StickManStickMan

Illuminati

The Illuminati tests were originally a series of cryptic tests I devised for readers to try to complete, just for fun. Entries to the StickManStickMan Illuminati are now closed, but you can find the original questions and answers below. Note that the majority of them refer to portions of the site which no longer exist, and so will be pretty much meaningless, or impossible to complete.

  1. there are six tests on this page. the first one is to find the rest.

    The first test was simply a case of highlighting the page in order to reveal the remaining tests, which were written in white on a white background.

    20 people completed the first test: David McGrogan, "SadisticMystic", "Boter", "YanQuan", "Bobshush", Jon Middleton, "Jymbob", "Soapy Waters", Chris Cawthorn, Julian Pulman, "No one in particular", "FortyTwo", Gareth Taylor, "Master 0f Souls", Dan Shaw, "Waaaaaayne", Jim Miles, Greg Lavery, "Falos" and "Moe".

  2. the second test to decode this message... "ebfrf ner erq / ivbyrgf ner oyhr / fgvpxznafgvpxzna / bjaf lbh"

    The message is encoded with ROT-13 and decodes to: "roses are red / violets are blue / stickmanstickman / owns you".

    15 people completed the second test: David McGrogan, "SadisticMystic", "Boter", "YanQuan", "Bobshush", Jon Middleton, "Jymbob", "Soapy Waters", Chris Cawthorn, Julian Pulman, "No one in particular", "FortyTwo", Gareth Taylor, "Master 0f Souls" and Dan Shaw.

  3. the third test is very hard. there are four hidden messages on the stickmanstickman homepage. mail me the locations of all four.

    The third test stumped an awful lot of people. The hidden messages are no longer there, so don't waste any time looking...

    The first hidden message was buried inside The Oracle (a piece of JavaScript which recited one of about a hundred quotes at random each time the main page was loaded). Finding it required you to either look through the hundred or so Oracle sayings, or to refresh the front page until "The StickManStickMan Illuminati beckon. You found hidden text 1 of 4." appeared.

    The second hidden message could be found by putting your mouse over the big "StickManStickMan" banner at the top of the front page. The words "The StickManStickMan Illuminati beckon. You found hidden text 2 of 4." appeared as the alternate text.

    The third hidden message could be found by highlighting the whole page. "The StickManStickMan Illuminati beckon. You found hidden text 3 of 4." appeared at the very top of the page, next to the box where the mandatory Keenspace advertisements were placed.

    The fourth message - "The StickManStickMan Illuminati beckon. You found hidden text 4 of 4." is in commented-out text at the very bottom of the index. To see it, you need to View Source and scroll down, to find it and a hint for #1, the hardest of the four to find.

    12 people completed the third test: David McGrogan, "SadisticMystic", "Boter", "YanQuan", "Bobshush", Jon Middleton, "Jymbob", "Soapy Waters", Chris Cawthorn, Julian Pulman, "No one in particular" and "FortyTwo". Honourable mentions to Gareth Taylor and Jim Miles, who found all but #1, and "Waaaaaayne", who found all but #4.

  4. the fourth test is to find the one page on this site which has no links to it, and no links away from it.

    The fourth test was originally very easy: simply creating a 404 error by typing randomness after the URL in your address bar would get you to the 404 page. However, I realised later that certain links on the archive page would take you straight there: in contradiction of the question.

    To remedy this I changed the 404 page to what it is now and made it so the 403 page was the one you needed instead. 403 is "access denied" and could be reached by going either straight to the 403 page, or trying to get to an inaccessible subfolder in the stickmanstickman doman: for example, /images, where all the images were stored.

    20 people completed the fourth test: David McGrogan, "SadisticMystic", "Boter", "YanQuan", "Bobshush", Jon Middleton, "Jymbob", "Soapy Waters", Chris Cawthorn, Julian Pulman, "No one in particular", Gareth Taylor, "Master 0f Souls", Dan Shaw, Jim Miles, "Waaaaaayne", Greg Lavery, "Falos", "Sonic Fruit" and Patrick Thomson.

  5. the fifth test has a clue. TRIANGLE

    The fifth test was simpler: you just had to go to the Gallery and click on the rather well-flagged picture of the odd triangles. At the bottom of the image was the secret completion message.

    4 people completed the fifth test: David McGrogan, "SadisticMystic", "Boter" and "YanQuan".

  6. the sixth test is to tell me what two-letter word this is: 01110 01111 11000 10101 01111 11010 10110 00101 01011 00010 10101

    The sixth test was nothing to do with binary itself. Take "01110 01111 11000 10101 01111 11010 10110 00101 01011 00010 10101". Divide it into 5 groups of 11 instead of 11 groups of 5 to get "01110011111 10001010101 11111010101 10001010101 10001010101", then stack them up:

    01110011111      .###..#####
    10001010101      #...#.#.#.#
    11111010101 i.e. #####.#.#.#
    10001010101      #...#.#.#.#
    10001010101      #...#.#.#.#

    being the two-letter word "AM".

    2 people completed the sixth test: David McGrogan and "SadisticMystic".

Final standings were as follows:

6 tests completed: David McGrogan, "SadisticMystic"
5 tests completed: "Boter", "YanQuan"
4 tests completed: "Bobshush", Jon Middleton, "Jymbob", "Soapy Waters", Chris Cawthorn, Julian Pulman, "No one in particular"
3 tests completed: Gareth Taylor, "Master 0f Souls", Dan Shaw, "FortyTwo"
2 tests completed: Jim Miles, "Waaaaaayne", Greg Lavery, "Falos"
1 test completed: "Sonic Fruit", Patrick Thomson, "Moe"

Thank you and congratulations to all who took part!