is either part of the information needed to solve a puzzle or the reward for finishing one. If the content is a web page, often the premise for the information hidden is the source code is that the character who created the page was trying to hide it from unfriendly eyes.

ARGs by their very nature are mystery stories of sorts, at least in their delivery method. Even if the narrative of the game isn’t of the mystery genre, the way it is broken up and delivered and distributed as various pieces of media makes the process of experiencing it a kind of scavenger hunt, as players seek out and assemble the various elements of the story strewn across the web and the real world. The point is that everything the game creators make is designed to be found and enjoyed (or at least puzzled over). And that includes the hidden content in source codes, embedded into images via steganography, and so on. Those are all parts of the story, just as the videos, sound clips, and web pages are.

So there’s no malicious purpose or intent to the hidden content in ARGs, in terms of conveying hidden or subliminal messages. Because of the way ARGs are made and presented, ARG players spend a good deal of their time devouring every single piece of content, examining it every way they can think of and often inventing new ways to do so along the way. Player communities often thousands strong devote themselves to solving and understanding every mystery within these games. It’s rare that any minute detail escapes their notice, so it’s almost certain that any such content with a dark or devious purpose in any past ARGs would have been noticed and thoroughly examined and discussed by now.

But there’s absolutely no evidence of any such content ever being found.

It honestly almost makes me laugh, the thought of trying to hide some sort of subliminal elements or messages in ARG content that would be unnoticed or undiscoverable by the players while having some sort of deleterious effect on them. It would be like choosing to hide the person or object you wanted to smuggle into the country in bales of marijuana before trying to cross the border. You couldn’t choose a less successful strategy.

So forget the idea that the hidden elements in ARGs somehow represent subliminal or dangerous messages. It’s just not true.

Furthermore, there certainly have been successful ARG campaigns that never hid any information using any of these methods, although that’s not to say they didn’t use puzzles that might have employed codes or ciphers of some sort. The point is, hiding information in various ways in game content is just one tool that an ARG creator can use if they want to, and hidden elements like this definitely aren’t a prerequisite of a successful or well-made Alternate Reality Game.

There’s another aspect of ARGs that’s often hidden, at least during the course of the live run of the game, namely the identity of the creators or Puppetmasters. While it’s not a hard and fast rule, the game creators often choose to remain “behind the curtain” while the game is afoot, but it’s certainly not because they plan on using that anonymity for any malevolent purposes or as a means of harassing anyone without fear of reprisal or possible legal prosecution. More often than not it’s because the creators want players to focus on the characters and story of the game, and not on who made it. Once an ARG concludes, these Puppetmasters are usually more than willing to step forward and claim their work, and it’s rare that a game successfully ends without following up with a credits list of some sorts.

This also explains why so many ARGs use domain names that have been registered privately, using proxy services that hide and protect the identity of the registrant. Actually some large scale corporate ARG campaigns choose to register all in-game website names normally, so as to make their corporate involvement readily apparent via these public records and to preclude any possibility of the site or the entire campaign being labeled deceptive or fraudulent. Leaving their name in the WhoIs records identifies or brands the domains / websites as part of a marketing or promotional campaign.

Finally, there’s one other question I’ve been asked that I’d like to address before ending this series about the Dark Side of ARGs. It’s a question that brings the entire discussion full circle to why I began it in the first place.

“Could an ARG be created to specifically harass, influence, endanger, or harm someone?”

The answer to that question isn’t quite as simple, and deserves a post of its own.

Tagged as: Alternate Reality Game, ARG, Dark Side, Dave Szulborski, dreamsend, dreamsend333, jeremy blake, live, theresa duncan, ty brown