It even completely filled the screen for a few moments.

Considering the amount of screen time given to something that was ostensibly Dr Who’s mobile number, it seems more incredible that this wasn’t the beginning of an ARG. It turns out to be one of the telephone numbers reserved by Ofcom for drama purposes.

Bah. What a wasted opportunity. That was a rabbit hole waiting to happen.

Uh-oh. A new addiction. Perplex City, created by Mind Candy, is a puzzle game which also happens to be an Alternate Reality Game. Season 1 ended when The Cube was found, but season 2 cards are now available and I’m already hooked. My profile page shows the gradually growing list of puzzle cards I’ve solved.

Dan and Lisa from Mind Candy actually popped into Hursley the other day, and it was really good to spend a few hours catching up. They were impressively tight-lipped about Season 2, but in addition to the puzzles I have a feeling that the storyline for season 2 might well draw me in too.

Imagine a world which you cant walk around in, but you can interact with via websites, phone numbers, text messages, faxes, and occasionally even bleeds into this world with live events. Season 1 had some fun ‘rabbit holes’ (including the answer to one of the easier cards being a phone number which, when rung, was the answerphone for the character Violet, who gave the URL for her blog).

I just noticed that the Wikipedia entry for Perplex City currently “may fail to make a clear distinction between fact and fiction”. Heh.

I have yet got in to PerplexCityTrades (which seems to be the state of the art of trading sites at the moment). If you’re interested in swapping cards here’s my list of spares. Nick (now similarly hooked) maintains such a list too.