[ARG] The Pizza Code Mystery

Black Mesa Archive The Cafeteria
#3041

Coming back to your previous post, JohnNotJohn, and yours, Jake R, I came across something interesting. You both mentioned Malbolge and Brainfuck, and I noticed whilst skimming through the last few pages that Pro-account-2000 posted something odd. His version of the decrypted HALOS file, utilizing the JavaScript found on the KXBM site, is titled “Brainfuck Source Code”. Why? Also, whenever I try to quote his post, I get this:

As you can see, the “Brainfuck” part is there, but it doesn’t show when I’m actually quoting it. Are we getting more hints, or am I missing something? Pro-account-2000, any tips on how this ended up happening?

#3042

If I understand you correctly, it’s properly quoted - that’s just what brainfuck code looks like.

#3043

Yeah, but why is it there? When did it come into suggestion to use that encoding?

EDIT: CPU’s mp3 file is very interesting, too. Sounds like a voice masked by a frequency change.

#3044

One of the passwords is “congratulationsyouwonthePIZZA” but there are many references stating “the PIZZA is a LIE” so maybe we should include “congratulationsyouwon” as a possible password…

#3045

You get that output (or similiar) if you use the method on the kxbm site to code morse via algorithm. We tried to run the halos file through it and that was the result.

EDIT: Ignore my post. I misread your first comment.

#3046

What mp3 do you mean??
I only know about an mp4 file in the “/assets” directory of the kxbm page and there is also some kind of voice.
Does someone has the proper eqipment for eliminating background noises from an audio???

#3047

but if the pizza is a lie… shouldnt it be congratulationsyouwonthelie?

Not that I know what I am talking bout folks. I am just guessing right along with you guys.

#3048

mp4 is a video file. You would need a tool capable of separating the audio from the video.

#3049

Clearly, it should be “congratulationsyouwonalie” instead. Because “the pizza” = “a lie”. Pfff. Beginners. =P

ANYWAY. I know of background.mp4 and the Base64 file (“RGllLi4ueW91IGFsbCBkaWUuLi55b3UgYWxsIGRpZS4uLg==”). No .mp3’s - except if you count the sound ripped from those two .mp4’s. I don’t believe there’s anything else, right?

Speaking of that second one, this page still mentions: “There are reports of this file being an SSTV signal with an image, but it’s from 8chan so its authenticity is questionable.” - I agree and think it’s absolutely nothing, but could someone please doublecheck this so we can mark it as officially debunked? I’m pretty sure it’s too short (under 10 seconds?) for a full picture, but I can’t seem to figure out how to do the SSTV thing properly on this laptop so I can’t check. Tutorials say the microphone should pick up the sound from the speakers, but the audio driver software seems to filter out sound produced by my own laptop so I can’t do that. And I don’t have a second machine here atm.

#3050

I’ll check, if you happen to have a link to the audio.

EDIT: Nevermind, I found it.

EDIT: There’s defineitely something there but it’s not SSTV.

#3051

Tell me these don’t sound like the mp3

EDIT: This is odd–where have we seen these encryption methods before:

[b]PGPFone[/b] PGPfone is another offering from Pretty Good Privacy Inc., a secure voice program for the PC. The interface is pleasantly intuitive, and there are options for different encoders and decoders (for either cellphone or landline use). PGPfone offers a selection of encryption schemes: 128 bit CAST key (a DES-like crypto system), 168 bit Triple-DES key (estimated key strength is 112 bits) or 192 bit Blowfish key (unknown estimated key strength).

The site the “PGPFone” portion links to has a time-stamp:

Date: Thu Mar 21 21:00:00 EDT 1996

. . . and is the weirdest, shadiest site I’ve ever been on. What the hell is this?

#3052

It could be voice encryption, I heard something that sounded like data in the mp3.

#3053

Adding to the Malbolge => Malebolge => Dante’s Inferno connections, Canto 21 naturally occurs during the traversal of Malebolge. Also, regarding the “cage for Satan,” Dante depicts Satan being encased in a frozen lake. Superconductivity generally only occurs at low temperatures. For Niobium alloys, the critical temperature is less than 20 K. In both cases, the cage would be very very cold.

Naturally, the Biodome also features a cryogenics lab.

As a general rule, for any sufficiently well-written work of literature, any genuine reference or allusion to another work, and any instance of symbolism, is indistinguishable from a coincidence.

Moving on to more meaningful things, I would suggest making note of any decryption of the hex code that results in ASCII or UTF-8 text, as it may be obfuscated code, on top of the cases seen in some of the IRC clues where the inner code was a classical cipher on top of some encryption.

EDIT: Just tested these keys. Same procedure as before, with slight adjustments to the end as noted :

  • nuclearmagneticresonance (also tried with spectrometer, spectrometry, and spectroscopy appended)
  • antimassspectrometer
  • helloworld
  • congratulationsyouwon (also tried with alie and aLiE put at the end)
  • malebolge
    As usual, no dice.

Returning to the mention of the notably cold cage, and looking at the whiteboard theory page on the wiki (which is in serious need of revision and elaboration), and the analysis of the whiteboards made throughout this thread, I noticed something interesting.

During my deep dive into Wikipedia in search of clues (which ultimately led to my previous discovery of Malbolge), I looked into several aspects of quantum computing, quantum mechanics, superconductivity, and the like–seeing as Dr. Horn has a PhD in Advanced Quantum Optronics.

Long story short, the white boards of the form c1a1x_uc#, previously mentioned as relating to cryogenics, actually focus specifically on a slightly more ineresting topic.

  • c1a1x_uc1 has a PT diagram showing superfluid regions, with distinctions made regarding phase core vortex regions, linking this to Type-II superconductors
  • c1a1x_uc2 references NMR, for which results of testing on specimen sample EP-0021 were given, and superconductors are often used in
  • c1a1x_uc3 makes note of the Josephson effect, the cornerstone of superconducting quantum computing
#3054

Quantum computing seems like a good direction to go in. Earlier (unconfirmed?) discussions were about that HALOS might have been intended as a code-breaking AI (you’ll have to look for the posts yourself, but I swear they’re there). And many of the currently used encryption methods are expected to be utterly broken once quantum computing is sufficiently progressed (but not yet, for as far as we know - even the NSA does not seem to have gotten that far, based on the info from the WP article linked within my previous link). I’m not sure if people started discussing this based on the whiteboards (thus making this entire comment a big “duh” moment), but if not, then here you go.

Question: I noticed a long time ago someone found a shack outside of player-out-of-bounds using Hammer. There were tons of tacos, or something? Also, an image that did not show properly in-game, only inside the editor? Should we try to use Hammer on other maps as well and see if we can find other such locations? Perhaps similar only-visible-in-Hammer images? Or are we not supposed to be using Hammer? I’d try it but I don’t want to get hit with a… ban-hammer. (seewhatididthere? … dear god I suck)

Edit:

I went through the links in the first post, and found this imgur album regarding Victor under Code C (“Later found in-game in a hidden room under a staircase in Questionable Ethics”). I assume that’s the “cubic guy” you mentioned. Now, I don’t want to be annoying by pointing out the obvious, but… that’s a TV. In Mesa. With yet another test screen. And a radio, as in, like the one on the KXBM site ad. Regarding my previous question: has anyone checked that room in Hammer yet? Because I really, really think someone should.

#3055

I must have whacked that guy at least 20 times on my recent playthrough, and it never occurred to me that the setup was literally perfect for the KXBM transmission. There was a radio, and it even happened in the Biodome. Nice find!

I don’t know jack about Hammer, unfortunately.

I brought that up a few pages back. It might have been proposed earlier, but the link between a supercomputer, niobium, and quantum systems–Horn’s area of expertise–just struck me as too difficult to ignore. If I understand that article, and the commentary of the more technologically-inclined, the implications of a practical quantum computer would be much more severe for asymmetric cryptography. My theory regarding the goal of the HALOS project being breaking TOR, which uses asymmetric cryptography seems a tad more likely.

This raises an interesting observation. If HALOS were currently online–and given the BibTeX code on the “Tempus omnia revelant” page, it might be–it would be just as stumped as us on the 752 Hex, even if it were a quantum supercomputer, provided the encryption is NOT Benaloh or Paillier, which are asymmetric. What’s more, the OTR hierarchy outlined in the PM from Code_ notably avoids asymmetric encryption entirely, opting for classical ciphers, base64 (and others) and finally symmetric cryptosystems. Dr. Horn did the same thing with codes A-D: pigpen, superposition of images, SSTV transmission, and the SECOM cipher. Granted, the base64 is a bit of a stretch, but I know I would have trouble reading that note to Victor without any eyes. The grilledpizza.jpeg too, which used images, binary, and a shift cipher.

Hmm…

#3056

After contacting a friend about the ARG, he told me localdesertsingles.com is currently down. If you’re still seeing the website, as I did, try Ctrl+F5 to see. For now, here’s a pastebin of the source in case we need it.

#3057

Did I say the secret phrase?

Joking aside, let’s wait and see what happens. In the meantime, another interesting observation I’ve made.

Superconductors aren’t the only way to build a quantum computer. Optics work just as well.Which begs the question, why would Dr. Horn go to such great, and admittedly rather silly, lengths to build a supercomputer on way when he was literally just a few feet away from a stockpile of materials to build one another way? And judging by his assumed friendship with Bottomley, the Biolabs administrator, and how he seems to throw his weight around in the note from Welsh’s diary, I don’t think he would have any trouble using such equipment for a secret project.

We may have made a slight miscalculation in our story theories thus far. I’ve got some theories, but I’m still trying to formalize them.

#3058

I dunno? I don’t know for how long it’s been down, or what caused it. I just know a guy who missed out on a lot of cool Portal 2 ARG stuff because he didn’t learn about it until later, and while explaining the stuff done so far to him he told me it was down.

#3059

Hello, I have been following this ARG for some time but since I’m not really good with anything except pointing out obvious stuff, so I haven’t really taken part in it.

But there are a few (more or less) obvious things that I haven’t noticed being mentioned in this topic, so I thought I could point them out.

Firstly, when you check out Time Evans’ twitter, it says he lives in Cochiti, New Mexico. Could this place be of any importance?
If I’ve understood correctly there have been previous real-world locations with some sort of hints?

I checked Cochiti out in Google Maps and one interesting place I found west of Cochiti lake was this:

1092×622
(I am Finnish btw, if you’re wondering the language)
This seems interesting, although I have no idea what it is and whether it has anything to do with the ARG.

Also, has anyone here wondered what the two “Related Stories” are about on the kxbm.net page. A “SpaceX launch postponed for unspecified reason” and “Depression linked to reading internet comments”. Also I noticed that there are apparently 22 comments on the article page, but it’s just saying to try again later. Is there some way we could find out what these comments are and whether they hold more hints/information?

That’s what I’ve noticed, if this is helpful to somebody then I’m glad :slight_smile:

#3060

I forgot how this guy looked in game, as well as what was in the room (aside from the radio). I dug around in there for ages during the Code D gate puzzle; it might be worth another play-through now that I have a different goal in mind. I can also view all the files that compose the game, if need be.

EDIT: Starting my second play-through today.

Founded in 2004, Leakfree.org became one of the first online communities dedicated to Valve’s Source engine development. It is more famously known for the formation of Black Mesa: Source under the 'Leakfree Modification Team' handle in September 2004.