halloween havoc - behind the scenes
*disclaimers: all contest content has now been removed from jadedmedia.net. due to copyright restrictions, any chat logs from irc.collectivedetective.org cannot be published. all chat transcripts contained herein are property of jadedmedia.net
stage 1 | stage 2 | stage 3 | stage 4
people who had previously signed up on the jadedmedia mailing list, or had become members of the jadedmedia forums, were notified at 11:55 am CST about the first destination for the game, www.jadedmedia.net/googlymoogly. at 12 noon, people who were chatting in the official jadedmedia chat room (#jm at irc.chat-solutions.org), as well as people in the collective detective chat room, were given the destination address.
<slackertodd> I plan on sitting here for six hours...i need a pillow
googlymoogly just came to us when we had designed the contest, it had no bearing to the end result.
the introductory page had this clue:
Do not enter your User Name.
Do not enter your password.Simply come here.
which lead to this directory: www.jadedmedia.net/googlymoogly/comehere
<fireball> simply /comehere
<necessitas> thanks
<Aveena> damn, i was trying just /herein /comehere/ the next clue was given:
the actor who has a Bacon number of three. He's connected to Nina Foch, an actress who was in Sliver with Colleen Camp, who was in Trapped with Mr. Bacon.
/find him and you will know how to go on/
and in the source code was this: <!-- 1944 -->.
<FrankenPaula> dang Nina Foch has been in a lot of movies
this clue led players to Bela Lugosi, who starred with Nina Foch in "The Return of the Vampire" in 1944, and www.jadedmedia.net/comehere/lugosi where players were treated to a very badly translated version of the Beatles' hit song "A Day in the Life", in French.
<fireball> heh, it's French lyrics for the Beatles A Day in the Life
<fireball> But I don't know what to do with it yet.
<Aveena> lol, 'i would like to excite you'<fireball> anybody ideas on what to do with the Beatles?
* Ktnb waits for someone else to figure it out first
<FrankenPaula> don't know if its relevant but i found a page about some easter egg in that song
<FrankenPaula> http://www.eeggs.com/tree/2063.html<oliver> SOLVED: /unjourdanslavie
<oliver> credit goes to my french girlfriend GwenaelleThe solution to this puzzle was simple: translate "A Day in the Life" into French: "Un jour dans la vie," which brought players to www.jadedmedia.net/googlymoogly/comehere/unjourdanslavie
one halloween, me and some friends were visiting more than one necropolis in an attempt to raise some ancient spirits. we ran across a mongoose, then another. that was weird, but not as weird as the penny that my friend mark picked up, which was similar to the one that jeff picked up, but different than the one i picked up.
we left the last necropolis and headed to a more modern cemetery. at this one grave, we took a good, long look at the grave. we noticed that the person was an avid gambler in life, as the gravestone had a die with a 5 and a die with a 2 engraved on the headstone. we thought that would be a cool thing to do.
we looked around and around, and finally found what we were looking for -- the grave of our former high school head. we remembered the time that we had all gotten into trouble at school, the time when we had lit the firecrackers in the hallway. we remember the punishment that we had to endure, carrying armful after armful after armful of wood into the school's furnace room.
we wiped away the tears from our eyes and carried on through the night.
this page had a story and a hint in the cource code as well: <!-- oh my god, a hint! five places to go, plurals --> All of the words in the story that were plural (we, friends, spirits) were displayed in a different color. The objective was to find out what words needed to be pluralized in order to find the directory.
<cyberjoek> we just need to un-string it :-)
<cyberjoek> what is the plural of necropolis ?
<fireball> I would not have gotten that.
<fireball> necropoli?
<teuqus> yup
<cyberjoek> yes!
<teuqus> solved: /necropoli
<SpaceBass> solved: /mongoosesThe five words were: necropoli, mongooses, dice, armsful, and pence. each directory led you to a piece of the solve for 1.3: lo, ve, ly, .ht, and ml, which got you to lovely.html and this message:
well done, well done.
the last part of stage 1, which is the beginning of stage 2, lies in your ability to find notes. i've left notes all over the place, so when you find notes, you'll know what to do.
find notes, then go to stage 2.
<Ktnb> http://www.jadedmedia.net/googlymoogly/notes/
<carlitoxxi> oh...
<carlitoxxi> terrific...this ends stage 1 and leads to stage 2
pure and simple, this was a fun one to design. players had to manipulate two different bits of music to determine what teh songs were, and how they corresponded with the textual clues.
the first musical clue was "knowing me, knowing you" from ABBA, and the textual clue was this:
14 March 1992
BBC Radio 4this person made this song famous by using it as an intro for his guests
email the person's name (not the character) @jadedmedia.net for further instructions
this had to do with a British comic named Steve Coogan, who has developed an on-air persona named Alan Partridge for both BBC radio and TV specials. When players emailed stevecoogan@jadedmedia.net, they got a responder which pointed them to kmky.html.
<clubhop652> so is alan partridge a real person or a character?
<fireball> apparently a character
<fireball> I googled alan partridge to find a real name
<clubhop652> okthe sound file for the second part of stage 2 was "cover of the rolling stone" by Dr. Hook. The text gave you this clue:
the magazine
what makes 683 important? that's your ticket to stage 3. /lastname/
issue #683 of Rolling Stone magazine has Kurt Cobain on the cover, marking the week when he died. this lead players to www.jadedmedia.net/googlymoogly/cobain.
<carlitoxxi> solved olè olè :-)
stage 3: return of an old friend
this is the message that greeted people at the start of stage 3:
ifiyourremembercyuri,.you'recinhforaatfun-time
ifsyouodon'tlrememberuyuri,tyou'reistilloinnforsa.funotimerg
yuri#isyreadyuforryou.i
of course, with some changes in color against a colored background, people actually got this:
ifiyourremembercyuri,.you'recinhforaatfun-time
ifsyouodon'tlrememberuyuri,tyou'reistilloinnforsa.funotimerg
yuri#isyreadyuforryou.i
so, now players had a chat server and a room to go to: irc.chat-solutions.org #yuri. yuri ended up having a lot of scripts that led to five clues for the stage 3 solve. the chat log is available here for you to see how the solve was completed, and the list of scripts (and what they did) is available here. the final solve for stage 3 ended up to be "flanders", which brought players to stage 4 at www.jadedmedia.net/flanders
players arrived at stage 4 only to find out that they were to start looking through the jadedmedia forums. there were messages throughout the forums, at random, that were very confusing at first glance. however, throughout the last hour of the contest, words in those messages began to be replaced by other words. The word substitutions can be found here.
<Aveena> bobvincent88: the words are changing
<Aveena> bobvincent88: spread the word or the puzzle is over
<Aveena> aveeena: hmmm, ok
<FrankenPaula> who's bobvincent88?
<carlitoxxi> ?
<SpaceBass> bob vincent owns jadedmedia
<FrankenPaula> aah
<Aveena> bob is the former? owner of jadedmedia<Aveena> dammit, he's changing the messages!
<SpaceBass> which messages
<carlitoxxi> there are 5 functions that are hidden throughout the forums.
<carlitoxxi> will you be the one to find them?
<carlitoxxi> for more information, seek out the square
<carlitoxxi> what square? :-)
<Aveena> "you have found the square, now take this beam" now says " ...now take this x"<Aveena> oh, another word "N". how will the key take shape?
<carlitoxxi> oh... i think always ofr nexus :-)
<carlitoxxi> for
<carlitoxxi> there have been very few players in previous games who have had the ability to see the key...
<carlitoxxi> perhaps you are such a player?
<carlitoxxi> oh, another word "N". how will the key take shape?
<Cortana> so, U, E, N
<carlitoxxi> X
<Aveena> and X
<imbri> nexus?
<carlitoxxi> :-)
<carlitoxxi> what to do with it?
* jamesi changes topic to 'have fun! www.jadedmedia.net/flanders | Welcome to the home of jadedmedia chat | time remaining: 15 minutes'
<dnbmathguy> nexus
<dnbmathguy> ?
<Cortana> tried /flanders/nexus<SpaceBass> email to nexus@jadedmedia.net gives me: subject: so close
<SpaceBass> but i think you've found the wrong home, don't you?
<SpaceBass> www.jadedmedia.net & www.guysguise.com
<SpaceBass> go together in perfect harmony<Aveena> sometimes, mirrors are really cool, escpecially if things bounce
* krystyn has joined #jm
<Aveena> ???
<Cortana> is that from GG, veen?* jamesi is now known as isemaj
<dnbmathguy> suxen@guysguise.com, I bet
<slackertodd> I got my questions all lined up
<Leftbrained> I tried that
<fireball> nope dnb, that bouced
<fireball> bounced
<Cortana> i sent a message at cather's request to johnwaite@jadedmedia.net
<cyberjoek> marco@guysguise.com
<imbri> dnb, it bouncedthe last clue for the final solve came six minutes before the end of the game, so players had to scramble to figure out the correct email address to send to. the end result: suxen@jadedmedia.net.
congratulations to the players that ended up in the top 5, and thanks to everyone that played.