The first ARG was actually a book from the 1970s

[@ia2625]

A missed opportunity for this video: Nabokov's works usually do involve interactivity and puzzle solving in very similar ways to modern ARGs, usually in the form of details that look like coincidences that when collected paint a larger narrative on top of the surface layer narrative. His short story The Vane Sisters ends with an acrostic in its last paragraph that reveals a hidden message from a ghost. A similar thing happens in Pale Fire where a message from a ghost is phonetically hidden in seemingly random nonsense ("pada ata lane pad not ogo old wart alan ther tale feur far rant lant tal told") and the characters give up on trying to decipher it but the reader can if he wants to. Pale Fire is actually full of these things (it even has a literal treasure hunt puzzle that has remained unsolved to this day) and its hidden narrative turns the whole novel on its head, tying up all the seemingly unrelated aspects into a beautifully unified whole. His most ARG-like work to me however is The Original of Laura, a book composed of Nabokov's unfinished notes for a novel, that he supposedly wanted burnt in the case that he died without finishing it, but his family ended up publishing it against his will after his death. Although these events are completely believable at face value, the possibility of all of this merely being another frame narrative orchestrated by Nabokov is too tempting, considering how thematically in line it is with the book's themes of dying (the original title was Dying is Fun) and erasing yourself. If this is true, he himself has become another of his ghosts, communicating with the reader from the afterlife. He would have loved Alantutorial.

[@Ituriel85]

Can Don Quixote also be considered as a predecessor of ARGs? Cervantes explains in a long preface that he only found a chronicle narrated by a fictitious Moorish author named Cide Hamete Benengeli. He also includes many poems dedicated to Quixote, Dulcinea and Rocinante interacting with other famous characters like Amadis de Gaula. One chapter ends with a cliffhanger because the “original manuscript was incomplete” and the next chapter begins when Cervantes buys another manuscript with the missing fragment. There is even an external intervention. An author named Avellaneda wrote an unauthorized sequel to Don Quixote. Cervantes then wrote the second part and in that book Quixote often mentions “the false adventures and stories written about him”.

[@whykevinwhyyy]

i love Don Quixote! and i would definitely include it in the pre-ARG category. if you look closely, it's included at the edge of the book cover collage around 8:05

[@-Reagan]

You’re like me, you really need to just start your own channel but, instead you just have a ton of information in your head to draw on and when you watch YT you get ideas 💡 but, then you just make long comments about it, when you really need to make a video! I’d love to see a video on this, maybe even illustrated with some creative editing (if it’s in your -wheelhouse- windmill) and sub 🔔

[@dumbbanana4334]

Hfjdhfjd I thought that u were talking about don don donki because it is also called don quijote

[@sad_birch_art]

It would definitely be in the realm of metatextuality, as the text is commenting on itself, as well as intertextuality, since our understanding of the main text is shaped by that introduction. I suppose texts that present themselves as such through another text would then be the predecessors of ARGs, since they build their world as larger than the text by using multiple texts of varying 'genre', but lack interactivity.

[@UhhNon]

Yea, I never read or watched Black Swan or The Holy Mother series either.

[@YankeeWhite]

That was something special. Thank you. I really enjoy your art style and animations.

[@sarahlynrogers4154]

Not sure what I like most, beyond the actual argument: William Goldman's eyebrows, S. Morgenstern's eyebrows, bodybuilder Stephen King, the California-Voice musician's voice and seated pose, that Teller magic, or so many stanky beats

[@whykevinwhyyy]

let's be real, it's the stanky beats.

[@NotProbablyKam]

I've never seen such an underrated youtube video. Something about the way ARGs are so flawlessly explained and the great editing makes this video amazing. In my opinion this vide should have millions of views and I hope it does in the near future.

[@im_genuinely_confused]

I came here from Sagan Hawkes....so worth clicking the link

[@staysterling]

seeing the lizzie bennet diaries in the compilation of ARGs was jarring. never thought of it as one, but yeah, i see it now! loved your reasoning at the end about the magic of the ARG... genre, I suppose? Story telling medium? Whatever it is. Whatever it is, it is an incredible way to make a story that makes everyone involved care for what is being told.

[@Gato303co]

15:02 I'm so glad seeing in the top left screen showing Catastrophe Crow, one of my favorite ARGs 😊

[@DaMoniable]

I remember one of the first times playing an ARG. It was an MMO called Secret World (which still sort of lives on) that had a lot of puzzles and narrative points outside the game itself. In fact i remember there being one questline that had a puzzle that was answered by one of the developers under the guise of a random nobody on some random forum which you'd get by googling the puzzle. And googling it was the only way to get the answer to the puzzle. The idea of something like that where the game not only continues to play outside the boundaries of the game itself, but will interact back in real time in some cases, just blew my mind. Making the draw to Penn and Tellers work, or just stage magic in general is honestly the most perfect parallel. Its all an illusion, and if the illusion fools you into thinking that in some way this could possibly be real, even for a fleeting moment, then its done its job to its fullest. And that's what makes it so fantastic.

[@theskullraider5058]

By your definition, one could argue that the first ARG was something completely unintentional: the mass hysteria spawned by Orson Welles' radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells. The radio show was told through the perspectives of newscasters and reporters who are describing in real time the horrors of a sudden invasion from Martians. A combination of the medium's then fairly young age, a general lack of mainstream notoriety, and people's imaginations, lead to the show inspiring a sudden nationwide panic at a fictitious apocalyptic invasion.

[@thewitchef]

That was a great video! Looking forward to see what other content you put forward. Little piece of feedback: I would have appreciated the sudden music to not be so much louder than the spoken bits.

[@CeceliaM]

love this video!! it's not a book but i've been very interested in the 1938 war of the worlds radio play for a long time and i absolutely think it functions as a piece of unfiction, though not in the way the books mentioned in this video are. can't wait to see what else you make :]

[@goodmaro]

It's actually fiction about a fiction, but you probably knew that. The stories about the public reaction to the airing were themselves made up as retroactive publicity.

[@CeceliaM]

@@goodmaro i did! that's part of why i'm so interested in it :)

[@annabellehka]

This was actually SUCH a sick video! I was baffled to see the view and subscriber count after such high quality research, writing, and editing! I’m keeping an eye on you dude, you’re gonna go far.

[@Minetuber07]

For a split second when you showed your face at 1:29, I thought I was looking at Tony Hawk. Great video.

[@ItsAsparageese]

I'm LOVING this video. Bit of feedback: The audio inserts like the music clips and the loud beeps redacting some words are quite a bit louder than your speaking. I'm listening at night trying to keep this down and keep having to quickly turn it down and then back up to hear your words. I also have sensory hyperacusis so some of those parts are a bit startling, and borderline painful depending on the specific sounds. I'm excited to check out more of your work after this great video regardless! But if you see this, I hope you take it into consideration for your future audio production as far as volume is concerned :) Thanks for the very cool video! Edit: Oh wow this is the first video of your channel? I'd be disappointed there isn't more to view right away, if I weren't so excited to be here early and glad to see your high-quality work getting some serious attention! Subbing and will be on the lookout for your future material for sure!

[@florbergesio4442]

What you said about The Princess Bride reminded me about two of my favourite books of all time: House of Leaves by Mark Danielewsky (a story inside of a story inside of a story, with beautiful imagery, really recommend the color version), and Shin Sekai Yori (From the new world) by Yūsuke Kishi (the original novel, not the anime or the manga adaptation) wich is written as letters from a person to the generations to come, but I actually never read that book, since it's written in japanese I was only able to read a fan-made translation in english (not my main language either) via individual translation updates posts. I just wanted to share these two books as I feel that if anyone likes this type of book might really enjoy these two. I don't think going into any more detail would do it justice to these books, but you can search for them yourselves or if you really want to I can try to give more detail without spoilers. Happy reading!

[@whykevinwhyyy]

thanks for sharing! i'm familiar with house of leaves, but i'll have to check out shin sekai yori.

I'll do you one better (actually I don't know if it fits as an ARG but it does fit with the definition in the video): the novel Hopscotch (Rayuela in it's original language) is a 1963 book by argentinian writer Julio Cortazar, and it's particularly unique because the story will drastically change depending on how you read it. You can read it the traditional way from beginning to end or you can stop halfway through and get a different story. You can also follow a specific order provided by the author or hop between chapters at will, both will give you unique develops to the narrative. It is a must read, one of the most important novels in latin american history, and most importantly, extremely fun.

[@reda29100]

1:52 firstly and most importantly, as a Java programmer for 5 years I can say confidently, neither am I but here we are! String args is a mystery beyond our mortal understanding. Dunno what mortality has to do with thinking, but so the saying goes.

[@albertcamelus6316]

This channel has a bright future right up ahead!

[@grantandrews4826]

Fantastic video, really inspiring to me as a writer, and former band guy ❤

[@goronska]

Absolutely wonderful, I had no idea that beyond storytelling you had the hidden talent of being a videoessayist!

[@DoccyWoccy]

Really well done video, loved the watch

[@NatetheNerdy]

"Later editions included Stephen King." Roland the Gunslinger met Westley the Dread Pirate on some level of the Dark Tower.

[@ernststravoblofeld]

Tolkien wins the "Commit to the Bit" award.

[@bp5257]

I read this back in the early 2000s and completely bought it 🤦‍♀️ What's more though, I had a friend that swore up and down to have read the original, unabridged version. To this day, I'm not sure if that was a lie, a misremembering, or playing along with the joke...

[@whykevinwhyyy]

whichever it was, i'm sure Goldman would be proud!

[@fishergordon2382]

Well iv learnt something new today.

[@scuzzbug]

im curious to why you used petscop and alantutorial as examples, because i dont think those really count as ARGS. maybe im misremembering both, but i dont remember a 'game' aspect being in either of them.

[@whykevinwhyyy]

honestly I agree that petscop and alantutorial don't quite count as ARGs, but I also think the definition of ARG is fluid enough that they're in the ballpark. I just used them because they're iconic examples that lots of people are familiar with and because I love them 😁

[@postbunnie]

Is there a hidden picture in the binary around 3:09? Or are my eyes playing tricks on me.

[@Cyfrik]

I think it's a repeating pattern. It becomes more noticeable when I take my glasses off, so the details blur.

[@VTPPGLVR]

This also seems like arguments for creepy pastas being hella old

[@samwamm85]

Not sure if this is relevant but I know of an old story by someone named Martenstein. It seems to me to be a terribly recounted version of the story of Beowulf. This might have at least been in part the inspiration for the novel. The author also seems to have altered characters in the story to resemble real world people at the time of writing it in a manner similar to what was done with Sleepy Hollow.

[@samwamm85]

Also I just now realised your name is "Kevin Y". I have a friend named Kevin Yang IRL. weird. Wait, nevermind, it's Wang, but still I guess kinda a coincidence?

[@CrypticSpoon1]

Good video

[@FatherMcKenzie66]

that’s cool

[@Wyrmwould]

Instead of found footage, it's as though the author is working with a found text. This reminds me of Tolkien pretending he translated the Lord of the Rings from an ancient source he called the Red Book of Westmarch.

[@MrZidaneValor]

This is a banger

[@dougalsii]

r e l i g i o n occasionally includes real-life game overs

[@rickriffel6246]

An ARG is a loud cry of exaspiration -- "AAAARRRG!" -- that's all it is.

[@raykampf4151]

If you now that no one knows what ARGs are - that you made it up- then why put that in your title?? This is fascinating information but you're making the viewer work too much. Or is this video an ARG?

[@ObsessionistVideos]

This is a beautiful perspective on The Princess Bride. I picked up my copy at a second-hand shop during a vacation in England and the magic of realizing what the author was doing, and deciding to play along anyway, was perhaps more impactful than any of the real places we visited. I immediately wanted more. 17776 felt similar and is one of my favorite pieces of media ever. I've yet to really delve into modern ARGs, but treating them as an evolution of one of my favorite literary techniques (rather than a less accessible sort of puzzle game) is compelling.

[@whykevinwhyyy]

I remember being really swept away and not wanting it to end when I first read it at age ~15. I'd never heard of 17776 before, I'll have to check it out!

[@ObsessionistVideos]

​@@whykevinwhyyy the extent to which 17776 presents itself as "real" in the AR sense begins and ends with the SportsNation article it is hosted at, but it is as a brilliant multimedia epistolary work through and through.

[@LichenJuice]

I LOVE 17776 SO MUCH

[@underarmbowlingincidentof1981]

@@ObsessionistVideos 17776 is so damn good!! I had to force myself into only doing one page a day because otherwise I would have ran through it on day one lol

[@PotatoCandyDarling]

Whenever I pitch House of Leaves to people, I always describe it as if Pale Fire were written by HP Lovecraft. You've talked about a lot of my favorite books here, so I think I'm adding another digit to your subscriber count

[@bloodypommelstudios7144]

I was half expecting this to be about Masquerade, a 1979 book full of hidden puzzles which was supposed to lead you to a treasure hidden in the English country side.

[@skyemaree1949]

girl, sorry. WhAt?!

[@alexhera_]

I don't know if I've ever seen a video that so perfectly explains what is so special about ARG's, while also offering a really interesting and fresh perspective on the history of the medium that I hadn't thought of much before. I'm really blown away & I'd love to see more videos like this!

[@jhor8113]

One of my personal favourite ARG like books would have to be House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski. it has a convoluted narrative, which is rather unique in that it's an ARG within an ARG within an ARG. The main character/author is writing cryptic commentary on a paper written about a movie that doesn't seem to exist in his universe, and the paper he's writing about and sharing with us claims that the movie is a hoax in it's universe, and each layer: movie, paper, and commentary, has its own reality if you will, with other fake articles and people being referenced in each layer. Each layer also has its own puzzles and mysteries, down to cyphers and Morse code hidden in the text, some of which the characters in subsequent layers try to solve, and some left to you. Each layer of the story is literally an ARG to the layer and characters after it. That said there is this force that seems to affect beyond the original universe, and the 𝐇𝐨𝐮𝐬𝐞 is able to destroy the lives of characters in the realities beyond its own.

[@jademonass2954]

this video is so perfectly made, i am FLOORED by the fact that this is your first video and you have 95 subscribers? that such a low subcount! It will take a week to get 10k youll see also loved the mention to ella minnow pea, thats my favorite epistolary novel

[@whykevinwhyyy]

just tell 9,900 of your friends about me and we'll get there! 🙏🙏

[@goodmaro]

Fictional provenances are *very* common, including in those of a lot of famous works like _Tarzan_ and _Frankenstein_ . Usually the setup is that the direct witness was indisposed or hir identity was being protected. Most of these are not epistolary, but minor epistolary features are pretty common in works where they aren't the main focus. An adventurer may have acquired an account of a strange and dangerous place that the narrator then relates and eventually pursues hirself, in some cases never to be heard from again except to leave some evidence behind. An "editor" may use a preface to contradict what has been written previously. Sometimes framing will be nested several levels deep, as in Washington Irving's purported works by Geoffrey Crayon.

[@Kreln1221]

*The true kings of ARGs are ancient and extremely influential on the course of civilization and society... They are the theological works such as the Bible. What better examples can you think of where human beings write documents that they say were written, not just by other humans, but by the gods themselves, and who literally create alternate versions of reality and history that millions of others, for countless generations, believe with 1,000% certainty, and who base their entire lives on?*

[@Deathsespresso]

You should read "As If: Modern Enchantment and the Literary Pre-History of Virtual Reality" by Michael Saler. It's pretty accessible and I think works well with your premise here. Also, play "The Beginner's Guide". That shit will blow your mind. Oh and man, the E-Literature scene of the 80s and 90s took Pale Fire and RAN WITH IT. just a deluge of folks writing interactive fiction and saying "we're definitely not making games" - spoiler, they were. I for one think an Alternate Reality and an Imagined World are different things. Which, if we make that distinction, has some interesting implications for the deeply intertwined but (in my view) divergent implications of Nabikov's work (or Italo Calvino, because "If on Winter's Night a Traveler" wants you to play along in a performative sense but not play it as in game) and Tolkien. Also, since we're defining things - the question of whether the Princess Bride can count has to do with the community element of ARGs. In my view, ARGs are designed for community game-play. And granted the Princess Bride does want the imagined world to be inhabited by it's readers - but playing it, in the way you've described doesn't quite get there for me. It's definitely "ergodic" and transmediated and a clear proto-ARG at the very least. With your definition though, with what you set out with - it totally qualifies. I think I'm just arguing from a different frame. Regardless, this rocks and I'll be using it in my classes whenever possible. It'll be on my 2026 ARG class syllabus (unless you outdo it by then). I will say, I think you hit the boundary between "metafiction" and "TINAG' right on the money though. Princess Bride seems to not have developed the spatial elements of pervasiveness yet, but it's clearly moving beyond metafiction with it's navigation of time. PLUS, intellectual nonsense aside, this video fucks and I can't wait to see more essays from you. Your style works immaculately in this form.

[@ErikHolten]

I agree that this video rocks.

[@ObsessionistVideos]

Take a shot every time Wren mentions The Beginner's Guide

[@easymentality]

I know House of Leaves is the modern poster child for "ARG" books, but Chuck Palahniuk's RANT was just as mind-bending and crazy in my opinion.

[@nolynylon]

Rant is Palahniuk's underrated best work

[@sl0wtwn]

thanks for the rec! been meaning to read another of his works after enjoying fight club and haunted and wasnt sure where to start

[@corpserevivers]

ohhhhhh as much as i think it's kind of a historical goose chase to determine what the very first ever arg was, you make some EXCELLENT points and it tickles me to think of goldman as a shared ancestor of so many modern args/media with arg-ish elements. great video!!!

[@generatoralignmentdevalue]

Knowing The Princess Bride only from the movie, I had no idea it was literally House of Leaves for kids. Neat. With the option to interact through the publisher, it may even count as a basic ARG.

[@jonothanthrace1530]

Considering the nature of some of the footnotes in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy novels, I wonder if Douglas Adams read The Princess Bride when it came out.

[@shiinamarkov]

Wonderful work and it's really cool to see Princess Bride discussed. It's one of my fave books and it's rare to see people mention the ARG elements in it.

[@sylph8005]

You really should have mentioned the Castle of Otronto. It did the whole "author insists they're not the author and this is a translation of a real, much older tale" thing before anyone else as far as I'm aware. On top of that, it was the first novel to call itself "gothic", starting the genre that included Dracula. It was called "gothic" because that referred to the dark and medieval in that time period (1764)

[@foolofdaggers7555]

I remember reading the so-called abridged version of The Princess Bride. I was in middle school and so missed all the interesting nuance, but it made me want to read the unabridged version. I was pretty disappointed to learn that version didn't exist.

[@jeronimoledesma6804]

This video reminded me a lot of my favorite novel, "Umineko: when they cry" it is a reaaaaaally long japanese visual novel, but it touches a lot on the themes of this video, of magic and beliving, of authors inviting others to their stories in particular ways, on the ways one story might change when written in such a way, I think if whoever reads this has the time (qnd... It is a LONG TIME) they should try and read it, it really will give you tons of what the video talks about (specially when you have in mind it was realesed episode by episode, instead of all together as it is today)

[@arianebarnes]

I was a player of what is considered the first "ARG" known as "The Beast", a promo for the 2000 movie "Artificial Intelligence", but the promo itself was based on the online promotion for 1999's "Blair Witch". But based on this description, there may be a non-digital ARG that pre-dates Princess Bride: The Mormon Church. "The Book of Mormon" is an epistolary novel obvious to anyone outside the church as being written by Joseph Smith, but according to Smith himself, he "translated" the book from golden plates given to him by the angel Moroni, the final character in the book who buried them. The entire Church is based on the idea that Smith was a translator, not the author, and the book itself was based on the "scientific" knowledge known at that time (1830) about the origins of Native Americans, now completely disproven thanks to archaeology, linguistics, and genetic studies that post date Mormonism. The "game" elements outside the book are the church itself. Knowing Better's video essay "American Exceptionalism as a Religion" lays it out better than I can.

[@selenamcmahan9234]

Canes jawbone. A murder mystery book that was published with the story and pages out of order. Since then the publishing company made a game out of it that if you can get the pages in order you would get some small compensation. The original book was published in 1934. Making it in my opinion the first ARG

[@therizinosauruscheloniform2162]

Back in 1979, A man named Kit Williams released a book called 'masquerade', which had the clues for the location of a 18 carat gold rabbit somewhere within its text and art. There is a wonderful talk on it by Ashens (about its terrible video game sequel hareraiser). I'd say that it counts as an ARG.

[@tromboneknuckles]

Wow this is incredible! I’ve never heard anyone make the comparisons you did here but they make so much sense, ARG truly is a vibe tho that was spot on

[@whykevinwhyyy]

arg is vibe~

[@goodmaro]

Too long to play the whole thing now, but I remember seeing about 50 years ago at least one paperback novel with branching points requiring the reader to choose based on the info available to that point, jumping to page numbers. I assumed there'd be more of them, and thought that they could be better (or at least differently) presented in magnetic form -- either as a computer game or as an analog video with branch points.

[@christianmcdepressed5899]

I’d for u to do a video on Gravity’s Rainbow or Infinite Jest. These books seem a lot thing very faint ARGs in a way

[@thegnarledpirate9198]

You should have more views. And subscribers. Oh wait this literally your first video lol

[@ftrwrwbg]

I’m reading the description and don’t see any explanation on what was inside the envelope the publisher would send

[@whykevinwhyyy]

OMG i forgot to put that in! i just fixed it, so feel free to check again 😅

[@integralmath]

Yeah, so I clicked pause and before clicking away because of my having lost patience with your overly lengthy and deliberately ambagious teaser style of question asking. This is, sadly, a fashionable style of non-discussion and non-explanation; it's strictly a tactic designed to waste people's time. Also, 'and basically all that comes up is just like discourse about how...' dear lord. So, I spent several seconds googling it. Your googling skills must be dramatically inferior to mine because it is certainly not the case that it's hard to define. How this video wound up in my recommendation feed is entirely mysterious. The algorithm must be out to get me today or something.

[@eveghost]

This was amazing, Kevin! I loved your take on this. Bravo! 👏

[@whykevinwhyyy]

🙏 twas an honor to include Axel in the ending collage.

[@eveghost]

@@whykevinwhyyy Thank you so much for including Axel. I was very touched! It was such a wonderful little hommage to the creators at the end!

[@QuizmasterLaw]

games, unlike stories, require users interactions which seek to attain a goal. Stories unfold before the audience, games are driven by the player. They are similar but distinct.

[@Cyfrik]

A game can be used as a medium to tell a story. Also, collaborative storytelling is a thing. Games and stories are separate concepts, but they can overlap greatly.

[@jbrecken]

When was the first puzzle book that led to a real-world buried treasure?

[@Т1000-м1и]

And I love them because I can find underrated and esoteric channels like this. The video has 3.1k views as of now

[@SaiScribbles]

Great stuff. I'm subscribing to see what else you do.

[@adajdzsk]

awesome video, can't believe this is the first one on this channel!! i'll be waiting for more

[@illuminahde]

This video kicks ass. Well done.

[@Pikaton659]

I thought this would be about Masquerade, but I love The Princess Bride so this is fun too!

[@mayanightstar]

Well this is the most interesting video I've seen all week, and definitely deserves more views! No wonder I've always been interested in the genre of ARGs, I've been dabbling in related genres all this time. EDIT: oh wow the background music of this video needs way more appreciation UMMM

[@samiracle13]

i never knew that sort of kept-up facade of, a character wrote this, not a real world author in books i used to read as a kid was an alternate reality media thing. which means a series of unfortunate events kind of counts, which is fascinating to me

[@obiwanpez]

I won a prize for the BMW Films ARG in 2002-2003. It was a lot of random fun, dispersed over the Fall semester. I arrived at my dorm room in college with a business card stuck in my door with "deciphernauts" printed on it. No idea who put it there, but I'm grateful.

[@BaldingClamydia]

I tried to read Dracula when I was about 12 and couldn't get through it. I personally hated all the newspaper articles towards the beginning, so I flipped forward to see if it changed, and ended up deciding it wasn't worth it. Imagine going through your entire goth phase never actually having read Dracula D:

[@stacyforsythe5738]

Huh. I saw the title and immediately figured you meant this book: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masquerade_(book) You surprises me. Great video about ARGs, Tolkien, TPB, and the genre of fictionally fictional books.

[@AzelRavenWood]

Dude! You got a subscription from me! I didn't know any of that stuff with the book, as I have never read it. Before you mentioned the name, I did guess what Book it was based on your description funnily enough. But the info on that and even the stuff with Tolkien, the Magic Trick from Pen and Teller (Who I have always found their personalities annoying, but that magic trick was Impressive and he/them get full Props/respect from me there) and the ending, all of that was amazing and wild! Great Job!!! 😊

[@FernBlackwood1995]

Is that Homestuck music I’m hearing right now Because it sounds like it and now I’m feeling nostalgic

[@whykevinwhyyy]

nope, it's just Kevin music but now I want to learn more about Homestuck

[@roseconleey103]

​@@whykevinwhyyy stylistically, it's one of the most interesting and unique works of the internet age. one of the only things to ever take full advantage of the "web" part of "webcomic". the writing itself is... weird. your mileage may vary. but it's definitely worth a look!

[@catserver8577]

I was duped by The Princess Bride, I have had a copy since it came out, and read it several times before asking a research librarian for the original book. This was before the internet, though, and the research librarian was visibly confused. She just said "I am pretty sure that IS the original.". By the time I could look it up online, I already knew it was a gaffe. I would suggest Gaston Leroux's Phantom of the Opera as a precursor as well, the footnotes lend a weird need to "prove" the story.

[@thomasdevine867]

Utopia plays some of these games. Thomas Moore said another man, Raphael Hythloday, wrote the book. Moore included letters written by his friends describing their meetings with R.H.! The name Raphael Hythloday means God's Healing peddler of rubbish.

[@wakingcharade]

Fictional travelogues gotta fit in here somewhere. It was a whole genre that goes back to Rome, but the example most people know of it is actually a parody of the genre - Gulliver's Travels. Almost every fictional travelogue pretends to be real, often sprinkling in real places at first too. Nathaniel Hawthorne also does the false provenance thing quite a few times, including in Rappaccini's Daughter, among others. The Isle of the isle of Doctor Moreau also claims to be an account by an in universe character. Actually a lot of books do.

[@sonicchica]

I’m surprised you didn’t talked about the two books that actually had some arg elements of finding actual treasure (or trinkets technically) that can be physically found around the world. I know one of them is forever lost due to the author’s death and keeping the answers to the riddles to his grave and the other is not related to him but similar in style.

[@jimcat68]

The book was incredible. For decades, I've been annoyed at how so many sheep-like fans poured undeserved adulation on the movie, which was nothing more than a "good parts version" of the book, without any of the nuance and deeper themes of Goldman's writing.

[@alfredvickers4054]

"At no point in the text of The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings or The Silmarillion does Tolkien break character and admit to being the author rather than the translator." This is the only thing that disappoints me about his friend C.S. Lewis' Space Trilogy. The first 2 books maintain the conceit that they are real adventures related to Lewis by his friend and colleague Elwin Ransom, but the 3rd book has a preface where he treats the thing as the work of fiction that it is. But then Lewis still briefly inserts himself into the text as a character near the beginning of the book. :shrug:

[@Electronica27]

Wouldn't the first ARG actually be the "War of the World's" Broadcast technically?

[@Trace-l7k]

There’s a reason “The Princess Bride” was favored by SCA members and not just the time period. Suspension of disbelief can be fun.

[@megagangster321]

What about dune? The 1st dune book had like little pieces every chapter of like someone telling you about Paul and what he did and poems and sayings of characters in the universe. I thought that was really really cool actually

[@tocov]

Wow! That was really interesting. Happy to be among the firs 1000 subs to this channel.

[@AzraelThanatos]

You also have things like a good chunk of Edgar Rice Burroughs books that use the conceit that it's journals and similar from various people

[@sleethmitchell]

loved 'pale fire'... could not abide the movie, 'princess bride'... leonard cohen's 'beautiful losers' also takes place after two of the three main characters are dead, but their letters are opened. oh, and borges.

[@marklane2718]

7:57 Could ‘Moby Dick’ and ‘The King In Yellow’ also fit in here?

[@how_am_i_not_myself]

Diary by Chuck Palahniuk is another great example as it's a book written about you and there's a mystery to be solved

[@thomsoap]

Oh man if you think Tolkien was richly detailed you gotta check out malazan.

[@FriskTemmieGoogle]

1:46 Ik what they are! ARGs is short for arguments! I cracked the code, yay

[@kelleeg353]

Great video!! The unexpected Alan Resnick reference made my day.

[@jerichothirteen1134]

That's not early arg it's a very old trope from fictional adventures.

[@tensijellyaddict5182]

lovely video, i know you’re gonna make it big out here. remember me when you do!!

[@linzywaltman1209]

I wrote in to get the redacted bits when I was in middle school & was so excited to read it! ❤❤❤❤

[@hold_onto_anything]

the princess bride is my favorite movie... i had no idea the book was so cool...

[@ZeASK]

I'm really glad I found this video and channel!