Progress is being made in Halo 3 ARG

Progress is being made as our beloved Halo 3 ARG has officially been kicked up a notch. And before we get into the news we have to warn you that these ARGs can and do get a confusing, but we'll try our best to recap the past few hours' events. Anyway, here we go ...

After the AdjuntantReflux went to sleep, Halo3.com received a little update. The website now displays five servers that are "locked" leading us to believe that our goal must have something to do with getting these servers online. But this rabbit hole gets a lot deeper. A paper boy posted a URL on the Bungie.net forums that he found after paging through this Sunday's Circuit City ad. The URL links to a Halo comic on Halo3.com that hides a IP address. This IP address is a page featuring a standard ARG countdown clock and when it hits zero, we're expecting more fun. But we aren't done. After doing a little reverse whois search a new website was found that is home to the Society of the Ancients. This society looks to be where ARG players will be registering, finding evidence, and solving this mysterious Halo puzzle of confusion. The thing is that all this progress may have been found earlier than was intended due to the Circuit City ad URL being leaked days before expected. Keep track of the latest news and details over at the Halo 3 ARG wiki.

It's late, our heads hurt, but we still find ourselves pulled in by the "game". How about you?

[Thanks, to everyone who sent this in]

Reader Comments (25)

err...what's an ARG?

It's nice seeing you on the forums, Dustin. ;D

Though, honestly, IRC is where it's at if you want the News when it hits. It's really intense, and exciting. Especially when you get a chance to contribute.

ARG is a term for "Alternate Reality Game".

Bungie is sort of infamous for these games before the real game releases. They usually bring some answers to what the story is about, but usually they bring up more questions then anything.

This game should be really exciting to figure out, I look forward to figuring out these clues with you all.

The server picture is gone now, that box is just blank. I think their plans were ruined slightly.

Sorry about the 3 posts, it froze and for some reason posted 3 times.

@2: Alternate Reality Game (I think.)

No offence to anyone, but how do you lot find the time for all this stuff?? It's pretty tough getting the hours in on the 360, let alone anything else!!

X3F, please keep posting updates on this.

@3(5,6 =P)

It's not blank. Clear your browser's cache and try again. I had the same problem.

@2
ARG stands for Alternate Reality Game, which is a social community-based game that blurs the lines of reality and fiction by incorporating real life things into the game.

Example: With the Halo 2 I Love Bees ARG, a website was "hacked" by an AI from the future, and the group of players from all over the country were sent out to answer ringing payphones in different cities to unlock more of the story being told in the game.

It's a very clue-driven experience, where most of the time you're only given hints at what to do and you have to figure out how to advance in the game on your own as a community. It's fun but very time consuming to keep up with. =)

ARG = Last Gen... stop wasting time bungie/microsoft. Get Halo 3 out earlier. :P

I just messaged AdjutantReflex on bungie.net and thanked it for the 'Watch for the signs, the keepers of the flame' email. I wonder why I was chosen?

I played the Beta (121 ranked, 74 social, highest level 13, 63 RP, Gunnery Sgt level 1 ) I wonder if any of those stats played into it?

Just wanted to share that with X3F and any other people that recieved the email from what I can assume was AdjutantReflex, to try to find some sort of pattern.

"No offence to anyone, but how do you lot find the time for all this stuff?? It's pretty tough getting the hours in on the 360, let alone anything else!!"

+ ∞

I barely have time to play Forza on my 360...

I don't get the whole ARG thing. Just give us the game. I'm not Sherlock Holmes over here.

@9

Anyone who was/is signed up to receive email updates from xbox.com or whatever received that email. I got it, as did many many others, so there isn't really a "pattern," more just expected.

I love how crappy that website looks, but its soooo obvious its linked (Look at the comic and then the evidence page from Tanzania at the bottom). Really, this is superbly done, as it looks like a hoky alien sightings page, but has a deeper meaning.

So, is it 50 Hours, 60 Minutes, ... Seconds?

Wait...

5 days, 16 hours, 2 minutes... God I'm a little bit slow.

Wait...

5 days, 16 hours, 2 minutes... God I'm a little bit slow.

Actually...its a bit less...the system skips any number where a digit is a 7, 8 or 9...If you watch the second counter...youll notice this...

I FIGURED IT OUT !!!

The symbol that AR keeps using is the seasonal symbol used by the Africans for SUMMER. All of the symbols/objects/structures on the "society of the ancients" website are linked to seasons and timekeeping... That countdown is going to end on the first day of summer !!!!

AR also said "the seeds have been planted" Seeds are planted in spring so that they can be grown and be harvested in the summer... It's all starting to connect more and more...

BUNGIE IS FUCKIN GENIUS !!

brianfontez@hotmail.com

Sure, the system skips numbers including 7, 8, or 9... but if you watch the second counter, it uses a 113 second minute, so with the skips, it still comes out to 60 seconds in the end. Very odd...

@17 It's because aliens obviously don't use the numbers 7, 8, and 9 to pertain to seconds... obviously. :)

There is something about the numbers 7, 8, 9 but I can't remember. I'll google at some time.

Base 6? It only uses the digits 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6...

I think Fontez figured it out...

I'm gonna speculate that one of the servers will be available in 5 days... At midnight from the 20th to the 21st. Look for it. And that server will contain more clues...

So, it looks like this is countdown is in base 7 (binary = {0,1}, base 7 = {0,1,2,3,4,5,6}). So every minute is 114 seconds using base 7. Based on this, it looks like the countdown ends on 6/21/2007 @ Midnight.

I'm guessing that the countdown ends at midnight of the summer solstice (longest day of the year).

@Fontez - It already is summer (here anyway).

Man do I feel like an idiot. Just realised that the countdown has now stopped and is apparently co-ordinates for somewhere near Voi. But still Bungie are crafty bleeders so something may yet be planned for midnight of the solstice.

Looks like I was right

Progress is being made in Halo 3 ARG

Reader Comments (25)

Posted: Jun 15th 2007 3:09AM (Unverified) said

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Posted: Jun 15th 2007 12:02PM DjDATZ said

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