Quick start
General
Perplex City (PXC) is an Alternate Reality Game (ARG). ARGs are very community oriented, as they usually are online-based and require lots of collaboration to solve puzzles, develop stories, etc.
Perplex City itself is the story of an alternate universe that is very similar to ours. They have a precious artifact known as the Receda Cube, which has been stolen. The role of players is to become familiar with Perplex City culture, which is based on mental agility (whereas Earth would be physical), and eventually find the Cube.
This is being put forth by the Perplex City Academy, run by Sente Kiteway. The Academy contacted Earth-based company Mind Candy, who "have sorted through the information provided" and produce puzzle cards for Earth players to solve.
It isn't necessary to buy the cards to play the game, but they are a lot of fun. There's a leaderboard on the website based on points for solving cards. They've been out in the UK for a while, and they recently picked up a couple of US distributors to sell them.
This is a very diverse, very involved game:
- When a character needed credentials in a library to get access to a rare book, Earth players wrote short stories which were published by a Perplex City company.
- Another trail led from a woman's dying words to a London university, to movie theatres in Canada, to an automated phone system, to a turn-based multi-player online game, to a banner pulled by a plane in the skies of Manchester, to a live meeting where players solved puzzles together.
- After that live event, a mole that had been helping solve puzzles all day escaped in a black helicopter.
- In another event, players riding the London Eye witnessed messages being flashed in Morse code from the banks of the River Thames.
- And much more!
Some helpful websites
http://www.mindcandydesign.com
Interested? Sign up on perplexcity.com to learn more!
