Noob.com has gotten even weirder

by Justin McElroy on Apr 11th 2008 9:00AM

Right, so you may remember on April 1 when we stumbled upon Noob.com (Mortal Kombat chief Ed Boon's personal site) and tried to made some sense out of the coded images there. At the time, we thought (thanks to reader Batzarro) that the site was hinting at a new game in the series called "Ice Rage," as it steadily counted down to 3 p.m. on April 17.

But things have gotten weirder now, with all those symbols replaced by a long series of numbers. We're hoping that they're a code of some sort and we're hoping that you smart, attractive readers can solve it. Feel free to use our comments section to work together and crack it Robert Langdon style.

Source

Tags: ed-boon, mortal-kombat, noob.com

Reader Comments (97)

WALT!!!

el oh el XD

4 8 15 16 23 42!!!!

What. The. Hell.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortal_Online

PROMOTIONAL ARG ATTACK!

If you convert all of the numbers to letters via the A=1, B=2, C=3, etc. method, you get...

E S Y R O T S L I F E L
E E R F D N A L S I V E
R S W E D E N I L N O D
T O D D A E L D E I L A
U L W O R G A E E S V C

Yeah, that's not very helpful to me either. The word "life" is in there. As is "todd". Just figured I'd throw it out there.

There's also the word Sweden on the third line.

Well, I tried reversing the letters, which may or may not have come up with something useful.

L E F I L S T O R Y S E
E V I S L A N D F R E E
D O N L I N E D E W S R
A L I E D L E A D D O T
C V S E E A G R O W L U

In the first line, I found the word STORY. In the second, I found ISLAND FREE. In the third, ONLINE (or LINED, but I think ONLINE would be more relevant). In the fourth, A LIE and LEAD (or LIED LEAD). In the fourth, SEE A GROWL.

Your guess is as good as mine. Maybe someone else will see something that I don't. :) Just thought I'd share.

Hey, no one told me there were more than those six lines! Dammit.

Try backwards: You could actually find more words.

CVSEEAGROWLU
ALIEDLEADDOT
DONLINEDEWSR
EVISLANDFREE
LEFILSTORYSE

C.V see a growl u a lied lead dot don line dew sr evis land free le fil story se?

I was thinking that perhaps it was Caesar cypher, but it'd have to be a little bit modified because the frequent occurrence of vowels should be playing in our favor.

Okay, time to make people who hate scrolling miserable.

E S Y R O T S L I F E L LIFE
E E R F D N A L S I V E
R S W E D E N I L N O D SWEDEN
T O D D A E L D E I L A TODD
U L W O R G A E E S V C
R K O M B A T D P H E R KOMBAT
N I N I A R A E P S D A
A M E M I R C E A E R N
R E V I T C E P S R E P
O Z I E W D A R K T A R DARK
U E C M O N E V H O M E HOME
N E T M A O D E E L B T NET
D R I I N O R T L O O F
E F M L T E L E P O R T PORT
L E T S A G E V W I I W LET SAGE WII

L E F I L S T O R Y S E STORY
E V I S L A N D F R E E ISLAND FREE
D O N L I N E D E W S R ONLINE
A L I E D L E A D D O T A LIE LEAD
C V S E E A G R O W L U SEE A GROWL
R E H P D T A B M O K R
A D S P E A R A I N I N SPEAR IN (OR) RAIN IN
N R E A E C R I M E M A A CRIME
P E R S P E C T I V E R PERSPECTIVE
R A T K R A D W E I Z O RAT
E M O H V E N O M C E U EMO
T B L E E D O A M T E N
F O O L T R O N I I R D FOOL
T R O P E L E T L M F E LET
W I I W V E G A S T E L WII VEGAS

Also, if you look vertically at it, the first line says TURN AROUND. That couldn't have been accidental. Upside-down doesn't seem to yield anything useful. I'm getting a headache.

line 14

E F M L T E L E P O R T

TELEPORT rather than PORT?

@netou

Whoops. I knew that. :P

Okay, I wrote out the vertical lines horizontally for easier reading, then reversed those (so I have upside-down displayed horizontally). I only found a few words, but they made a little sense.

E E R T U R N A R O U N D E L TURN AROUND
S E S O L K I M E Z E E R F E
Y R W D W O N E V I C T I M T ONE VICTIM
R F E D O M I M I E M M I L S
O D D A R B A I T W O A N T A
T N E E G A R R C D N O O E G
S A N L A T A C E A E D R L E
L L I D E D E E P R V E T E V
I S L E E P P A S K H E L P W - SLEEP ASK HELP
F I N I S H S E R T O L O O I - FINISH
L E D A C R A N P R E T F T W

L E D N U O R A N R U T R E E
E F R E E Z E M I K L O S E S - FREEZE LOSES
T M I T C I V E N O W D W R Y
S L I M M E I M I M O D E F R
A T N A O W T I A B R A D D O
G E O O N D C R R A G E E N T
E L R D E A E C A T A L N A S
V E T E V R P E E D E D I L L
W P L E H K S A P P E E L S I
I O O L O T R E S H S I N I F
W T F T E R P N A R C A D E L - WTF ARCADE

I'm wondering if SLEEP ASK HELP is trying to tell me something. :D By the way, it's a lot easier to decipher if you put it in a text editor that gives all characters equal spacing.

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/usermovies/200553.html

uh, you should also give them the ones you have

:-)

FINISHER rather than FINISH?

We should give John Nash a call...

Whoops, forgot a line on the vertical ones. The second to last line vertically:

E V O L V E D R E A M B O R I - EVOLVE (OR) EVOLVED (OR) EVOLVE DREAM

Upside down:
I R O B M A E R D E V L O V E - DEV LOVE (lol)

U L W O R and G A E are there too. jk :P

what if, much like the name noob saibot, this code is in reverse? So instead of reading from left to right, try right to left? I'd love to get into this but being at work... sigh.

Rollins, you seem to have a hell of a lot of time on your hands. Either that, or you are just able to decipher those in your head pretty quickly.

Good job though, this is getting interesting, assuming your decryption is gold.

T R O P E L E T L M F E
=Rope Let.

Hell if I know what that means.

@StrangeBum

Although most of it came to me pretty quickly, I have to admit that I have way too much time on my hands this morning. I work part-time on-campus in a computer lab where I basically make sure the students can use the printers. Hence, I have a bit of spare time on my hands while I'm here.

Rollins, that's cool man. I have way too much free time on my hands too. I'm a CAD Draftsman for a stone countertop company, hence the reason I have all the time in the world to sit on here and read these posts all day long.

Slow word days FTW!! [but also FTL] :(

Rollins, me too! Thats where I am right now, until 2. Joystiq and Digg are my friends during this boring time.

hm,
i wonder how many of the people on joystiq are the people who work in computer labs in campuses across the world and are bored out of their skulls.
I kinda do the same, but i supervise those who help people figure out how to use the printers. lol

Come on, you're not looking hard enough!

T O A M T E N

See now?

26 letters in the alphabet...the numbers don't get bigger than 26...

Midway will be taking up the Metal Gear Solid series now!

YAY........errr.....NOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Hex maybe?

Can't be. All Hexadecimal characters start at hex 41, since there are no numbers near 41, it's not likely that these are hexadecimal coded letters, although I can see where you were coming from.

It's Letter/Number coded Word Search. On the 6th line I've found the word KOMBAT.. but Im still decoding to find any more.

LoL had the same thought as you:)

You may be right, I've also found "TREE" "SWEDEN" "STORY" "DREAD" "LIED" "LINE"...

I guess you can try to find all of the hidden words and take any letters that are left and see what you've got.

Hmm....word search maybe?

Look for the most common number. That number most likely is an "E"

There's only one anomaly that I've seen, and that is the "8" on line 11

Perhaps to signify this game being MK8?

It also seems to be backwards. If you read everything right to left, there's many more english words to be had.

Whoops, he beat me to it...

I investigated the code and it's basically loading a JPG into a Flash file, so there no sense decompiling the Flash. When the timer expires it simply says 'countdown complete'.

Furthermore, it's some "Christmas Countdown" widget from Spring Widgets. That leads me to believe this is some very indy project or they aren't putting a whole lot of marketing dollars into this.

My theory, based on what people above said, is that he or a team he's on plans on launching some type of free-to-play online game maybe based around an island? Just kind of a far out there guess

http://www.noob.com/noob08.jpg

Is the source JEPG he mentioned.

There's more numbers than joystiq's picture shows. Go to the actual site....

hmm... vertical and horizontal text. Anyone want to try applying a "Yoshi's Cookie" approach to manipulating the characters that currently appear randomly placed between the words being picked out above?

That sounds painful. I mean, it could very well be it, but that won't be fun.

yoshi's cookie doesnt work on this one.

e s y r o t s l i f e l
e e r f d n a l s i v e
r s w e d e n i l n o d
t o d d a e r d e i l a
u l w o r g a e e s v c
r k o m b a t d p h e r
n i n i a r a e p s d a
a m e m i r c e a e r n
r e v i t c e p s r e p
o z i e w d a r k t a r
u e c m o n e v h o m e
n e t m a o d e e l b t
d r i i n o r t l o o f
e f m l t e l e p o r t
l e t s a g e v w i i w

This is what I have so far.
I'll pull the words from each line:
1st line: rot, rots, life
2nd line: dna
3rd line: sweden, nod
4th line: todd
5th line:
6th line: kombat, her
7th line:
8th line:
9th line:
10th line: dark, tar
11th line: home
12th line: net, ode
13th line:
14th line: teleport, port
15th line: let, lets, sage, age, wii

if we look at it in columns, we get:
1st column: turn, around
2nd column:
3rd column: won, evict
4th column:
5th column: odd, bait, two, ant
6th column:
7th column: rat
8th column: ide, deep, vet
9th column: help
10th column: finish
11th column: evolve, evolved
12th column: led

Backwards:
1st line: story
2nd line: land, and, free
3rd line: don, online, line, lined
4th line: lie, lied, read, dot
5th line: grow, row
6th line: tab
7th line: ads, pear, rain
8th line: crime
9th line: perspective
10th line: rat, rad
11th line: venom
12th line: bleed, ten
13th line: fool, tron
14th line: trope, rope
15th line: wii, vegas, gas

And finally upside down:
1st column: led, ran, rut, tree
2nd column: freeze, lose, loses
3rd column: now, wry
4th column: slim, mode
5th column: brad, rad
6th column: rag, rage
7th column: cat
8th column: vet, pee, peed, dill
9th column: sap, peel
10th column: lot, sin
11th column: rob, love
12th column: wtf, narc

So basically, I have no idea what this means. Any guesses?

Also, are there more rows appearing as time goes on?

Arcade

Upside down under "L" at the top of last column

Also,

Dream: starting with the "D" in evolved

Victim: Down from the "V" in perspective

Crime: Backwards above perspective

TIP EHT FO MOTTOB

LOOK TO LA LUNA

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Noob.com has gotten even weirder

Reader Comments (97)

Posted: Apr 11th 2008 9:04AM CommentSystem said

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