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Forum index » Archive » Archive: General » Low-Volume Games

[UMedia][TRAILHEAD] www.feelbelieve.com

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ironman
Guest

[UMedia][TRAILHEAD] www.feelbelieve.com
There's a thread in their forums about it

Helloo

Go to http://www.feelbelieve.com and if you're on the home page - there's the beginning of a pretty basic puzzle trail, except I haven't gotten past stage two yet... i'm working on it. I don't know what it leads to yet though.

Anyone know anything about it? Or if someone works something out then please reply. I'll post again if I see something new

-----IronMan-----

Edit: Moved to N&R as apparently this is more than a puzzle trail, and retagged. -SpaceBass

QUICK REFERENCE:
Cast of Characters List post with links to blogs
Story so far... post

U-Media homepage with page id=word (change to access hidden pages)
Employee Lounge forum directory (password=umedia)

blog of Jan, schrodingers_kitty
blog of Tobin, nichtobin
blog of Ulli
blog of Miriam
blog of Alex
blog of Sally and the others in The Village

directory of hidden image on Alex's personal site, example file name "Image(048).jpg"
and "Image(566).txt" describes the upcoming break-out

Ed's hidden directory with coded files (some solved, one not)
links to "backdoor" pages and current puzzle discussion

(other ingame links coming soon)

Posted: Wed Dec 13, 2006 8:51 pm

catherwood
I Have 100 Cats and Smell of Wee

Joined: 25 Sep 2002
Posts: 4109
Location: Silicon Valley, CA

U-Media
there could be a ARG developing in the background

I am surprised there has been no one posting here. People in IRC have taken the puzzle trail a few steps deeper. I'll get to that in a minute. I've also dug around the company website, and exploited a backdoor into their employee forums. They are discussing some weird science!

http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=6

Then, by looking at the forum memberlist, I found an employee with a blog:

http://janmayer.blogspot.com/

They're building a backstory, I can smell it. But that's cool with me. I LIKE -- nay, LOVE -- simply eavesdropping on the evidence of events past and present, and piecing together the story for myself. When they start pushing live events at me, it won't be nearly as intriguing -- but there is more to their company's product than marketing slogans can describe.

Anyways, back to the trail. On the homepage, you should notice some things, which becomes a trailhead to another puzzle.

Spoiler (Rollover to View):

The words in bold font on http://www.feelbelieve.com/ spell out:
first advance to the centre
(and yes, the British spelling is important)

Notice how the links to the other pages on the site use a variable in the URL. Change that id=word to advance to the hidden page

http://www.feelbelieve.com/go.php?id=centre

I'll return with more later.

Posted: Thu Dec 14, 2006 10:42 pm

bagsbee
Unfettered

Joined: 21 Oct 2003
Posts: 417
Location: NYC

Forums

Checked out the forums. In addition to a General Discussion forum, there's a "password-protected" Employee forum, but there are a couple of paths that will get you in:

Spoiler (Rollover to View):

First, register. This will allow you to view member profiles, among other things. In the profiles there are "Most active forum" and "most active topic" links, for some profiles the links are to the supposedly "protected" forums... Long story short, the "Employee" forum is protected, but all of its sub-forums are not.

A less elegant, but simpler, way is to just use phpBB's query string API to go to the different forums, for example http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=2 is General Discussion, change the "2" to different values, and voil�.

Forums (so far):

http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=2 General Discussion
http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=3 Employee Lounge (password protected)
http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=4 R&D (2 topics)
http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=6 Marketing
http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=7 Distribution (0 topics)
http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=8 Engineering (1 topic)
http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=9 Management (1 topic)
http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=10 General Employee Discussion (9 topics)
http://www.feelbelieve.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=11 Sales (3 topics)

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 12:38 am

catherwood
I Have 100 Cats and Smell of Wee

Joined: 25 Sep 2002
Posts: 4109
Location: Silicon Valley, CA

feelbelieve puzzle trail so far

Now back to the puzzle trail. Per the spoiler i posted above, the next stage is a page of riddles. Below are hints but not specific answers:

Spoiler (Rollover to View):

http://www.feelbelieve.com/go.php?id=centre

They break down into 4 sections. The final goal seems to be to find 4 quotations and email them to... well, someone on the employee forums named EntagledEd says it's his puzzle trail, so figure out how to send the answers to him.

1. The first's a gift from friend to friend ...
{then skip to the bottom}
You've reached the end, so here's your first
To keep you free of boredom's thirst:
* {the quote from Albert Einstein is given to you right there, so no real riddle is to be solved for this one.}

The 2nd is complex, i'll skip ahead.

3. The third's a simple thing to get
Just answer the question I have set:
What's never asked for, always got
No man's prize, but each man's lot?
* {the answer to this classic riddle is "life"}
* Change the URL id=word to id=life to get a quote from Nancy Willard

2. The second hides with younger folk
To crack the egg and find the yolk,
Just check for words that went awry
With their address you will soon fly.
* {Here you need to explore the website some more. Follow their recruitment link and then notice that they have a special section for "younger folk"}
http://www.feelbelieve.com/go.php?id=recruitment_yep
* Look for all misspelled words on that page. (Ignore British spelling differences.)
* Note what letter needs to be substituted to correct the mistakes.
* Those new letters together make the id=word to change in the URL
* Socrates is given credit for the quote you find there.

4. The fourth you'll get by asking round
"Who's the coolest man in town?"
There's one who'll help, this season's son
When things need fixing, he's the one.
* {We're kinda stuck on this one}

I'm not sure if anyone has completed the final step at this point. A few of us have made stabs at emailing characters and using the employee forums to gain more information.

(edit to add:) OK, to be honest, we have some guesses about the 4th part:

Spoiler (Rollover to View):

If you read all of the employee forums, you'll find out that there is one guy who seems to be the fix-it man, so perhaps we need to ask him the question directly. His last name ends in "son" but i'm not sure it refers to the season. Alternatively, the female employees have a thread going in which they discuss which guy in the office is the "fittest".

The fact that they're all on UK time means some wait time is involved for getting replies back from personal messages.

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 1:51 am

haffastrider
Boot

Joined: 05 Dec 2006
Posts: 39

The Village

Got a giggle out of the allusion to The Prisoner. At first I thought there might be some relationship, but can't find any.

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 4:57 am

haffastrider
Boot

Joined: 05 Dec 2006
Posts: 39

Tried to get a job at Umedia

In Research and Developement.

Emailed this to them: I tried to apply for employment and the submit form did not work. Either that or you will receive about eight thousand registrations for me.

I am interested in research and development as well as the bold faced lettering on the home page. I went to the centre, and think I could be of help to your company. I love puzzles.

And recieved this back: Deirdre,

Thanks for your interest in U-Media. I've forwarded your Email to our head of R&D, he should be getting in touch very soon.
I'll speak to Alex Winterson, our IT go-to guy about fixing the site - probably some mis-routed IP socket pipes or other such technical jargon.
I'm not sure what you mean by puzzles or the centre. I'm assuming this is one of the guys in the Village playing around again. They don't get much contact with the outside world. I think they go a bit loopy in there.

Let me know if you have any problems that I can help you with,

J.Maxwell, head of Engineering
(License Enforcement and Crisis Response)

[/spoiler]

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 11:18 am

bagsbee
Unfettered

Joined: 21 Oct 2003
Posts: 417
Location: NYC

New Blog post

New post at Jan's blog:

http://janmayer.blogspot.com/2006/12/worried.html

Spoiler (Rollover to View):

Ed has disappeared from the Village, sketchy characters asking questions, oh noes!

plus a Prisoner reference, just for you haffastrider Wink

edit: ok not new, posted last night...but not posted here so Razz

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 1:43 pm

bagsbee
Unfettered

Joined: 21 Oct 2003
Posts: 417
Location: NYC

odd HTML code

forgot to mention this, it was the first thing I noticed when I did a view source on the home page. There's some HTML code hidden in comments:

Code:

combined with some existing CSS, basically the effect is that when you mouse over the word "LIE", it is highlighted. But the code is commented out, so it does nothing Confused

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 3:20 pm

Jetamo
Boot

Joined: 16 Jun 2006
Posts: 56
Location: The land of Rhudd Draigs.(Red Dragons) (Wales)

Email from J. Maxwell!

Quote:

Hello Jetamo(usedrealnamehere),

I like your attitude - I got into this job for the pay, but it's certainly good to have vision! The Engineering dept. covers many avenues, so there are no "must-haves" but there are certain "good fits";
- it's a real plus if you've had law enforcement or security experience.
- if you're squeamish, the engineers probably aren't for you
- an open mind is a must.
- adaptability and a willingness to get your hands dirty are key.

The major upside of this job is being on the front lines for the practical side of the roll-out. Obviously I can't tell you too much until we're ready to launch or announce a date, but the engineers will be indespensible to the expansion of U-Media.

If you get back to me, I can set up a telephone interview. Who knows, you could be a member of the team by christmas.

J.

On 12/15/06, Jet2themaxSPLATaol.com <Jet2themax> wrote:
Hello,
My name is (realnamehere).(Last name hidden, in case i do not fit the requirements).
I was interested in becoming an Engineer.
Tell me - what are the requirements required to become an Engineer?
I would love to become an Engineer, so in 30 years time, i can tell my children, "I was an engineer for U-Media. I helped tropes become an everyday thing".

Reply in your own time.
(realnamehere).(UK, Wales)

Sounds.. good. Sad

_________________
Playing: Perplex City, Sammeeeees, Urban Nightmare
Played: CTW2, LostExperience
Chat-moderating: #lookingforav,#urbannightmare.

2ms and 5es, Are you a sammeeeee?

COPYRIGHT JETAMO

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 3:47 pm

bagsbee
Unfettered

Joined: 21 Oct 2003
Posts: 417
Location: NYC

Jetamo wrote:

Sounds.. good. Sad

Look on the bright side, you can be our mole!

Well done. Cool

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 3:57 pm

Jetamoo
Guest

Thing is - i can't answer the phone.. I WON'T REMEMBER WHAT HE SAYS!
Sad

Maybe I can get him to just do an over email interview..

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 4:36 pm

rose
...and then Magic happens

Joined: 26 Nov 2003
Posts: 4117

Jetamo - That sounds like a good plan. Ask about email. But maybe he doesn't want to put things in writing. Somehow that job description sounds more like a military thing than a regular job. Maybe the tropes want their own militia.

_________________
I love this site for being free, in every sense of the word~Spacebass

Mankind was my business, the common good was my business.~ Dickens

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 8:40 pm

ironman
Guest

Quote:

They're building a backstory, I can smell it.

- Catherwood

This is so much bigger than I thought, massive iceberg territory. I'm excited. Haha my American counterparts, I'm in the UK, maybe I should try and set up a real life interview - would they do that? Scary...

-----IronMan-----

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 8:52 pm

bagsbee
Unfettered

Joined: 21 Oct 2003
Posts: 417
Location: NYC

ironman wrote:

maybe I should try and set up a real life interview

Do it.

Do it.

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 9:21 pm

haffastrider
Boot

Joined: 05 Dec 2006
Posts: 39

Another email
they are very responsive

But not very helpful Sad

Anyway, thought I'd fish a little bit, let J know about Ed being missing....
His reply:
Thanks for the heads-up. Looks like I don't have my eye on things as I should.
I'm looking into it. Can't have any chickens loose of the coop.
Let me know if you find out anything else - mum's the word.

Not much help, grrr.

Ironman, do the interview, do the interview....
and yes this seems to be pretty large.

Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 10:12 pm

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