Story (Full) 4
Notice: This page begins coverage of the first arc of Johnisdead. Johnisdead shares several characters, concepts, and locations with Ben Drowned - a separate ARG created by Alex Hall in 2010. It is recommended that one becomes familiar with Ben Drowned through one of the following methods:
- The first three pages of this story recap, which are dedicated to covering Ben Drowned.
- A summary of Ben Drowned, which can be found on the Story Summary Page.
- An even shorter recap of Ben Drowned, which can be found on the Story Cliffnotes Page.
If you're already familiar with Ben Drowned, continue reading on:
The story so far...
In the previous section, the ARG's creator, Alex, seeming stepped out from behind the curtain and announced that the story was on hiatus. However, during this period that was supposedly meant to be out-of-character, the players noticed several oddities. This culminated in "The Glitch" - an event that corrupted YSHDT.net, allowing the players to access various hidden files. Here, it seemed as though several characters such as Alex were trapped and asking for help.
One of these files was a message from Matt warning that someone named "Kayd Hendricks" was in danger. Kayd was actually Ryukaki - a player who had received the login information for "The Truth" from Rosa before her disappearance. After this, Kayd uploaded several videos to his YouTube channel showing that he was being chased by BEN. At one point, he attempted to hide out in a mysterious location called "The Orchard", though this attempt was short-lived. Unfortunately, the players were unable to save Kayd as he was presumably killed - though not before giving the players a piece of the login information for "The Truth".
After this, Alex teased that the final part of the ARG would coincide with the release of a video game. Unfortunately, this game's development was very troubled and was repeatedly delayed. Eventually, Alex created Within Hubris - a canon message board where the players could cooperate more efficiently. Within Hubris also contained Wayward Horizon - a strange board that seemed to contain the souls of ascended Moon Children. This seems to imply that ascension results in the soul of the participant being trapped within digital environments or technology - much like how Ben was trapped within the Majora's Mask cartridge.
Eventually, the ARG was placed on hiatus once again as Alex moved onto another project - a film titled "Methods of Revolution". After a while, Within Hubris was deleted, forcing the players to create their own version called "Newbris". Over the next few years, all was quiet on Within Hubris. That is, until 2015...
After Within Hubris shut down in 2012, the players spent the next few years creating their own projects on the board's successor - Newbris. For the sake of simplicity, Newbris will simply be referred to as "Within Hubris" throughout these pages. By 2015, most players had given up hope of Alex ever returning to complete Ben Drowned. However, on January 22nd, 2015, a new user reignited the players' interests.
thelaw
Group: Canon Characters
Member: #592
Joined: January 22, 2015
Jan 22 2015, 07:12 PM Post #1
I just read the arg a few days ago and decided to look up some things in case i could find something.
I looked at all the sites
http://jadusable.wikia.com/wiki/Jadusable_Wiki
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/20745027/18FebYSHDTzip/18FebYSHDT/main.htm
http://yshdt.com/
When is the arg coming back?
Sengi
Group: Players
Member: #342
Joined: March 4, 2013
Jan 22 2015, 07:41 PM Post #2
It'll resume when Half Life 2 Episode 3 releases... AKA THE FUCKING RAPTURE!!!!
Mugen Kagemaru
Group: Players
Member: #83
Joined: August 15, 2012
Jan 22 2015, 07:42 PM Post #3
As soon as Mr. Hall finishes and releases his movie, Methods Of Revolution, he has promised that he will immediately resume working on the ARG.
thelaw
Group: Canon Characters
Member: #592
Joined: January 22, 2015
Jan 22 2015, 07:55 PM Post #4
oh ok
The site said soon so i thought he had a date
Sengi
Group: Players
Member: #342
Joined: March 4, 2013
Jan 22 2015, 08:03 PM Post #5
You're really naive, arent ya?
EDIT: HO, SHIT!! yshdt works!? Wonder if it's true then...
Edited by Sengi, Jan 22 2015, ((Unknown Time)).
GreyouTT
Group: Players
Member: #27
Joined: August 10, 2012
Jan 22 2015, 10:08 PM Post #6
Whoa what the fuck? When the hell did that happen?
Sengi
Group: Players
Member: #342
Joined: March 4, 2013
Jan 22 2015, 10:10 PM Post #7
The 15th, apparently. I made a thread to discuss it kinda maybe sorta
thelaw
Group: Canon Characters
Member: #592
Joined: January 22, 2015
Jan 23 2015, 01:03 AM Post #8
You did not know?
A user named thelaw joined Within Hubris and asked if Ben Drowned was starting up again. Some players scoffed at this idea, having lost faith in Alex years ago. However, they quickly noticed something odd with thelaw's post - he had linked to a brand new website, YSHDT.com. This acronym was a clear reference to the Moon Children's website Youshouldnthavedonethat.net from Ben Drowned. While the players were shocked at the website's existence, thelaw was more surprised that the players hadn't stumbled across it yet. It seems as though thelaw had simply come across YSHDT.com while researching Ben Drowned and assumed that it was already something that was widely known.
Upon accessing YSHDT.com, players were met with a Zelda-styled text box that read as follows:
It's been too long.
I survived.
The sky is falling, the people are crying. Where is your link now?
This message was presumably from BEN himself, taunting the players for failing to defeat him back during the events of Ben Drowned. In an attempt to round up some remaining players, the player Sengi created a thread on Within Hubris dedicated to investigating YSHDT.com.
Sengi
Group: Players
Member: #342
Joined: March 4, 2013
Jan 22 2015, 08:44 PM Post #1
Ok, so a little while ago this new guy posts in the Help Central asking when the ARG returns, and one of the links he puts up is This one here
A page called yshdt.com... not the full old "youshouldnthavedonethat.net" because that's a corpse.
In the page there's a zelda-styled textbox saying
"Im still waiting
Let's play again soon"
with some eerie music playing in the background, and maybe some figure in the darkness, I can't really telland honestly, it unnerves me to fuck and back, im a scaredy-cat, whatever
When inspecting the html, there's text saying
So..... New development hype or troll baiting us? Discuss
thelaw
Group: Canon Characters
Member: #592
Joined: January 22, 2015
Jan 22 2015, 08:48 PM Post #2
yes hello
I am that new guy. So the ARG is coming back soon?
Spirkiroid
Group: Players
Member: #12
Joined: August 10, 2012
Jan 22 2015, 08:57 PM Post #3
hm
Players began theorizing whether or not YSHDT.com was an official continuation of Ben Drowned created by Alex Hall. Meanwhile, the website updated once again. It now featured an eyeless version of Link with updated text that now read "I'm still waiting. Let's play again soon.". This was accompanied with a reversed version of the "Game Over" theme from the original Legend of Zelda game - more hints that the players failed to stop BEN in the past and that he now wished to challenge them once again.
On January 24th, 2015, the player Greyoutt decided to submit the "Oath to Order". This was done for two reasons:
- An attempt to summon a new Link for the players.
- A joke referencing how submitting the "Oath to Order" led to disastrous consequences during Ben Drowned.
As the players waited to see the results of this submission, they decided to form their own official player group. At the time, many of the players exploring YSHDT.com had previously investigated a mysterious Ben Drowned-related videogame named Remember.exe. Since activity involving that game had dwindled, these players decided to repurpose their Remember.exe Skype Group into one dedicated specifically to YSHDT.com. They called this new group the Internet Detectives. Two new players named Tyler and Jacob even created a theme song for this new group:
After this, YSHDT.com remained untouched - that is until February 13th, 2015 when its front page updated with a video titled "dontstickaround.swf".
Description
N/A
<--- Click for Video Transcript
This video began with a black screen. Suddenly, the "Oath to Order" plays out on-screen. This is followed by a laugh from the Skull Kid.
Summary
- Unfortunately, this video was not archived.
- This video simply featured the "Oath to Order" being played - followed by a laugh from the Skull Kid.
Sadly, this video was not archived. Its contents seem to suggest that BEN was amused by the players' submission of the "Oath to Order". After staying on YSHDT.com's front page for a while after the video already ended, players would be redirected to a new page - "http://yshdt.com/news".
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