More morse, maybe? With a letter standing in for a dot? I dunno, though.

It’s possible those are just extra junk characters that happen to render as spaces. My browser highlights them with red dots when viewing the page source, which I think is it trying to tell me “hey this looks like a space but it isn’t really”.

I mainly wanted to point out the punctuation matches as well as the alphanumerics, but it caught my eye.

got a new response.

ICANHEARYOUJUSTITSFAINTBUTICANHELPYOU gave me
*** THERE'S AN ECHO - BUT I CAN HEAR YOU ***
not encoded or backwards. Maybe they're in a cave or deep pit

Edit: NVM

No, that’s a generic response.

That's a generic answer, sorry. Good try, though.

E: Manco ninja'd me

it looks like this when i inspect the source code in my browser :
i̠̞̹̺ c̴͙̙̰̬͙a͍̭n̘͚̜͖̻͔ ̺̮h҉̦̖̜͙e̶͓a̟̜̖̕r̶͓ ̩̹ͅy͜o̹̰̟͔u̢͉̼,̦͕͉͉͎̕ ̞̞j̗̼̮̠̥̥͍us̗t̩̺.̻̗ ͕̞̳̹̭̀ͅi̛t̰̯̙̣͖̟̙'̪̪̞̦̳̩s̕ ̩̬̗͖̻̖̀f̴̙͉͎̯̺a̫iṇ͚̞͢t̵͚̬͇̰͍̼ͅ,̬͕̹̖̩̮͜ͅ ̺͔͎͉̺̱b̸̝̰̬u̻͍̲̕t̪̼̮̣̫ ̮͕͎͍͡i̮̱͙ ͎̲̤̯c̷̺͓a̜̪̺ṉ̻̲̦̲̼̻͘ ̧̳̗̮̘̦͔h͏̪͎̬͔͎͍̗ȩ̤̞͖̬̘͕Ã*̺̭̭̼ŗ͈̳̠̤̳̗ ͏y̲͈̭̘̰͔͞o̢̗̳̘u͔̫͚͉.̩̼̠


e: they used that way to communicate before, i don't remember where
on twitter i think

there's also this :

@Wariopunk25 happy birthday, Chris, thanks for all your support. Here, have a sp__________<BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ> *hello?*

— Oddworld Inhabitants (@OddworldInc) 23 marzo 2016

@zulag @Wariopunk25 // trying // t̀͏h̛͟ì̡s̕͟ ̕i͏̴̷s͏̀͟ń̛'͠͞t̴̷ ̨̧͢m͝y̸ ̴-̸͠ ̨̕wa̧҉̶it̛͡.҉́.̶̶̀.͘͞

— Oddworld Inhabitants (@OddworldInc) 23 marzo 2016

Wiki page update, nice job guys!
http://oddworld.wikia.com/wiki/Soulstorm_ARG

Since we keep getting false positives on the generic message box responses, I’ve started adding them to the wiki page – please refer to it before reporting a new response.


z̘̭̞a̹̖̝̜̺lg̯̠͓͇̪͉̰o̥͇͉̝̜̤,͈͇̠͚̲̰̼͞ ̧̟̜͓͖̟h̥͙̗e̩̤͎͇̩̼ ̸̤̲̱͎͎c͍͜o͙m̙̣̠̼̘͓ẹ̻s͏͎͔̼͚͚

Seriously though, good catch. That must only render like that in certain browsers, which are you using?

I'm noticing that error/negative messages are coming up a lot even when using phrases proven to give a response. Is that happening to others too?

I can see it in chrome

I figured it out, you have to set your browser’s text encoding to UTF-8 (View > Encoding).

How do you do that? Might be a good idea to have that set!

I wonder if someone at OWI is reading this and laughing at us because we're too dumb to pick up on the next clue, or panicking because we're solving this thing faster than they can put up the next section.

I mentioned it earlier because it seemed to be coming up every other message.

I hope so. That'd be great.

So, what’s the next step? Can we glean any new info out of this new message? Are there any more secrets hidden in 0451.jpg or lsot.mp3? Or are we now waiting for more clues to be added?

This is the only thing which catches my eye.

https://i.gyazo.com/16690800b9297f90...05d7582dd1.png

Not really sure what it correlates to though.. Does 356 hold any significance?

Far too many video game characters were harmed extremely badly in the making of this experience. In a sane world this would never have happened. We're sorry.


They have this in the code of the main page and it keeps making me chuckle.

Great job so far, guys. I've been following attentively from the shadows.

I rewatched all of the old cutscenes for keywords or phrases to enter into the form, and I typed in "MOMMA FLABBY"—the graffiti written on the wall in the execution room in RuptureFarms—and I got this response:

E*NN AVFR GBHL *UAR **B-NP *HR PEOR *' GUU

I used the cipher to translate it:

R*AA NISE TOUY *HNE **O-AC *UE CRBE *' THH

It's probably nothing, but I couldn't find an anagram in there, so I thought I'd add to the hunt in some way.


Keep up the great work!

I think you may have gotten a jumbled up version of one of the generic answers kjjcarpenter.

My experience with these sort of things is that developers ALWAYS underestimate how fast a fan community can solve these things. We're probably WAY ahead on their time table.

The Gravity Falls fanbase is a great example of this. Along with The Binding of Isaac fanbase.

It's not easy to estimate, I'll give them that

P.T was like a videogame version of an ARG and the community managed to solve it much much faster than Kojima anticipated.

Maybe it's just a coincidence, but i think there's something more to find here https://scontent-lhr3-1.xx.fbcdn.net...1d&oe=56F7FC43

sorry for my bad english

Yes, we know about it. You can check our progress at this link.

no, what i mean is that we assume there is nothing left to see in that image, i just have the feeling there is something more... maybe i'm just hearing voices or something

The image was created with magic eye / eye squint type of puzzle in mind. I honestly don't think there's anything more. But hey, I might be wrong. If you find anything, let us know!

Holy fuck, a lot has happened since I last checked up on this. I feel like it's impossible not to fall behind all this ARG business unless you're constantly checking up on it. I guess I'll have to give that wiki page a read in the near future. Good job to everyone who's been cracking at this whole thing.

I went through the wiki and was trying different terms. Here is what I found. Also updated on the wiki ARG page.

Soulstorm has been updated to [WE'RE AWARE OF ISSUES ON THIS PAGE AND ARE WORKING TO REMEDY THE ------------]

Director Phleg got USERNAME UNKNOWN, PLEASE TRY AGAIN while just "Phleg" got A R E Y O U L S O T ?.

Aslik gives a generic response while "Vice President Aslik" gets SECURITY CLEARANCE REVOKED, PLEASE CONTACT YOUR SYSTEM ADMINISTRATOR.

Maybe we can find a way to "login" correctly? I also think that the 3rd reveal picture will hold some sort of key or an update to the ARG.

Edit: Just tried "SHUDDAP" and got [PLEASE CLOSE THIS WINDOW IMMEDIATELY]

I got: *** THIS STUFF. THIS STUFF ***
(by typing SHUDDAP, but it's probably generic)

Both “Dripik” and “General Dripik” return THAT'S GENERAL DRIPIK TO YOU, and “Brewmaster” and “Molluck” both still return their usual messages.

Trying out some combinations, I got *** DID YOU GET THE MESSAGE? ***

EDIT: “Abe” now returns *** ABE? YES - ABE. ***

I think they added new generic messages since I got a couple of these with other attempts. I have been following this all day and hope I can actually help make progress.

The Oddworld merchandise has been added to the page, filling the recently-added space in the code. So I think we can write that off.

Typing MAGOG returns "...DRINK...BREW..."


I also found some new generic responses.
"RZ ENRU ANP HBL REHF Z'V" or "EM RAEH NAC UOY ERUS M'I".

"[WE'RE AWARE OF ISSUES ON THIS PAGE AND ARE WORKING TO REMEDY THE ------------]" isn't specific to SoulStorm, it's another generic response.

"?RTNFFRZ RUG GRT HBL QVQ" or "?EGASSEM EHT TEG UOY DID" is another new one and so is "[PLEASE CLOSE THIS WINDOW IMMEDIATELY]".

I'm sure you can hear the first one, Nep.

???

First message you posted is "I'M SURE YOU CAN HEAR ME" backwards, that's all.

'Dripik' Gave me ***'THIS STUFF. THIS STUFF.'*** Is that generic?