The Enigma

[confusio]

What could a super smart woman like Loki want...something personal that she's been trying to develop for many years... Well, I could be TOTALLY out there by saying this, but could she be looking for a Think Tank? You can't have such a group with only one member...maybe she's looking for people like us to join her?

Maybe I'm dreaming.

It could be or feel that we are reading between the lines, but that's what I thought in one of my previous

posts, also I don't know what level of monitoring these folks are doing. I joined neowin because besides

some IRC channels (something I quit long time ago after suffering from always on-line disorder :-) )

this is just one of the few forums where I found interesting activity going on related to this game.

To be frank I don't give a squat about the prizes, tough a cool laptop or some gadget will be welcomed,

my main interest is the challenge, and a great oportunity to learn from other people working in a

common project.

You can find tremendously smart people around here, if they are not keeping an eye on us it will be a

shame and then I'll be convinced that this is just another marketing stunt.

Microsoft has a lot of talent, incredible smart and dedicated people, I've been a couple of times in Redmond,

the problem is that when you are there is like you get a total brain wash and you become a Redmonite and

devoted Microsoftie, then it make sense that they may be looking for some people to "think out of the box".

So I thought, yeah the puzzles are cool, they will have fun, we'll create some buzz and atract some media

atention (BTW, most of the media coverage I found say source: Microsoft :-( ), BUT lets throw them a

problem and see how they dissect it, what tools they use, what analysis they make, how they cooperate

present and share information, how they dig for information, etc. This could certainly be a clever way

to find a group of very smart people willing to work as a team with a common goal.

Then I don't think you are dreaming, it makes a lot of sense, but is it what this is all about ?

well we'll know it in just few days, hang in there :-)

My .02

Cheers

Edited January 24, 2007 by confusio

[confusio]

Just a litle snippet ...

Somebody posted this comment in the events section about CES 2007 @ MSFT Partners Pavillion:

"I met Bill Gates a few moments ago and shook his hand, was rather surreal and not something that

most will believe when I tell friends etc. He seemed a little nervy infront of a huge crowd of us geeks

with tongues hanging out but it didn?t halt him from giving some insight into a promised huge

Windows release marrying vision and speech - interesting."

huge ?

[wbell]

A VERY nice thread! Keep up the good work!

WBELL

:D

Edited January 24, 2007 by wbell

[JohnY79]

Posting some futher reading. I have to remind m self that "Loki" is a trickster and is probobly weaving a web of lies for us to stumble though.

I found this on wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loki%27s_Wager

Interesting enough.

Interesting read :)

Makes you wonder how much of a trickster our Loki is, and how much deliberate misdirection is being used in the game, for example to make us waste time on on things that could be taken as clues but are actually meaningless or vice versa.

[cglrcng]

Anyone else getting a mail bounce from the special event reply mail link? Or have you not seen the Special Event Invite when you click on Puzzle Box #4?

[cglrcng]

Anyone else getting a mail bounce from the special event reply mail link? Or have you not seen the Special Event Invite when you click on Puzzle Box #4?

No matter what I do when I respond in a mail it bounces...But the "yes" on the printed Invite is "gold" not yellow. Is that the simple answer to the Loki question?

[tgeairn]

No matter what I do when I respond in a mail it bounces...But the "yes" on the printed Invite is "gold" not yellow. Is that the simple answer to the Loki question?

What bounce are you getting exactly? can you post the bounce message? the SMTP code will tell us more.

[Notfit]

Read the whole thread, great job everyone.

confusio, your picture is great. The biggest noticeable difference between yours and the bruce is image 3-12. The wiki claims there is no icon for puzzle box 3, puzzle 12. edit: I found my mistake. The wiki is listing the images alphabetically. There is still a difference, but the wiki is not claiming there is no icon for puzzle box 3, puzzle 12. end edit You say there is according to the flash. Makes me wonder if this is a 42entertainment mistake or something.

In regards to the office prank from MIT.

This also happens at Microsoft, as demonstrated here: http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=27781

The MIT connection may be just coincidence.

[cglrcng]

No matter what I do when I respond in a mail it bounces...But the "yes" on the printed Invite is "gold" not yellow. Is that the simple answer to the Loki question?

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Sent it with subject, without, with nothing in the message area & without.

[confusio]

Read the whole thread, great job everyone.

confusio, your picture is great. The biggest noticeable difference between yours and the bruce is image 3-12. The wiki claims there is no icon for puzzle box 3, puzzle 12. edit: I found my mistake. The wiki is listing the images alphabetically. There is still a difference, but the wiki is not claiming there is no icon for puzzle box 3, puzzle 12. end edit You say there is according to the flash. Makes me wonder if this is a 42entertainment mistake or something.

Yes that's the main difference between bruce's collection in the wiki and what I posted here. I noticed

the difference during the game, if you capture the images from screen the resolution is quite low to

notice it, I realized that bruce got the wrong piece when I inspected the flash files, all the plates are

defined as shapes, and looking at that particular one zooming on the shape shows clearly that

is the one I included. I don't remember now what shape number it is but with a decent flash decompiler

you can easily see it.

Also some shapes with the vertical lines show a little angle, they are not 100% straight vertical lines.

The decompiler I use is from Sothink

you can download a trial for free.

In regards to the office prank from MIT.

This also happens at Microsoft, as demonstrated here: http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=27781

The MIT connection may be just coincidence.

Interesting, the bouncy balls one reminds me one that we did when one guy was on a trip

we filled up his office with these damn shipping peanuts, the office was closed but we were

able to drop them removing some of the cieling tiles, the biggest problem is that these

peanuts were not the antistatic ones and we spent weeks with the damn things sticking on us,

we had to call a company (and obviously pay for it) to clean up the mess.

Strange things happen in the geek community ... :-)

Cheers

Sent it with subject, without, with nothing in the message area & without.

Your emai address or your mail providers domain name seems to be in a spam

block list and the receiver mail system is rejecting your message.

[tgeairn]

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The mail system

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It thinks you're a spammer. Your sending mail server is likely blocklisted or something. Are you using Excite's server for outgoing mail? Try sending from a hotmail account or something.

[_eXile_]

Hi,

Here all white boxes and it's background. Maybe something could be important about that.

PS: Yes it contains all 27 boxes (in my last post it were only 26 because I forgot one).

Greeting,

eXile.

[confusio]

OK, be aware that the real identity of Loki has been revealed, so she does not work for Microsoft.

Then, the metion to some neowinias at CES that she works for Windows Client Division becomes

a relevant clue ?

creamhackered probably some additional comments about what she said at CES may

provide a more solid clue ? comments ?

Cheers

[confusio]

Quick Summary

OK here is a brief summary on our findings about Loki

- We know that the character is play by a professional actress following an enigmatic script

- We don't know what the character "is" or "represents", but I'll keep refering to Loki as "she"

- She is 22 years old

- Her name is Lorelei or Loreley Kitsune

- Quadruple major, physics, stage arts, history and folklore

- Her bio, the videos, GPA, etc, provide references to the pi, Euler's and Golden ratio numbers, and a picture of a fractal

- She learned Chinese, English, Latin and Greek

- By 21 she visited almost every country in the world

- Photograpic memory, never owned a camera

- She is a trickster

- Given her talents she has been hired to run this challenge with the title "Enigma Director"

- Many connections with mythology and japanese folklore (Red Fox, etc)

- She will vanish soon, she said that "at the end of this challenge I will cease to exist"

- She has been trying to "find the way" to build "something"

- She is looking for help to find her own vanishing point

- When the moment is right she will ask a question

- After Box 1 she gave us the word "play"

- On the videos, with her glasses she gave us the following directions: RIGHT - UP - RIGHT - DOWN - LEFT

- From our viewpoint on the videos she is moving from left to right

- From the puzzles she gave us a collection of plates that form a figure

(We didn't arrive yet to a conclusion of what this figure is or represents)

Anything missing ?

My .02