![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
I AM SO, SO PROUD OF YOU.
NEWS BULLETIN.
First of all, everyone passed our first activity check! Yay! So let's move on to some quick updates.
And that's it for the quick and easy deets.
- ACTIVITY: We're going to adjust the reminder each month from the 25th to the 1st. Don't ask me why it was originally on the 25th; I (hi, this is Nix) asked myself the same question when I was processing everything and had no answer. The 1st makes way more sense.
- CR MEME: Due up tomorrow! Additionally, we plan to try moving the CR meme next month so it coincides with our event log. Naturally, we'll let you know when it's up, so you don't have to do anything differently.
- REWARDS: You can find our adjusted pricing here! Please fill out and submit the form on that page if you aren't sure where an item fits (especially if it isn't mentioned in the examples), it's somehow canon-specific, or you're trying to purchase an item that costs 100 or more points.
- QUESTS: There's a player quest! You can find an IC broadcast here and a log here.
And that's it for the quick and easy deets.
ALPELBETS AND YOU.
I guess we're calling it the Apelbet now? Because...I made it...(this is Pel speaking).
Anyway, some people have been speculating about the nature of the freaky deaky writing found in the ruins. Fun fact: it is entirely solvable. But not everyone uses chat, so here's a rundown of the info people have been able to pry out of me. After this point, people will have to buy clues on the rewards page; however, if someone makes a correct guess, I'll confirm it so long as they can prove to me that it's something their characters figured out on their own. It is entirely possible to decode the writing without buying any hints.
The most important thing to know about the writing system is it's nonessential to the plot of the game. If no one cracks it, no one will get blocked out of any special plot content. We included it as a potential fun thing for characters and players to focus on and, well, play with. But its use in the game is affected by your interest in it, so don't worry if you find this totally boring or stupid. It's completely avoidable.
Here are all of the examples of the writing system so far:
Some notes:
We'll link this post on the information page; players can add new details every time someone buys a clue or figures something out, along with any future examples of the writing system.
Feel free to use this page to speculate amongst yourselves!
Anyway, some people have been speculating about the nature of the freaky deaky writing found in the ruins. Fun fact: it is entirely solvable. But not everyone uses chat, so here's a rundown of the info people have been able to pry out of me. After this point, people will have to buy clues on the rewards page; however, if someone makes a correct guess, I'll confirm it so long as they can prove to me that it's something their characters figured out on their own. It is entirely possible to decode the writing without buying any hints.
The most important thing to know about the writing system is it's nonessential to the plot of the game. If no one cracks it, no one will get blocked out of any special plot content. We included it as a potential fun thing for characters and players to focus on and, well, play with. But its use in the game is affected by your interest in it, so don't worry if you find this totally boring or stupid. It's completely avoidable.
Here are all of the examples of the writing system so far:
Some notes:
- Variations in the angle, width, and depth of characters are attributable to my handwriting, rather than what the characters mean. All characters were made to look distinct as possible; #3 shows a "standardized" font.
- The line means something, but it is not mathematical. There is a numeric system in this writing system, but it hasn't come up yet. Perhaps ironically, it involves no lines.
- It is not mirror-based or mirror-themed. In fact, it wasn't even originally made for the game. As such, nothing about the writing system or its characters is inherently relevant to the game's themes.
- OOCly, anyone literate in English has all the tools necessary to decode the messages. ICly, because of the setting's fancy written-down-is-translated rules, feel free to handwave an ESL or non-English-speaking character being able to decode them as well. It would be shitty of us as mods to block out the characters who don't speak English from participating in this, if they want to.
- The writing system has no inherently magical properties and, with the exception of the writing on the Wall, can be erased or smudged.
- The best way to solve this is how you crack any code: Look for patterns. Test and extrapolate. Etc.
- For anything else, you gotta buy a clue. ;)
We'll link this post on the information page; players can add new details every time someone buys a clue or figures something out, along with any future examples of the writing system.
Feel free to use this page to speculate amongst yourselves!
QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, ETC.
no subject
what medium are the various letters written in (or do they appear to have been written in)?
no subject
With the exception of #2 and #4 (which are specifically printed on the Phone Booth and written in chalk on the Wall), any of the writing can be found anywhere, in any medium. The examples' variation was just
someone playing around in photoshopto give variety.INFO COLLECTION.
Player: Your name.
Character: Your character's name, username, and canon.
Type: Are you submitting a clue? A guess your character made?
Summary: Tell us about the thing you're submitting! What's the clue? What do you want confirmed or denied?
Link: Just a link to either your purchased clue with a mod response or wherever your character did some speculating.
Re: INFO COLLECTION.
Player: Ami
Character: Koushirou Izumi (
Type: Making a guess!
Summary: Does the line separate consonants (or consonant-like letters/symbols) from vowels, with consonants on top and vowels on the bottom? It looks like there are 24ish (some I'm not sure if are the same letter or not hence the 'ish') top-level symbols and five bottom-level symbols, with no 'words' containing only top-level symbols, so it seemed like a place to start.
Link: UH I don't have a link where any guessing was done ICly (since he would've just been working on stuff alone) but I can show you my ooc notes as I've been testing stuff on this. For awhile. And so I want to figure out if I'm even on the right track with the base 'system' before putting more time into figuring out what sounds/letters go where. As far as IC justification goes puzzle-solving is Kou's thing, and he works with (and seems to have deciphered) the Digital World's writing system, so I think it's reasonable ICly for him to have some guesses by now.
no subject
NOW THAT I UNDERSTAND THE PURPOSE OF THIS
Player: Carolyn
Character: William (
Type: Guess!
Summary: Does the triangle symbol = D?
Link: this + it ends a bunch of words + it's a double letter at one point
no subject
no subject
LET ME RUIN YOUR INBOX
If you character 1. has vaguely positive cr with William (and isn't blind) or 2. would have expressed any kind of interest in the letters to him or over the network
and you want him to spam the shit out of your character's inbox with ideas (some of which may even be helpful!)...let me know
Language speculation and info
KNOWN
• This confirmation of the word structure regarding consonants and vowels.
PSEUDO KNOWN (No official confirmation but pretty sure)
• There are five vowels and 19 or so consonants. I say 'or so' because a few are a little hard to tell apart, but I'm pretty sure they're separate (note that I made a mistake in the question to the mods; 24ish was the total number of letters, which is pretty expected for a roman alphabet-based language/code especially since some consonants are doubled and unnecessary, such as c and k.)
SPECULATIVE (I think this is a pattern, but can't confirm)
• The little o next to the vowels could have a few uses. My current guess is that it designates if the vowel comes before or after the consonant above it, and tentatively I think the 'default' is consonant, then the vowel below it, then next consonant on top, etc etc with the o moving the vowel to before the consonant above it, but there are a lot of places where this doesn't seem to work.
• Other ideas for the o are marking extended or double vowels, or starting or ending a syllable. These all have weirdness to them, though.
• So far things seem to fit better reading left to right, but definitely don't rule out that these might be right to left. When I mention word placement in an image, though, I'm assuming left to right.
• We also need to consider that certain letters are 'missing' or potentially represented by the same symbol as another (such as c and k possibly being grouped.) This would throw off some translations.
• Also important to consider if if there's a 'y' equivalent and how that might affect vowels/consonants (though I would personally guess that 'y' has been absorbed into another vowel symbol.)
WEIRD AND BAFFLING (This stuff has got me completely lost)
• There's a two letter vowel only word, and it has the o marker.
• There's one word that starts with a vowel with no consonant above it; if the o designates that the vowel comes before (or possibly after, if the 'default' is vowel first) the consonant, why would there be a word with the vowel alone in front?
• Why does the only one-letter word (a single vowel letter, so probably A or I) have the o marker?
NOTEWORTHY (Words, patterns, etc that seem important)
• Aforementioned single-letter word that is probably A or I, and therefore narrows down one vowel if so.
• The five letter word with only one vowel (image #2, second on bottom) contains three letters that make up their own word elsewhere (image #2, fifth word on bottom.)
• The word with the vowel with no consonant above it appears three times (images #5, #7, #8)
• The last word in both the top and bottom rows of image #2 is the same.
SO that's what I've been working with, mostly focusing on trying to find a mix of letters that work with the two words that share several letters mentioned above. So far I'm not having a whole lot of luck, though, mostly because it's just a whole lot of combinations to try especially with not being completely sure what order the vowels and consonants go in. But hopefully all this is helpful and I'm gonna keep working at it!
no subject
- Unnecessary consonants have been cut! There is no C, for example, there's just S and K.
- The circle next to vowels does not denote vowel placement; all vowels automatically come after the consonant they're underneath. If they're underneath no consonant, then they come first.
- You're correct in that the circle denotes the vowel length. Just to make it easier on you, because I realize this will be killer difficult otherwise, the vowels areIt's up to you to figure out which corresponds to which! You're crazy clever for realizing the 'Y' was absorbed into a vowel, though.
- The word with a vowel in front that repeats several times has shown up in the game previously; this was my attempt to give you a rosetta stone starter kit.
- The phrase in #2 showed up in the TDM.
- If it wasn't obvious, this writing system is phonetic.