I was tempted to describe this one in the NFT thread because it kind of started life with an NFT offering; but turns out (so far) that the creators aren't really like
ideologically married to NFTs the same way that your common cryptobros are, so I figured I'd put it here instead.
There's a game that was released a few months ago now, called "I'm Looking for 3024 People", which calls itself an ARG. The game that you actually buy (for the love of god do not actually buy it) and download is less than 100MB and consists of a couple of screens directing you to websites where most of the story information is posted, and a single game level that takes about ten minutes in total to complete where you navigate a maze that you can't see (the screen is solidly black, there is no visual information whatsoever) and listen to instructions in the form of a dialogue between characters that is voiced entirely by hilariously bad AI text-to-speech bots, for a reward of an image of a list of 3024 codes. In order for the game to progress past the first level, at least 3024 people must buy the game, obtain the codes, and log into the official game Discord server all at the exact same time where they're supposed to enter one code each into a designated channel within a specified 10-minute window. If all 3024 unique codes are not entered by 3024 unique members, the attempt will fail and has to be tried again during the next window.
You've probably guessed that this willll....never happen, because Discord absolutely just CAN'T handle 3,024 simultaneous posts in a single channel within only ten minutes of time, so functionally the game can never progress. Other small relevant minigames/puzzles within the Discord server itself that require multiple players interacting with the server bots have likewise proven impossible to actually complete despite a few serious attempts.
For these reasons there is a loud outcry amongst people who have paid for the game that it is basically a money-making scam - you're buying a game that can never be finished because any and all progression is paywalled behind 3,024 people buying the game and somehow coordinating to complete an impossible task.
Membership/playership was originally sold as a set of 3,024 NFTs at a price equivalent to about US$50 that apparently almost nobody bought (which is hilarious because this idea is not really any stupider than any other NFT project, so there's no obvious reason why it shouldn't have sold) so the dev(s) moved the game to Steam where they sold it originally for $20 before eventually lowering the price to $15, then $10, and nowadays it fluctuates at around three to five bucks as they desperately grasp to make
any money at all on something that transparently cost nothing to make...but also, desperate to quell the dissatisfaction of the few customers that are trying to stay open-minded and loyal, they have made access and participation in the Discord side of the game free to anyone, because they probably think the next part of the game is SUPER awesome and will completely vindicate the project but they can't release it because they can't find enough interested people to complete the task to unlock it - a task which the devs obstinately refuse to understand is literally, technically not possible due to Discord's limitations.
A few YouTube videos that had been made by various people discussing all of these issues with the game were DMCA's by the dev - in their own words for "spreading misinformation", which....isn't what the DMCA is supposed to be for? - but all of these DMCA's eventually expired because the dev never moved forward with the claims.
This video goes into more detail about the game and the DIscord and all of the problems with the whole project; it includes "gameplay footage" (of a black screen) that includes some the TTS voices in the game and it's worth watching just for that if nothing else.
