I'm at level 8 so far...

December 18, 2004 8:49 AM

This is not pron - its a damn hard puzzle. More info here.
posted by Orange Goblin (27 comments total)

I got to the first level!
Then I got bored.
posted by ba at 8:58 AM on December 18, 2004

IE-only sites are so 1998.
posted by clevershark at 9:04 AM on December 18, 2004

I think you spelled your username wrong, cleversnark.
posted by ba at 9:06 AM on December 18, 2004

my, what a grainy picture.

'He entered the new world'

WTF am I supposed to do with THAT?
posted by Busithoth at 9:09 AM on December 18, 2004

Hey, I agree with clevershark. I'm sure as hell not using Internet Explorer. For anything.
posted by baphomet at 9:14 AM on December 18, 2004

and, FWIW, I got to level 4.
and I'm not going into the source code to get to 5.
posted by Busithoth at 9:16 AM on December 18, 2004

If anyone is -- at this late stage of the malware wars -- still using IE, would they be so kind as to tell us poor MS-expatriates how the story ends?
posted by ChrisR at 9:16 AM on December 18, 2004

I am scared.
posted by wuchoogundonow at 9:25 AM on December 18, 2004

"trick me!"

Yeah, I'm done.
posted by ticopelp at 9:45 AM on December 18, 2004

You don't need IE - well, I haven't needed to so far.
posted by Orange Goblin at 9:49 AM on December 18, 2004

and, FWIW, I got to level 4.
and I'm not going into the source code to get to 5.

The source would not help you. But a morse code translator might.
posted by bugmuncher at 9:57 AM on December 18, 2004

Um, ok, I'm stupid. But I got the morse code thing and now I have no idea how to use it. It's allegedly a user name and password but for WHAT?
posted by u.n. owen at 10:15 AM on December 18, 2004

just hit the tab key a few times to find the hotspot on the image.

im stuck on the "thatsit" one.
tried an anagram permutator and didnt come up with anything.
posted by juv3nal at 10:19 AM on December 18, 2004

Level 4 has me stumped, too. I'm guessing the reason is general incompetence and not the fact that I'm using Safari.

On preview, juv3nal has thrown a beautiful life-preserver. Thanks.
posted by nuala at 10:32 AM on December 18, 2004

Early death? Now I'm scared.
posted by DrJohnEvans at 12:21 PM on December 18, 2004

FWIW, I dig shit like this. Not that I'm very good at it. But it reminds me of that AI web puzzle a few years back. Thanks, Orange Goblin.
posted by fungible at 2:50 PM on December 18, 2004

im stuck on the "thatsit" one.
tried an anagram permutator and didnt come up with anything.

I got stuck on that one too. I looked at the page source and went to the forum listed in a comment. They have tons of hints there. After seeing what needs done for this one, I'm not even trying the rest.
posted by Bort at 5:24 PM on December 18, 2004

Well, I'm blocked at 5. I have no idea how the CD and Operation Torch are related. *pulls hair*
posted by Plinko at 7:29 PM on December 18, 2004

i got to level 10, but then i didn't want to deal with figuring out how to decrypt the embedded PKCS7 data! the puzzles are fun, but techno crap like this is very lame. also, it should definitely work in all browsers...
posted by muppetboy at 8:40 PM on December 18, 2004

plinko: google "big bad voodoo daddy" and the song lyric in the url.
posted by fungible at 9:05 PM on December 18, 2004

Busithoth said 'He entered the new world'
WTF am I supposed to do with THAT?

you mean you don't know? fffffph! yeah me neither.
posted by freudianslipper at 11:12 PM on December 18, 2004

i think if I would have seen the requirements to play this game. Must have photoshop...must know braille (that is braille isn't it?). I wouldn't have bothered. oh well, fun in it's own way I suppose.

ok where is the this IS pron link?
posted by freudianslipper at 11:30 PM on December 18, 2004

For freudianslipper: http://deathball.net/pron/

heh. heh.
posted by StrangerInAStrainedLand at 11:46 PM on December 18, 2004

i think if I would have seen the requirements to play this game. Must have photoshop...must know braille (that is braille isn't it?). I wouldn't have bothered. oh well, fun in it's own way I suppose.

there's any number of free image editing programs that will let you increase the brightness of an image.

and its morse code which you don't actually need to know since there's a ton of web morse code translators.
posted by juv3nal at 1:16 AM on December 19, 2004

I got to level 50, but in an alternate universe.
posted by bwg at 4:38 AM on December 19, 2004

sorta lost its fun about level 5. i like puzzles and all, but not really sure what the reward is here. a very small percentage of people actually finish the puzzle? that means its either very hard or kinda boring, so people lose interest.
posted by caution live frogs at 8:00 AM on December 19, 2004

I've been tempted to post this for a month or two. I got up to the upper fifties (with a little help from my friends) and did almost all of it in firefox. I also played with Irfanview where the others used Photoshop, I think.

If you don't believe me, when you reach 53 look in the comments for an IRC transcript of "ml". Thatsa me.

The reason DavidM (the creator) says you need IE is to play the background .mp3 tunes, nearest I can tell.

It's doable and some of the puzzles are very, very interesting. Unfortunately the first twenty are atrocious.

It had stabilized in the thirties for a while, but then got suddenly very popular. I think it had some to do with getting posted on smaller community forums. Look it up on Google if you don't believe me, to find an interesting look into the convergence of modern internet communication skills and the dregs of forum software. Steadily new puzzles and users appeared, and to my knowledge DavidM and friends haven't stopped making temporary endings.

One of them was a two page tribute to Elvis, and tastefully done at that.

I, however, dropped out before reaching 60. My buddy who got me into it had quit and the #stupidweirdriddle folks who'd leveled with me got ahead of me. I don't know how high it's gotten now, and doubt I'll go back unless some of the mefites want to be there with me.

(Oh and I've got a bunch of out of date spoilers up into the fifties. DavidM rewards the temporary winners but then soon after changes the urls/passwords needed to get there, to foil the spoilers.)
posted by codger at 8:29 AM on December 19, 2004