'Experience' game promises to explain their significance

No one on the TV series "Lost" has yet been able to explain the significance of the number string that seems to follow the characters around. Those playing the "Lost Experience" game, though, may find out soon.

ABC says the globe-spanning online game, which launched in May, will reveal the meaning behind the 4-8-15-16-23-42 number string -- which has bedeviled Hurley (Jorge Garcia) in particular -- in its current phase. The network also promises information on the mysterious Alvar Hanso and his Hanso Foundation before the game concludes at the start of the show's third season.

"The reward we've always promised from the Lost Experience is information, which is currency to anyone who is a fan of the show or a participant in this game," says Mike Benson, head of marketing for ABC Entertainment. "This additional form of storytelling allows us to engage current and new fans in a genuinely innovative way while delivering the same extraordinary content that 'Lost' provides as a television series."

The "Lost Experience" takes viewers deep down the rabbit hole of mythology surrounding the series and involves a number of web sites, blogs and video clips -- some embedded in the sites of corporate sponsors -- as well as a bit of theater. At last weekend's Comic-Con in San Diego, an actress saying she was "Experience" figure "Rachel Blake" interrupted a panel on the show to tout one of the game's sites, Hanso Exposed.

The game has already given players clues to the significance of the Black Rock -- the old ship several castaways discovered during the show's first season -- and the reason why the DHARMA Initiative is so named (apparently DHARMA stands for Department of Heuristics and Research on Material Applications).

ABC says players need not have watched "Lost" before to get in on the game, which is also running in the U.K. and Australia. Players from around the world are encouraged to share clues.

Those looking to catch up can do so here.