Lead designer of Perplex City here! Perplex City was an ARG (alternate reality game) produced by Mind Candy in 2004. Unlike almost all ARGs at the time, it wasn’t promoting a movie or TV or associated product - instead, we sold packs of puzzle cards that tied into the game’s story.
This is a puzzle card I thought would either be solved very quickly (within a year or two) or not at all. To have it solved after 14 years is very special.
Perplex City has had a lot of interesting alumni. It was made by Mind Candy, which was founded by Michael Acton Smith, who is also co-founder of Calm. The lead writer was Naomi Alderman, who became an award-winning novelist and whose novel The Power was one of Obama’s top books of the year and is being adapted into a $100m Amazon TV show.
I went on to co-found Six to Start with my brother Dan Hon (who you may know from his popular newsletter, and later left the company to do a lot of good work in the US government digital services realm and Code for America). Six to Start is best known for Zombies, Run!, which is the world’s most popular smartphone fitness game and is sort of like an ARG, if you squint at it.
I continue to do a lot of thinking and writing around ARGs (which are still fascinating) and gamification (which I mostly dislike). My blog post, What ARGs Can Teach Us About QAnon, went somewhat viral a few months ago: https://mssv.net/2020/08/02/what-args-can-teach-us-about-qan...
Edit: That blog post also gets into the confusion between the Perplex City Satoshi and the Bitcoin Satoshi (which conspiratorially-minded people DM me about regularly) along with my supposed involvement in Cicada 3301.
I honestly can't believe there's a front page Hacker News post about Perplex City today. I was literally searching for cards on eBay last night. I would love to see a game like Perplex City return some day. It was one of the first ARGs I followed on Unfiction, and it helped introduce me to the world of puzzling and puzzle hunts, and also helped push me towards my current career path. So, I guess I want to say thank you for working on such a unique and interesting game that had a massive positive influence on me when I was a teenager. It was so exciting to see the mid-2000s internet work together in a whirlwind of multimedia creativity.
Also, this is completely random, but do you happen to know if there's a warehouse somewhere with a bunch of unopened boxes of Perplex City cards? I always keep an eye out for cards, but it's hard to find people selling things from a game that ended over a decade ago.
I deeply miss the golden era of ARGs circa the 2000s. I keep feeling the impulse to log onto the Unfiction Forums and check what's going on, but alas, even those are gone now! Without a central watering hole, I think it'll be that much harder for the medium to come back—everything's siloed into separate Discords now, without a single sustaining community. It's not really possible to lurk or hop between games anymore, and scattershot chat messages are harder to catch up on than forum threads, and don't preserve as well or make for very good reading after a game is over.
I'm probably younger than most of the crowd that was involved in that ARG scene, so I wanna say thanks for helping to create a piece of my childhood! I actually remember the name Six to Start and that there was a lot of hope behind it when it launched, so I'm glad to hear it's doing well.
Just want to express my admiration for what you and the team did with perplex city. Thank you for making something so damn cool.
The believable near future sci-fi. The beautiful art and design work. The binding of a community from all across the globe long before it was the norm.
It was a palpable universe.
Sucks that it ended when it did, but I'll always cherish the veritable mountains of quality content we got.
Perplex City was great, thanks so much for all you did on it! Fondly remember the community that built up around solving these. I lucked in to being the first to solve one of the silvers (Differently Lethal), and remember all the efforts to solve this one back in the day.
Perplex City was awesome, and I still miss it. It had a really unique storytelling mechanism, the cards were generally pretty fun, high production values.
I thought the second season suffered a bit when they introduced human actors as characters, instead of just illustrations. It lost a bit of charm. And as a Euro-centric game it was harder as an American to be as involved. But it was still a great multi-platform experience. I would love to see something like it again (or even work on such a game)
Now that this puzzle is solved, can you explain how it was intended to be solved?
It was solved using reverse image search, which was present when this puzzle was created but not very reliable for uncommon images. So it's likely that you did not intend for it to be solved via a reverse image search.
So what was the intended way to arrive at the solution?
I only clicked because I thought it was Bitcoin related. Even though it predates Bitcoin, I assume the popularity is given by Bitcoin's current media coverage.
It's not clear to me how they find the crucial picture of him (the one he holds the beer). The article says "user th0may used a reverse image search and discovered a photograph of a man holding a beer", but /u/th0may's thread on Reddit doesn't say anything like that [1].
If anything, /u/th0may himself said in thread, "maybe you already found this image", which implies that the image itself is already known (and likely NOT discovered by "reverse image search", but by other ways). /u/th0may then reverse-searched the image to find the website, which lead to the answer.
Anyway, I'm still curious how they find this beer image, since this looks to me is the most important step.
He guys, first up I’m the guy who found the image of him holding a beer.
It was barely simple I used the webpage https://pimeyes.com/en uploaded the image from the card, cropped it a little to hide the Japanese characters etc. The first two result where the same that I scanned. The third was the image holding the beer. I saw some resemblance, but didn’t think it would work. PimEys let’s you search for free but you have to pay for the full url. So I took the fraction of the url figured out the full one. Found the original image on the webpage. And then posted my findings to Reddit. I and also other users found new pictures of him the following days. On the 28th of December we found an image with him wearing a bib from a half marathon through the results I found the name and it was Satoshi.
I heard about the story a year ago, but forgot about it. Then I remembered and told my family about on Christmas. So I wanted to check out if this is still unsolved and found this reddit. I’m currently researching about AI and found a few image backwards search engines way more powerful then google image search. It turned out that I found the image of him holding the beer, when I fed in the card. Just wanted to play around, but it looks really promising now. ;D
I found this part the most interesting too. There’s a comment in the reddit thread now where the author says:
It is called PimEyes but it does not give you the full url unless you pay. So I had to start digging from what I got.
"heard about the story a year ago, but forgot about it. Then I remembered and told my family about on Christmas. So I wanted to check out if this is still unsolved and found this reddit. I’m currently researching about AI and found a few image backwards search engines way more powerful then google image search. It turned out that I found the image of him holding the beer, when I fed in the card. Just wanted to play around, but it looks really promising now. ;D"
>Q: What was the password that Satoshi was supposed to share?
>A: It was a question in Japanese that he would have spoken to whoever found him. The answer to the question was the puzzle’s answer. The creator of the puzzle, Jey Biddulph, has posted an audio clip of the question on Twitter. Can you solve it?
Not quite that easy, as the puzzle was initially released in 2006 when the corpus of images to search against was much smaller. I'm sure many people over the years tried reverse searching the image, but it wasn't until after 14 years of searching and filtering through the data that a match was finally found.
It's worth highlighting that, back in 2006, social media was very new and most people didn't have any social media profiles. Both Twitter and Facebook was only launched that year. Only a handful of people had mobile phones with internet. Both the amount of photos of people were low, and also the avenues people could take to find others were narrow and few.
I played PerplexCity back then and engaged with the hunt for this puzzle amongst others (e.g the cube!). For my part, it was mainly word of mouth with Japanese friends or colleagues over the years until I forgot about it. Occasionally every few years something happened to get people interested in this puzzle. I believe community members put up a reward for solving this.
Just as back then the web resources were few, those that were created have mostly disappeared. Wikis, a few hugely active forums, chat rooms etc all individual websites all lost.
I've been wondering whether its possible to have Alternate Reality Games in today's mobile phone and social media land.
I can't help wondering when reading this...just how many "free brain cycles" do people have in the world?
By "free brain cycles", I mean like one's not used for work and your family and perhaps one hobby...
I cannot even imagine how many people worked so hard and used their cycles to figure this puzzle out, and like I can barely remember what to buy from the store whenever I go.
Don't get me wrong, it's a hell of an achievement for everyone involved, but I just have such a hard time understanding the absolute motivation behind it.
Well you have to consider that this is the "one hobby" for a lot of people, so your own division of brain cycles leaves room for a group who works on things like this for fun.
Misleading title for obvious reasons. Would be wise to modify it. Me and most likely others, believe this is related to the author of bitcoin. It's not.
Satoshi is a common name in Japan. I work with a guy by that name and know several others. This says more about your own bias than it does about the title.
[+] [-] adrianhon|5 years ago|reply
Lots more on Wikipedia here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perplex_City
This is a puzzle card I thought would either be solved very quickly (within a year or two) or not at all. To have it solved after 14 years is very special.
Perplex City has had a lot of interesting alumni. It was made by Mind Candy, which was founded by Michael Acton Smith, who is also co-founder of Calm. The lead writer was Naomi Alderman, who became an award-winning novelist and whose novel The Power was one of Obama’s top books of the year and is being adapted into a $100m Amazon TV show.
I went on to co-found Six to Start with my brother Dan Hon (who you may know from his popular newsletter, and later left the company to do a lot of good work in the US government digital services realm and Code for America). Six to Start is best known for Zombies, Run!, which is the world’s most popular smartphone fitness game and is sort of like an ARG, if you squint at it.
I continue to do a lot of thinking and writing around ARGs (which are still fascinating) and gamification (which I mostly dislike). My blog post, What ARGs Can Teach Us About QAnon, went somewhat viral a few months ago: https://mssv.net/2020/08/02/what-args-can-teach-us-about-qan...
Edit: That blog post also gets into the confusion between the Perplex City Satoshi and the Bitcoin Satoshi (which conspiratorially-minded people DM me about regularly) along with my supposed involvement in Cicada 3301.
[+] [-] dmcginty|5 years ago|reply
Also, this is completely random, but do you happen to know if there's a warehouse somewhere with a bunch of unopened boxes of Perplex City cards? I always keep an eye out for cards, but it's hard to find people selling things from a game that ended over a decade ago.
[+] [-] mintplant|5 years ago|reply
I'm probably younger than most of the crowd that was involved in that ARG scene, so I wanna say thanks for helping to create a piece of my childhood! I actually remember the name Six to Start and that there was a lot of hope behind it when it launched, so I'm glad to hear it's doing well.
[+] [-] TeaDude|5 years ago|reply
The believable near future sci-fi. The beautiful art and design work. The binding of a community from all across the globe long before it was the norm. It was a palpable universe.
Sucks that it ended when it did, but I'll always cherish the veritable mountains of quality content we got.
[+] [-] bowmessage|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hturan|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] LargeWu|5 years ago|reply
I thought the second season suffered a bit when they introduced human actors as characters, instead of just illustrations. It lost a bit of charm. And as a Euro-centric game it was harder as an American to be as involved. But it was still a great multi-platform experience. I would love to see something like it again (or even work on such a game)
[+] [-] nameoda|5 years ago|reply
It was solved using reverse image search, which was present when this puzzle was created but not very reliable for uncommon images. So it's likely that you did not intend for it to be solved via a reverse image search.
So what was the intended way to arrive at the solution?
[+] [-] schaefer|5 years ago|reply
Thank you for providing this behind the scenes, and for your initial work on the game itself. I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on your blog.
[+] [-] nojs|5 years ago|reply
> Q: Is this related to Bitcoin?
> A: No. Satoshi Nakamoto is the pseudonym used by the person who created Bitcoin, but it’s not the same Satoshi.
Weirdly this apparently pre-dates that other Satoshi puzzle by a few years.
[+] [-] gpvos|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eecks|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fireattack|5 years ago|reply
If anything, /u/th0may himself said in thread, "maybe you already found this image", which implies that the image itself is already known (and likely NOT discovered by "reverse image search", but by other ways). /u/th0may then reverse-searched the image to find the website, which lead to the answer.
Anyway, I'm still curious how they find this beer image, since this looks to me is the most important step.
[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/FindSatoshi/comments/kktjhc/found_s...
[+] [-] th0may|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nasir|5 years ago|reply
I heard about the story a year ago, but forgot about it. Then I remembered and told my family about on Christmas. So I wanted to check out if this is still unsolved and found this reddit. I’m currently researching about AI and found a few image backwards search engines way more powerful then google image search. It turned out that I found the image of him holding the beer, when I fed in the card. Just wanted to play around, but it looks really promising now. ;D
https://www.reddit.com/r/FindSatoshi/comments/kktjhc/found_s...
[+] [-] rollulus|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] _puk|5 years ago|reply
"heard about the story a year ago, but forgot about it. Then I remembered and told my family about on Christmas. So I wanted to check out if this is still unsolved and found this reddit. I’m currently researching about AI and found a few image backwards search engines way more powerful then google image search. It turned out that I found the image of him holding the beer, when I fed in the card. Just wanted to play around, but it looks really promising now. ;D"
[+] [-] Arnavion|5 years ago|reply
>A: It was a question in Japanese that he would have spoken to whoever found him. The answer to the question was the puzzle’s answer. The creator of the puzzle, Jey Biddulph, has posted an audio clip of the question on Twitter. Can you solve it?
( Direct link to the clip: https://soundcloud.com/user-650898069-942959925/speech-20201... )
"炎を生んで死んだのはだれ？ Who gave birth to a fire and died?"
Was the answer "Izanami" ? (Shinto creation myth - Izanami burned to death while giving birth to Kagutsuchi, the god of fire and blacksmiths.)
Edit: Yes, confirmed in the Twitter thread.
[+] [-] aaron695|5 years ago|reply
Top result. (Past original photos)
It might be using this new info, but I'd guess it was what /u/th0may used.
[+] [-] clydethefrog|5 years ago|reply
It's based in Seychelles now. probably for bad reasons.
https://hacked.wtf/privacy/pimeyes-ownership-moves-to-seyche...
[+] [-] GrantZvolsky|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lgeorget|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] th0may|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] colonwqbang|5 years ago|reply
It would be more interesting if we could get some details on how they did it. How was the image search carried out, etc.
[+] [-] capableweb|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vmception|5 years ago|reply
that's wild. seems outside the bounds of the project constraints but it certainly was not specified.
fascinating.
[+] [-] chippy|5 years ago|reply
I played PerplexCity back then and engaged with the hunt for this puzzle amongst others (e.g the cube!). For my part, it was mainly word of mouth with Japanese friends or colleagues over the years until I forgot about it. Occasionally every few years something happened to get people interested in this puzzle. I believe community members put up a reward for solving this.
Just as back then the web resources were few, those that were created have mostly disappeared. Wikis, a few hugely active forums, chat rooms etc all individual websites all lost.
I've been wondering whether its possible to have Alternate Reality Games in today's mobile phone and social media land.
[+] [-] chippy|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cubano|5 years ago|reply
By "free brain cycles", I mean like one's not used for work and your family and perhaps one hobby...
I cannot even imagine how many people worked so hard and used their cycles to figure this puzzle out, and like I can barely remember what to buy from the store whenever I go.
Don't get me wrong, it's a hell of an achievement for everyone involved, but I just have such a hard time understanding the absolute motivation behind it.
[+] [-] a_crc|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chippy|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nogridbag|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] notthegov|5 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] notthegov|5 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] growt|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rvba|5 years ago|reply
Also the text says about a password, but then it never says what it was.
[+] [-] toovs|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] blindm|5 years ago|reply
https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/emails/
https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/posts/
https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/code/
https://satoshi.nakamotoinstitute.org/quotes/
[+] [-] atmosx|5 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dfcowell|5 years ago|reply
Satoshi is a common name in Japan. I work with a guy by that name and know several others. This says more about your own bias than it does about the title.
[+] [-] Taek|5 years ago|reply
Admittedly, I did think initially it was a Bitcoin puzzle that got solved, but I am not disappointed with the real article, nor do I feel mislead.