Mars Web by RyanJavanshir
Mars Web is a short single player ARG (Alternate Reality Game) that involves hunting down clues across the Web to help save the colonists on the planet Mars.
(I know ARGs aren't everyone's thing because they can sometimes be a bit difficult and time consuming, but I thought I'd see how well I could do during the time I had!)
I've opted out of graphics because some of the elements I've used were not made during the 72 hours (e.g. pictures of Mars, which are quite hard to get at this resolution in 72 hours XD).
Made by http://www.twitter.com/ryanjavanshir




| Other (document) | https://tinyurl.com/yaq3w6ka |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/42/mars-web |
Ratings
| Overall | 426th | 3.545⭐ | 79🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 638th | 3.18⭐ | 77🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 17th | 4.164⭐ | 78🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 1078th | 2.764⭐ | 76🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 737th | 2.365⭐ | 65🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 533th | 2.701⭐ | 69🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 211th | 3.608⭐ | 76🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 167🗳️ | 115🗨️ |
I see you have 0 karma points.. Having more makes more people see your game on lists. You should go around and rate/comment on other games to get that score up so more people will see this gem!
Regarding the completion code: if you have it then that's the end of the ARG! To be honest with you I didn't think anyone would play it all the way through and I included it in case someone did. I ran out of time to have a nice conclusion to it too haha. Thanks for playing, I am genuinely surprised.
I will make sure to play and rate your games!
The work is just huge. I feel to find myself on ouverture-facile.com
It's very cool.
Technologically speaking it's very impressive as well. All of the layers all working together in browser is huge for convenience points.
Interesting story too. Well done.
This is clearly my favourite game on this ld submission, i just like it. It took me about 2 hours to complete the game, but i enjoyed the process)
Hope you get more ratings!!
But overall really great! Didn't plan on spending this much time on it but it had me hooked :)
I like the vision and if you let me know how to get past that first bit and into the command line stuff I'll give it another shot
@mediyaz Thanks for trying my game! Did you find the Twitter clues? (Linked from the mars web site)
It's quite difficult and time-consuming but when you manage to be "immersed" it's very cool.
Will share this with my boss, he kinda like this kind of stuff! (huge fan of a normal lost phone)
I wish Unity3D WebGL build is pretty hungry and prone to hang/crash for users that still have too many tabs open (power users).. I played on chrome and it gel'd good!
It's a nice touch of approaching mixed-digital media.. 👍
Optional Suggestion:
- If there's chance to utilize Twine and exploit HTML5 tags for media, etc. for more options or to execute the multi-screen: controls, hacks and input on tablet while you interface console on desktop screen.. 📺
I'm generally not very good with ARGs, but this had just the right amount of difficulty _(for me)_!
This was a very fun experience, thank you for putting in the effort in making this work as well as it did!
__SPOILERS:__
I like who marsweborg follows on Twitter, nice touch!
One question though:
What was the clue for solving the servers on RMWOS (if any)? I just ended up brute forcing them, as it was a pretty quick process.
I love the whole realism of it. You built a proper site and twitter page, and even the company letter was excellent.
Found myself more confused than anything else. But I love what you've done with it.
Couldn't quite make out how it ties into the theme. But perhaps it was more evident later on. Unfortunately I didn't get to finish it.
You guys are crazy, this is an awesome idea.....
Still I was stuck at the login page for a long time x) ... And I can't fihure out how to play the actual game, code lines don't seem to work ! But this introduction sequence was really something !!...
PS : Any audio somewhere ? (appart from the audio code ?)
IF you want some audio for a next jam or project, I may be the guy for it :-)
The puzzles were interesting as well. The main challenge was in finding the information to solve them, and that was super rewarding. After that they were relatively straightforward, although one of them might require additional knowledge that might confuse non-tech-savvy people.
The connection to the theme was a bit loose, but other than that this is one of the best entries I've played so far on this edition (and probably the others I've taken part in)
 :sunglasses:
@ithildin Thank you for playing! Yeah I was going to get rid of the ads but didn't know if it was worth it since I didn't think anyone would actually play it. But you are correct, in the end it was totally a creative decision >.> Mars Web only has a limited customer base and couldn't afford to get the ad free Wix subscription! XD
Some feedback would have been nice from the login screen (it doesn't tell you incorrect user/password when you try wrong ones) and the console could have been more user friendly (give a different error for a correct command that just isn't calibrated, instead of saying the command doesn't exist. Also, auto scrolling down when entering commands and supporting case-insensitive commands too). Overall though it was incredibly innovative!