Roles People Play

We present an initial framework for roles that are assumed by players and designers of Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) to help promote and sustain participation and collaboration during gameplay. These roles are being derived from analysis of a sample of ARGs and interviews with designers. In particular, we find that approaches designers take to incorporate in-game protagonists (e.g., “protagonists-by-proxy”) can influence the ways in which 1) players gain access to disparate narrative and ludic elements within an ARG and 2) designers can integrate collaborative learning opportunities authentically into the narrative and gameplay.