Lost and Found luggage?

Mystery suitcases have been turning up for some time now. First there were Greenway's Tulse Luper Suitcases but more recently a series of "Mucguffin suitcases" have been appearing on Amazon, Craigslist and Ebay, as well as on their own website. Rumored contents range from sums of money to international secrets and even clues to a game. Has anyone received or lost one?

 

Puppetmaster Stalin was Behind Roswell's 'UFO' Crash

According to investigative journalist Annie Jacobsen's exhaustingly assembled new book “Area 51”, Stalin enlisted infamous Nazi Dr. Josef Mengele in plan to crash UFO's in the Arizona desert to freak-out the Americans. The explanation for the famous "flying disc" that crashed in Roswell in 1947 is nearly as bizzare as the UFO theory. Jacobson writes that Josef Stalin inspired by Orson Welles' famous 1938 radio broadcast of War of the Worlds, wanted to throw the United States into a similar panic.

So Stalin enlisted Nazi doctor Josef Mengele, who had fled to South America after World War II, to create a crew of "grotesque, child-size aviators" to fly in a Horton Ho 229 plane the Soviets had seized from Germany. In exchange, Mengele would get a eugenics lab. Apparently the children, aged 12 and 13 and described by Jacobsen as having "unusually large heads and abnormally shaped oversize eyes," did not fly the plane; instead it was piloted remotely. But the Horton crashed in the New Mexico desert and authorities decided to hush up the incident. Quite the Rabbit Hole.

The Last Crystal Skull is Found!

The centuries old enigma of the Crystal Skulls continues. Judging from the history and mystery around them, it seems clear that these objects are an part of a Renaissance ARG. One of the many actual Da Vinci Code like mysteries that flourished in the 16 century Europe. Certainly the engineering stinks of Freemasonry. While many claim the skulls to be of Mayan origin, carbon dating puts them at 500 years old, well after the collapse of the Mayan Empire. 

The Mirror quoting German news sources claim that this last skull was discovered on the roof of an old Bavarian estate. Measurements cannot be confirmed at this point, but the German news source said the weight was substantial – heavy enough to make it one of the most valuable jewels ever discovered by serendipity. Many in the New Age movement suggest the discovery confirms the nearing the end of days. According to the legend, collecting all thirteen crystal skulls in one location will bring about the saving of the human race amidst a quickly unfolding Doomsday. As we all now know, the gifted Mayan astronomers and mathematicians, calculated the “end of days” - to take place during the winter solstice, December 21, 2012. Until this week, only twelve of the thirteen skulls had been discovered.

There are also suggestions that the ancient skull thought to have belonged to Hitler’s SS chief Heinrich Himmler, may somehow be related to a cache of lost Nazi treasure that was hidden at some point during World War II or its aftermath.

Mapping Alternate Reality Game Begins

Part Alternate Reality Game, part Pychocartography, part Art, the Urban Codemakers project has launched in Melbourne, Australia. The game appears to involve finding hidden objects, joining secret collectives and uncovering the history of the cities development and planning. If you find yourself in Melbourne, maybe worth going along and checking it out. Send us a report.

Broken Spoke

Brighton based artist group Blast Theory (I like your old stuff better than you new stuff) have been presenting their bicycle based mobile work “RiderSpoke” in several world cities over the last couple of years. Recently, we received reports that a game within the game broke-out when the work was presented in Copenhagen, Denmark. While details are scant, apparently a group calling themselves “udbrugsforening” (uncooperative people) staged and intervention involving throwing at least three of the mobile equipped bikes into the Søerne (the three rectangular lakes curving around the city centre. While Blast Theory have not confirmed, Interestingly Copenhagen doesn’t appear on their list of cities in which the game was presented on either Wikipedia or on Blast Theory's website.

Love Robot Love

Who doesn't like cardboard robots? Nobody, right? Well New York duo Awkward Hug are currently running Must Love Robots, based around the idea of building love connections between people and robots. You think this would cost billions, but no, these creators have imaginatively pulled the whole thing off with pocket money.

Without going to much into the game which you can find out all about here, it basically it provides a reason to dress as a cardboard robot. (As if we needed an excuse) This self-funded project came out of an original desire to create a Web series about a robot, a la Robot Frank, but developed into an ARG.

坂本 龍馬 ARG

The Japanese ARG Ryoma:The Secret revolving around the life of popular cultural figure Sakamoto Ryōma began in Tokyo earlier this month. Sakamoto Ryōma was a master swordsman and progressive leader of the movement to overthrow the Tokugawa shogunate during the Bakumatsu period in Japan.

If you read Japanese or pretend to like us, then help us keep across the burgeoning Tokyo based ARG movement by keeping an eye on these sites:

Website: http://igdaj-arg.blogspot.com/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/ARG_INFO
http://arg.igda.jp/