I’m tired of the same format of explaining ARGs in a single YouTube video. ARGs used to mean something, but apparently they don’t anymore. I feel like every time a new ARG goes “viral,” it’s the same thing all over again, they literally have no differences.

The Search for the World That Doesn’t Exist, or for short The King in Yellow by Wifies, is something I’m conflicted about. I love the story, the puzzles, and especially the climax, but at the same time it’s everything I dislike about modern ARGs. There’s a trend of making “ARGs” just for one video, and it’s annoying me, because these used to be interactive experiences, and now it’s just copy-paste every time. Even when something original is released, everyone starts making copycats for views, and all of a sudden it’s not original anymore.

I feel like there’s no innovation anymore, everything just feels the same. I love ARGs as an art medium, but I feel like it’s not working anymore. Am I the only one who feels this way?

Hello! I am a huge fan of Minecraft ARGs and have followed them for a couple years. In recent months I have seen a huge shift in the priorities of these stories.

I think there is a sort of "Marvel-ization" happening with ARGs currently, rather than focus on creepiness or abstractness, they are now the same "I am going to walk through huge custom built maps and read books. I think this is really slowing down the genre as a whole. No one ever cared about $1000 maps and voice acting. I want ARGs to go back to the low budget, filmed on Bandicam kind of look. The high production value makes it feel too clean, too safe. Even voice acting like in SFAWTDE just ruins the vibe, I should barely have a string to hide behind in terms of fear, having a voice protagonist gives far too much security to the viewer. Also for clarification I understand that there has been a major shift in WHO is creating ARGs, I think that ties in to the issue, a lot of Youtubers are hopping on ARGs as if they're the next slop content that will generate millions of views.

While I enjoy connections with literature, I find the cop out of "X god/deity from X novel is infecting this Minecraft world" kind of lame, especially with normal ass humans somehow defeating them in the end.

In short, I want more effort put in to the fear that the viewer feels with aesthetics, story-crafting, and a SILENT PROTAG, rather than the fictional fear of normal guy vs god.

I know some people disagree with this and it may just be because I prefer alpha Minecraft ARGs, but recent videos like "Searching for a World that Doesn't Exist" or I Dreamt of a Minecraft World" just feel so watered down compared to the old style. I fear this style of content will lead to more plot hole filled stories with random gods/deities there for cool literary brownie points.

Now my main issue with these isn't the actual content infact I think the content is well made, it's pretty good. One of my main problem is the fact it's surrounding fucking minecraft.

Im a really big fan of internet horror and args but I CANNOT TAKE THESE SERIOUSLY CAUSE OF THE MINECRAFT PARTS! They can be really terrifying and then they jump into minecraft gameplay AND IT TAKES ME OUT OF THE ENTIRE EXPIERENCE BECAUSE HALF THE TIME IT'S TREATED LIKE FOUND FOOTAGE AND ITS JUST NOT, ITS JUST FUCKING MINECRAFT!

second part I can't stand THESE ARENT ARGS, arg stands for "alternate reality GAME" game being the keyword. An arg requires AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION. like the gravity falls cypher hunt WAS AN ARG most of the "minecraft args" are internet horror not ARGS.

Third part I can't stand, WASTED POTENTIAL! these could be so great! So horrifying! BUT ITS NOT CAUSE ITS FUCKING MINECRAFT! "oh my god the scary ghoul is Infront of you! What would YOU do in this situation???" ID CLOSE THE FUCKING GAME!

the reason horror is so effective is cause we as the audience put ourselves in the situation but when the situation is as simple as just NOT PLAYING A GAME, ITS NOT THAT HARD TO RATIONALISE IT FOR YOURSELF.

FOURTH THING I DESPISE THE MOST, IT IS ALL SO OBVIOUSLY SET UP AND SCRIPTED BY THE YOUTUBER COVERING IT, IT HURTS. the reason I like alot of these explantation videos is cause I can hear the YouTuber theorizing and I can theorize on my own with them. BUT WHEN THE CREATOR OBVIOUSLY MADE THE VIDEO IT'S KINDA HARD TO "THEORISE" WHEN YOUR BEING SPOONFED THE STORY.

anyways yeah that was my rant it just pisses me off to see genuinely good content be ruined by its own circumstances.

Edit:I feel like alot of people are taking this, as me telling you that you can't or shouldn't enjoy these stories. I'm not saying that at all. This is a post Expressing rage at the fact I can't enjoy them as these are all VERY MUCH me problems. Not everything I say automatically applies to you. Got it?

These fucking slop horror, made for pre-teens who think its actual cinema just annoys me. Like there are so many flaws and mistakes that just make the story suck. And somehow it gets praised and creates entire huge communities that will soon die out because they are so trash. (I'm not hating on the communities of people who like it, I just have a problem with the media they like).

So what flaws do most of these "ARGs" have? Almost everything that ruins a story. What do I mean? Well most of these "ARGs" do not have some sense of "realism". What I mean is that the way most of these "ARGs" are presented do not make sense. For example, "Searching for a world that does not exist" does this and it just does not work. Like we are apparently watching a recording of a player named Avery or Lord (I forgot the other dude's name), and this struggle against some haunting by a version of the King in Yellow. Well this gets thrown out the window when we consider stuff outside of the screen/recording. Like in part 2 of that story Avery says something along the lines of "Man I'm exploring this weird anomaly thing on my Minecraft world, when I should be celebrating New Years." Like that's good, it sets up something that draws our real world selves to a fictional story. However, this gets thrown out the window when that same character goes into a fucking 12 HOUR TRANCE WHERE ALL THEY DO IS DO SOME RANDOM BULLSHIT. LIKE APPARENTLY THE 2ND PART TAKES 15 HOURS+, WHERE THE HELL IS LIKE FRIENDS OR FAMILY AND SHIT. DON'T YOU THINK THAT SOMEONE IN AVERY'S LIFE COULD'VE WALKED INTO THIS TRANCE SEQUENCE AND DONE SOMETHING?? But NOOOO, the story only focuses on the game inside the computer, and disregards any sense of reality in it. Another example is one I heard/watched about a while ago. I forgot its name, but the main premise is that the protag of the "ARG" gets a cursed modpack that has some evil corporation technology inside it that spies and takes people's souls in the form of huge giant stone humans, and in the end our protagonist's soul gets sucked into the game and into those giant stone humans. Now, when our protag gets sucked into the game, don't you think people outside of the game would've done something? NO, it never gets explained. No mentions of things like school, family, friends, or anything. Like, there was no possibility that when our protag was searching and messing around with this evil modpack, that their parents could've walked in to ask them to do some chores/work or some thing? Now this is all speculating that the characters in the story are teenagers or young adults who have things like friends or family outside of playing Minecraft. Also things like just turning off the fucking game does not exist for these people most of the time. Like even if it's haunted it's a fucking computer game, Alt-f4 or task manager that shit out of there.

Another issue has to be with its "ARG" aspect. Throughout this rant you see me writing it as "ARG". The reason why is because it's not even an ARG. Presumedly doing basic decoding and finding other youtube channels makes it an ARG. Most of these stories do the bare minimum to have outsider/viewer involvement in the story. Like from the wikipedia page on ARGs it says "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. It is shaped by characters that are actively controlled by the game's designers..." The biggest problem is that most of these stories do not have the players/viewers change outcomes or events of the story. It feels like giving someone a pre-baked cake and telling them to put frosting on it in this specific order, in a cryptic method. Now does the fact that the cake is already pre-baked and already had instructions as to where to put the frosting mean that the person you gave it to helped bake and decorated the cake? HELL NO. Nothing changed the design of the cake, as you literally just gave them directions to how to create it in your vision. Relating the cake thing to the "ARGs", it feels like most of these stories are already finnished/has a plotline that cannot be changed in the slightest. Any viewer involvement involves them finding more clues/directions that the creator of the "ARG" placed down already.

Look there maybe some good ones like that minecraft full moon horror thing, that actually focused more on the "real" human being behind the screen, but most of these "ARGs" just don't care about it. And yes some of these are passion projects made by people who just want to create stories however, good or bad they are, but it just irks me when there is some lack of outside "realism" or lack of actual viewer involvement.

I've been watching videos from a Youtube channel called RetroGamingNow, about ARG's in Minecraft, and I am now curious; what are your views regarding them?

Personally, I find some to be very ingenious in plot or the way they're done, but others can be quite... eh.

So what are your thoughts?

I've seen these 3 and I think these 3 are amazing, but I can't find any that hit just as hard. I'm not a fan of the whole someone else in my world but it's blatantly fake ones. I like ones that feel genuine.

yo, i recently created a second channel specifically for video essays, documentaries and mainly arg covering, i am trying to find a minecraft arg to cover but it is really hard to find a good one that has not been covered yet, any recommendations?