#TS-Morpheus: Recruiting

We are recruiting for an unofficial, cross-faction Ingress ARG. If you only want to solve an ARG, don't read further, you might get spoiled on a potential future one.

What's an ARG?

First, what actually is an ARG? To quote Wikipedia:

An alternate reality game (ARG) is an interactive networked narrative that uses the real world as a platform and employs transmedia storytelling to deliver a story that may be altered by players' ideas or actions.

The form is defined by intense player involvement with a story that takes place in real time and evolves according to players' responses. Subsequently, it is shaped by characters that are actively controlled by the game's designers, [...]. Players interact directly with characters in the game, solve plot-based challenges and puzzles, and collaborate as a community to analyze the story and coordinate real-life and online activities. ARGs generally use multimedia, such as telephones, email and mail but rely on the Internet as the central binding medium.

Ingress itself is basically a huge ARG with the investigation being the "transmedia storytelling" with actors appearing at different events to deepen said storytelling and media and intel leaking online to further the plot.

Why do you need help?

Running an ARG is hard work. In theory one person can run an ARG alone with only some text snippets, but that's quite boring. The perfect ingredients for an ARG are a good written story, nice graphics, challenging puzzles and so on, something that can be managed better with more people.

What will this ARG be about?

Nothing is set in stone yet but a few ideas already exist. But then again, a good ARG needs a good writer, so if you have ideas for a story which is Ingress related, by all means, I'm happy to hear them. 

The ARG aims at providing a challenge for both agents who are experienced in the story behind Ingress and agents who "only play" and don't care about the story at all. The goal is having both factions working together to unlock the secrets of this ARG.

What will this ARG not be about?

First off, it is not official. Niantic doesn't know anything about this and the story that'll be told won't be canon in the Ingress universe. It won't award agents with a special badge or anomaly intel. Passcodes may be distributed, but they all come from loadout cards or other sources (unless Niantic wants to help out with a few codes or a badge *wink wink nudge nudge*). 

You may have heard of the #TS-Morpheus investigation with deaddrops and puzzles last year. That's us, and we want to do a second round.

In addition, the ARG is not a competition between agents, decoders or factions. It is supposed to be solved together and agents are encouraged to share their knowledge and experience.

So what can I expect?

You've read everything and still want to help? Great! If you choose to join you can expect happy agents all around the world as they try their luck on the puzzels. We'll work together to not only set up everything but also making sure everything is going smoothly during the actual ARG and changing things on the fly should we be required to do so.

What should I not expect?

Basically, compensation of any kind. The ARG is supposed to be a global cross-faction operation run by agents like you and us. We're not some company or cooperation and, frankly speaking, we don't even have anything to give to you. If you decide to join you should do so to motivate other agents to work together.

So why exactly do you need me?

The following will be the perfect vision we have. We're fully aware that that'll be hard to archive, but people can dream, right? 

Looking at other ARGs that others have run within the Ingress community (Liminal Continuum for example) and others outside of Ingress, the main thing is to engage agents (and keep them engaged) and how to deliver new content to them. A lot of projects do that via a website or social media channels, but others send physical mail or do deaddrops, others actually have actors delivering the last piece of a puzzle, which, to be honest, is more fun then just waiting for a website to be updated. People also need something to do "im between". For example, the ARG "WakingTitan" which was held to promote a big update for the game "No Man's Sky" had a website with a terminal in which you could input code words, and, depending on the input, you could receive further intel or even unlock new parts of the ARG. That terminal was online all the time, so people could revisit it whenever they wanted. 

Authentic graphics or videos also deepen the connection to the ARG. When you have a company in your story its more believing to give out a scanned internal note with the company logo and redacted passages like the NIA does instead of a text that is just posted to Twitter.

Cut to the chase then. What exactly do you need then?

The following is, again, a list that would be perfect, but can probably not be archived 100%.

- Storytellers: We need people who can tell (and plan!) a good story. You should know about the investigation as a good story which focuses Ingress should mention some core mechanics from the investigation.

- Graphic designers: As demonstrated above, good "intel" should look like real one.

- Programmers: Depending on where we're going, we need some people who can program web apps or other bots, the WakingTitan terminal being an example.

- Web designers: A website is good, a good looking website is better! We're currently having our website on a Squarespace server, but it could be moved if needed.

- Deaddroppers: When we have deaddrops, we need people all around the world to have the most impact. It's quite boring if a deaddrop always happens in the same city. There's no real skill required, you'll just have to print out a document and place it somewhere.

- Puzzle makers: No ARG is fun without puzzles that need to be solved. If you can think of good puzzles you might be just the one for us ;)

Who are you guys actually?

We are the group behind the #TS-Morpheus investigation. From March to May in 2018, we ran an ARG within the investigation community. The response was amazing with people making missions, starbursts, fields and even fanart! The project originally started as a way to promote our team for last year's Camp Navarro, Camp Storyteller, but it evolved into something beyond our imagination. You can read a little more about us in our afterreport here.

Any restrictions for me?

If you want to join, you must absolutely promise to not tell anyone that you are part of the group. The fun is just gone when you know who did what behind the scenes. It also might benefit us having a spy in the inside of a group you're part of. That also obviously means you're not allowed to tell what happens next in the ARG. Nobody likes spoilers.

Of course, when the ARG ultimately concludes, you can tell everyone that you worked on it.

Alright. I've read it all and I really want to help! Where can I sign up?

Great, always happy to have people on board! Shoot us a quick message on TG @TS_Morpheus and tell us what you can do to help. It's not an interview thing, it's just so we can organize a little better.

I still have questions!/I have an awesome idea for something you can do in the ARG.

In that case you can also shoot us a message at @TS_Morpheus.