SoulStorm ARG - Piece 6

[EJ Prime]

Hi, all! I'm here because somebody asked a question on the Witness subreddit

That was me Welcome to the hunt

[V_O_T]

So many possibilities with this one.

So I may be completely wrong but I'll throw out some suggestions to try help.

-what if we take the first letter of every colored triangle and find key words.

-what if each point of the triangle represents the 3rd letter of the color of each triangle.

-what if the triangles (once connected to one another) form a really low quality image?

-the question mark could be placed on purpose as all these shapes could be a string of words asking a question like the previous piece asking for screen shots
.
-what if we connect the corners of each triangle with lines corresponding to their color? Perhaps letters can form in the overlapping lines?

-disclaimer- I've been following this on and off so if these have been mentioned, my apologies. Also if they seem horrendously inaccurate and dumb, sorry lol. Just trying to throw in another perspective.

[Clementsparrow]

So, I wanted to make a picture showing the alignment of the triangle edges, but I found out that they are actually very poorly aligned. You can see it on the image linked. So maybe there is a message coded by the displacement of each triangle. (Also, I haven't checked if the triangles all have the same size).



The image does not seem to appear, so here is the link.

[Connell]

Does anyone know anything about animated .png files? I know they can either have the file extension .apng or just .png, and most browsers don't natively support them. I tried downloading a .apng extension from chrome but it only recognises the files if they're actually called .apng's and won't attempt to play .png's, so if it is animated, I can't tell as of now. I'm not really sure what part of it would animate, if any.

Might be completely wrong, this all just stemmed from me thinking how it was strange that they had strayed from their usual format (.jpg) and thinking there must be a reason behind it.

[Nate]

Might be completely wrong, this all just stemmed from me thinking how it was strange that they had strayed from their usual format (.jpg) and thinking there must be a reason behind it.

These are the first images produced in some sort of drawing program, rather than editing pre-existing images, right? If you want solid shapes with no artifacts that would confuse ARGers, PNG would be the file type to use. JPEG inserts compression artifacts that people would probably misinterpret when they're analysing the picture.

Also, y'all should probably stop harassing Jonathan Blow. Either he's uninvolved, or he's involved and won't help. I'm betting on the former, personally.

[Xavier]

My toughts as well. The PNG allows to respect shapes and colors much better than JPG files. So it could very much be that the colors are very relevant here.

[Scrabaniac]

My Enamel Pins Arrived! And the Gametee card has something on it....
"HP+?"... Maybe it's something for the ARG?

[Xavier]

I will have mine this evening but I seriously doubt this is related. This card looks like the random cards Gametee include with their shipments, without any indication it could be linked to Oddworld. Did you also get the Mudokon card or only that one?

Also is your photo flipped horizontally or is the card really written in mirror?

[Scrabaniac]

I didn't get the Mudokon Card, Just the Gametee one. And the picture is mirrored because i took it from my Mac's Camera. I had 2 sets of pins delivered and both the Gametee ones are the same, but I don't think they are the same as the card i got with the Soulstorm Brew poster.

[Crashpunk]

Yeah GameTee give you one in every purchase.

I got the Oddworld card when I got the Soulstorm print.

[Connell]

My toughts as well. The PNG allows to respect shapes and colors much better than JPG files. So it could very much be that the colors are very relevant here.

Gotcha, that makes a lot of sense.

Also, y'all should probably stop harassing Jonathan Blow. Either he's uninvolved, or he's involved and won't help. I'm betting on the former, personally.

I tweeted him twice, and he was kind enough to reply. Hardly "harassing". It was his choice whether to acknowledge my tweets or not.

Besides, he has to be involved in some capacity, I doubt OWI would just use mechanics and ideas from is intellectual property without informing him of what the game is and how it functions, particularly with regards to communication.

Also, so it looks like the Pins aren't going to be related to the ARG. But don't forget there is still something hidden in at least a few of them, if OWI's tweet is to be trusted. So if you find anything, let us know, ARG related or not

EDIT:

Close… they might hear us. shhh

— ed (@edmudokon) April 14, 2016

[Xavier]

Looks like EJ Prime had the first part of the puzzle right...

helping? pic.twitter.com/DSTReuotBP

— ed (@edmudokon) April 14, 2016

[zigggyy]

Could it be that there are 4 puzzles we need to solve, each will reveal a letter and give us the code. so as of now we would have C * * * ?

[Dank_Meme]

http://www.oddworld.com/soulstorm/ed/witness.png changed to the pic ed tweeted

[Nate]

Besides, he has to be involved in some capacity, I doubt OWI would just use mechanics and ideas from is intellectual property without informing him of what the game is and how it functions, particularly with regards to communication.

It's a popular game that came out recently. Might just be a pop culture reference.

Also, my point was rather that you're not going to get anything out of him. If he is involved, he's not going to help. And if he's not involved, he can't help.

[Connell]

I noticed no one had tried this to see if there is any correlation between the specific segment highlighted in the first puzzle, and the triangles that inhabit the same area on the trigrid. I can't see anything, but I attached it there for reference.

EDIT: Ed has tweeted this today. Looks like the solution does lie in using both together. Or he misspelt a famous Star Wars quote.

First… use the first…

— ed (@edmudokon) April 15, 2016

[Xavier]

I have no clue how to solve this thing...

Worst part is that we probably have everything we need to solve it at this point. :/

Do we need to have like the same RGB/Hex amounts both inside and outside the shape?

[Connell]

Yeah I literally haven't got a clue on it, and they're being more than generous on the hints. It probably does have something to do with the colour values and they intertwine in some way. I've thrown out so many random and wrong ideas on this one I'm fairly out of juice, I'll have another look later though. It might be worth running down all the facts we've got so far.

[Cute_Spide]

So my idea was to use the hex codes (because this has many Oddworld references included). Then, following the path of the solution of the last puzzle, take the first value from each triangle that you pass by. So, for example, following the path and stopping at the 121212 triangle gets the value #aface1. I stopped there because of the limitation on Hex values, and I'm unsure what to do after that. I hope this at least helps a bit ^^;

[Connell]

So my idea was to use the hex codes (because this has many Oddworld references included). Then, following the path of the solution of the last puzzle, take the first value from each triangle that you pass by. So, for example, following the path and stopping at the 121212 triangle gets the value #aface1. I stopped there because of the limitation on Hex values, and I'm unsure what to do after that. I hope this at least helps a bit ^^;

Hmm now that is an interesting lead. It's plausible considering the face is the next big reveal coming up. #AFace1 doesn't return anything on Twitter as a hashtag, and I can't find any URL's on the Soulstorm site, but this might be good. Perhaps Ed's "use the first" Tweet also meant use the first letter of each.

EDIT: It says ABEFACE1 from top to bottom. I edited my photo from yesterday to include the Hex codes. Can't believe how close I was, I just didn't look for that pattern, well done Spide, now it's just a question of what the last digit is? Perhaps the hex code of the red circles?



EDIT: I think it has something to do with the "1029" triangles on the right and their pattern. I believe this would make it ABEFACE15. But if that is right, what do we do with it? Also, down the left hand side and bottom row of the picture it says "15ABEDEAD" in HEX code. Strange!

Triple edit: THEY KNOW.

@Retro_Finds_UK Abe's face in Oddworld: Soulstorm? Yes, we plan to reveal that in due course. Why?

— Oddworld Inhabitants (@OddworldInc) April 15, 2016

The top banter continues afterward.

[Cute_Spide]

Triple edit: THEY KNOW.

@Retro_Finds_UK Abe's face in Oddworld: Soulstorm? Yes, we plan to reveal that in due course. Why?

— Oddworld Inhabitants (@OddworldInc) April 15, 2016

The top banter continues afterward.

Glad I could have finally contributed! I pulled myself out of bed in the morning just to get on here and give you my thoughts

So does the fact that they answered mean we got it right? I never would have thought to do what you did with the 1029 triangles, btw~

[Connell]

Glad I could have finally contributed! I pulled myself out of bed in the morning just to get on here and give you my thoughts

So does the fact that they answered mean we got it right? I never would have thought to do what you did with the 1029 triangles, btw~

Well you've definitely put us in the right direction. I tried to put the pattern from the first picture over the other one last night, but to be honest I didn't bother to check the HEX codes again You managed to spot it! Congrats

I wouldn't say we're done, I think there's more to do with the "return" part of the task. Who do we return it to? And I'm not sure if the "15" part is correct. Any ideas on what else the mystery square could be? I think the tweets were just their friendly way of letting us know we're heading in the right direction.

EDIT: Edward is begging us to figure it out haha.

yes! almost there…

— ed (@edmudokon) April 15, 2016

[Acaeris]

Hmm, so inside the C it says ABEFACE1 (or ABEFACEI maybe?) and outside, it says "15ABEDEAD?"... "Is Abe dead?"...

That would leave us with the "1029" triangles and the one that has a 50 for some reason.

[Connell]

5? no…

— ed (@edmudokon) April 15, 2016

Well it 'aint ABEFACE15. I just tweeted Ed saying that and he said that a second after. I'd say that's pretty much the closest we've come to a genuine reply from Ed to a comment. What else could it be?

EDIT: Perhaps ABEFACE19? The two rows of 1029 triangles are mirror opposites of each other. So the opposite end of the 501029 square is 9.

[Manco]

5 is definitely wrong.

5? no…

— ed (@edmudokon) April 15, 2016

e: speedy shit

Edit: The hex codes of the green and purple triangles are just “1029” repeating – 102910-291029-102910-291029 etc. The only exception is the top triangle which starts with 50.

[Acaeris]

Hmm, I was wondering if the 121212 one is supposed to be read as a 1 or I and realised it's the only gray in the puzzle and all the reveal images are gray so far... maybe that's relevant? (I'm literally picking at straws as I have no idea on this one).

[Connell]

Edit: The hex codes of the green and purple triangles are just “1029” repeating – 102910-291029-102910-291029 etc. The only exception is the top triangle which starts with 50.

Yep, but what do we do with that information?

EDIT: Maybe the colour is #291050, that's switching round the end bits, like the 2 rows do with each other... or some variation thereupon. Probably. And then the first digit is the one we're looking for. We can say for sure it's not 5 though.

[Xavier]

So my idea was to use the hex codes (because this has many Oddworld references included). Then, following the path of the solution of the last puzzle, take the first value from each triangle that you pass by. So, for example, following the path and stopping at the 121212 triangle gets the value #aface1. I stopped there because of the limitation on Hex values, and I'm unsure what to do after that. I hope this at least helps a bit ^^;

Wow, thanks for pointing us in the right directing, can't believe we were so close without seeing it. We probably are driving the guys over at OWI completely mad .

[Acaeris]

501029 = "Spirit of 1029" used earlier?

[Connell]

Wow, thanks for pointing us in the right directing, can't believe we were so close without seeing it. We probably are driving the guys over at OWI completely mad .

I can't believe I drew the shape round the triangles and was like... "Nope, nothing there" hahaha. Cute_Spide is our saviour on this piece. We're so close now. Just need to figure out which digit it should be. And then where to send it.

501029 = "Spirit of 1029" used earlier?

I was literally on that URL as we're typing this. How did we originally find the lost.mp3 text in it? I just ran it through a magic eye solver and couldn't find anything.

EDIT: No dice. Still just says lsot.mp3