There's always another secret [Potential IFComp 2024 Spoilers]

It’s not Whitespace. I just ran the code in a couple online compilers and they reported runtime errors.

The code can be found by viewing the page source, either through your computer (right-click and click “View Page Source” on a Mac) or through this online tool. The whitespace occurs from lines 251 to 749, totaling 3096 characters, all single spaces (" "), and 498 lines.

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Yeah, I feel like this has to be something… especially considering the variations.

Screenshots


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@markm Did you do this :joy:

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Manon, I bet it’s you :slight_smile:

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I SWEAR on all the spaghetti code and word crimes I’ve done in the past that I have no access to the code of the IFComp website! :raised_back_of_hand:

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But you do have access to talking with the managers!

Several of the games themselves are connected. In Ms. Gosling’s Last Case, in the notes from the Gwydion case, there are instructions for a specific spot in the encyclopedias in The Den. I didn’t go back to check it out, but I bet it’s the next clue. Also BOSH seems to be in the same universe.

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So Phil Riley, Ben Jackson, Daniel Seltzer are all in cahoot

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Looks to me akin to 8-bit tape cassette encoding…

Best regards from Italy,
dott. Piergiorgio

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Ah, I noticed the references to the other two in Daniel’s game but didn’t think it was anything more than a fun easter egg!

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What happens if we go by depth? Divide the spaces in each line by 4, and the resulting number sequence might be a code?

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Okay so, it looks like if we do my idea, the result is never higher than 3. Each line might be a binary pair.

0 = 00
1 = 01
2 = 10
3 = 11

I need to get to a desktop so I can inspect this.

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(Darn it; I noticed that huge swathe of whitespace earlier today when I was updating my bodgy CSV scraper, but dismissed it as just some HTML-generation glitch.)

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I’m pretty sure, as @JTN said, that’s just an HTML-generation glitch: indentation from some template that’s not producing anything. @DeusIrae had a vague recollection that someone had commented on it in years past, and when he said that it sounded familiar to me too. I imagine it’d be trivial to pull up an old version of that page from 5-10 years ago on the Internet Archive and check, right? That’s a public page?

But I’m almost positive this whole line is a wild-goose chase: I’d be looking at the games.

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Yeah I would imagine that the impetus is to get people to play the games :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

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Here’s the brooch:
Screenshot 2024-09-01 211400
Here’s a detail of @mathbrush’s review banner:
Screenshot 2024-09-01 211519
Coincidence? Possibly!

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Checked The Den.


“…a unique aspect of certain Kizzuwatnan rituals was the ‘kuwac hapanza’, literally the “wet dog”: a domesticated dog who had been ritually purified with running (not still!) water. Unlike the “impure” puppies used in other rituals, the kuwac hapanza was considered pure enough to function as an intermediary between the physical and spiritual worlds, a living anchor for the rite through which the spirits could act…”

Also here’s the relevant (?) stuff from Miss Gosling’s Last Case, in case there’s other clues buried in there.

It seems one of the previous occupants called himself “Disgybl Gwydion”, claimed to be heir to the ancient Druids, performing strange rituals in the flower gardens and seeking eternal life.
…ancestral spirits / lares and penates, bound through belief, worship? / no, alchemical process-congelation of the soul! See Petrus Catadesmicus, Liber Animarum / but held to the anchor, how to move and act? / Kizzuwatnan ritual, the kuwac hapanza - Father’s Encyclopedia vol K p 197 - replaces the nails or spikes! / must be in the right place…

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I just noticed that the whitespace “code” changes when you reshuffle the list, so I think @JoshGrams is right, this was a wild goose chase. Sorry everyone!

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Just coincidence! I wanted to have a cat skull and thought ‘What do I love more than cat skulls? Decaying roses!’ but it didn’t come out looking decayed.

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Who among us hasn’t had this exact thought? :slight_smile:

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