It started with a mysterious, yet questionable email I received two months ago which explained that Marvel Studios was prepping to announce an S.H.I.E.L.D. event in New York City for spring 2011. The event would bring film stars Samuel L. Jackson (Director Nick Fury), Clark Gregg (Agent Phil Coulson), Cobie Smulders (Agent Maria Hill) and at least four other agents and have them "recruit" new SHIELD members.

This would supposedly occur during filming of The Avengers in April or May and would also continue through San Diego Comic-Con in July. We didn't jump on it at the time, but things got interesting a while later when our own Roth Cornet attended WonderCon two weekends ago only to experience the beginning of Marvel's SHIELD viral.

SHIELD made phone calls to attendees in their hotel rooms and on closed-circuit TVs, they broadcasted messages. Attendees could sign up for their very own SHIELD ID badge in person. There were Agents everywhere and several SHIELD edition vehicles surrounded the premises. It was a very cool Marvel Studios marketing ploy to tie into the upcoming release of Thor.

If you missed out on that, don't worry. You can go to the newly launched SHIELD website and take part yourself. Go to joinshield.com and sign up as a new recruit, provide your fingerprint for access and create your official SHIELD badge. Congratulations Agent, you are now a Level 1 Field Operative and as such, you get to enjoy the benefits of "unique weapons and vehicles."

Marvel SHIELD ID Rob Keyes

You may have thought SHIELD was a secret government organization, but it's actually corporate owned by Acura. The next step involves you choosing your vehicle, and I chose the S.H.I.E.L.D. edition of the Acura MDX which offers "superior tactical performance, firepower and a high-grade emergency exoskeleton." An exoskeleton? Is that a movie hint?

Let's get serious. We're an Agent of SHIELD and the world is counting on us. Let's open our first case file with our newly granted access. The site features live-action actors playing agents, who provide your briefs. Our first task is dealing with an a "alien artifact" (Thor's hammer) which is causing intense electromagnetic energy. Luckily, Acura augmented our vehicles to handle this.

There are three tabs and the first (Media) lets us look at case information, photos from the alien artifact crash site and other interesting SHIELD info relating to the event. The second tab (Agent Task) is also available to us:

TASK: LOCATE & CONTAIN A MASSIVE ENERGY DISTURBANCE

Unidentifiable energy pulses have been detected in the Puente Antiguo Sector of New Mexico. Deploy a recon drone to locate & identify the disturbance.

The actual game for this first task involves a topography map that you need to scan over to locate the crater impact of Thor's hammer. You only have six shots so randomly guessing can be a pain. But as a trained SHIELD agent now, I know you'll use the Media files to your advantage to make the search easy.

Once you've completed this task, you'll receive your first promotion to L1 access and your Acura will received an enhancement. You're also prompted to share your work on Facebook should you choose to do so. It's not a top secret matter or anything, so go ahead and share with your friends and the rest of the world the inner workings of SHIELD ;)

Here's the video from WonderCon if you missed it:

That's just the beginning, so if you're a Marvel movie fan, definitely check out this cool site and sign up for the cause. You'll want to do it before Thor releases in a few weeks. Maybe we can capture him before then?

Join me on my quest to take over Nick Fury's role as Director of SHIELD and in the process, finding Thor and stealing his hammer. Follow us on Twitter @rob_keyes and @screenrant.

Thor opens in theaters on May 6, 2011 and The Avengers opens in theaters on May 4, 2012.