***Crypt***
Crypt is a labyrinth of sound, image, data, and code. It is an enigma. Once solved, it is also a gateway.

Crypt is a multilayered piece of generative art, one that unfolds into something else, then unfolds again. It contains artworks within artworks, found by puzzles inside other puzzles. One leading to another. At the center is a gateway. The gateway opens another world. That world is an Alternate Reality Game filled with cryptic histories, untold stories, and physical treasures hidden all over the world. 

To begin, some hints. The solution to the first puzzle is a three-part key. It leads to another layer. Here is a room of sorts. An escape room. Viewable from three angles. In the room are eight code-words. They lead to the way out. Collaboration is essential.

At the bottom of Crypt is another key. It unlocks a world. It unlocks Cyclops.

To confirm your solution to crypt and claim your reward please visit: https://cyclopsgroup.art

***Cyclops***

Cyclops is a networked performance, collaborative narrative, and alternate-reality-game designed to be played by groups of people working together across the world. Set in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the game begins with a series of audio tracks. Some tracks are musical compositions, others are filled with odd voices reading letters and counting numbers, others still resemble nothing more than noise and static.
 
Each track is, in fact, a puzzle of increasing complexity. As players work together to solve them, a narrative about early research into psychological operations, mind-control experiments, and an alternative history of the internet age begins to emerge. Over the course of the game, players come across - and are invited to collect - a series of artworks specifically created for Cyclops players. To find these artworks, players must identify and follow up on clues provided within the game. Cyclops is a world within a world.

Crypt

~~~~~~~~~~~  Simple, Pure & Uncut Noise, straight from the Hash ~~~~~~~~~~~ 

HashCrash is an ode to the book SnowCrash, written by Neal Stephenson. This book had a very big influence on the crypto and NFT culture. Long before NFT's or concepts like the MetaVerse were used, Stephenson already described the things we are living with today. For example, he introduced the concept of HyperCards, digital items that could be exchanged and sold in the MetaVerse.

One of the main concepts in the book is what is called "SnowCrash". This is a digital drug that can take over the minds of people, turning people into puppets to be controlled by their master. The drug was represented as a type of visual noise that could bring the viewer into a trance state. Like SnowCrash, NFT's have quite some effect on our minds and body, the addictive behavior and price rushes of NFT’s evoke in people clearly something that has resemblance to how certain drugs work. 
HashCrash plays in a cynical way with this concept of a digital drug. 

By simply representing the pure input hash-data and mapping it  to color, geometric figures appear. By mirroring and cycling through the numbers, the structures behind the random hash string come alive. What seems as a simple noise pattern, can reveal whole worlds to explore for the ones that look closely. The fast paced representation of the hash data can evoke different feelings from relaxation to panic. 


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  Cheap, fast & powerful  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

* No customized rarities for this one. What you see is purely translated randomness from the transaction hash.

** Stare at the center closely in live mode for guaranteed breakthrough within 10. minutes

*** Use with care, do not watch when sensitive for strobing lights.



HashCrash

A Map is a score for a new world...
 
Maps is a generative script stored on the blockchain. Each mint generates a unique svg using a seed hash.
 
The initial inspiration for Maps was the idea that graphic notation can create a variety of different outputs for music.
 
This led to using sprites, a form of graphic notation that gives a sense of how things move without being animated, as the layout to explore each world. 
 
Each Map uses variable colors and patterns to generate different environments. By mixing 10 different elements, new biomes are named ( i.e. scorched forest, dune ocean, etc… )
 
These environmental elements are represented by color ( HSL ). different base and accent environments were picked to be mixed and matched freely. 
 
Maybe an NFT can be an instruction for something non-digital, too… The different colors are also matched with pantone chips so that each SVG can be easily printed.
 
The method for generating the pattern is called dithering, which is both inherently as much a digital process ( i.e. bitmapping ) as it is a physical one ( i.e. halftone ). The script uses a modified Floyd–Steinberg dither algorithm to approximate the light between each pixel and create unique patterns.

Maps

Inspired by Max Tegmark's book Life 3.0, we envisioned what it is going to look like when a general AI starts a media company for the first time. An AI able to create and stream unique content to every human watching. 

Soon though, we realized that there was something else going on.

As the work progressed it became clear that Supermental is a way to question and express much of the friction that we see in NFTs and Web3. Especially around mental health.

While we are firm believers in this new world we do have questions. And we do see red flags.

We often complain that some Web2 companies are causing depression and online addiction. And they are. But while the data and the assets might be free in Web3, are we better off when it comes to our mental health?

In the land of NFTs our online identity now consumes. Not only time, but money and assets. The mimetic status games are no longer confined to likes and followers. Now we deal in tangible value. This expansion of the mimetic scoreboard does not make it easier to live a balanced life. The benefit of being online has just increased dramatically for a lot of people. But it comes at a cost.

How do we ensure that we don’t recreate our mistakes of the past? How do we make sure that online addiction does not become worse? How do we make sure that our mental health is not sacrificed once again.

If we really do own the platforms, the assets, and the memes, it should be in our best interest to create an online environment where proactive mental health is the default UX. 

With Supermental we hope to draw attention to mental health issues in the Web3 and NFT space.

Supermental is made by a duo. My partner wants to stay anon.

Take care,
Jarl Rosenlykke

---------

Controls

- Click on the animation to change your mental state

- Press space to pause and take a deep breath

Supermental

In the year 3075 of the Second Nuclear Age, a laboratory of an unknown race of aliens was discovered on the planet Vtolmr while drilling a well of molecular oil. Its presumed purpose is to study genetic mutations of races from neighboring planets. During the laboratory investigation, 512 silicon impressions with DNA of different alien species were extracted. Modern methods of quantum analysis do not allow the deciphering of the data obtained. At this point, their value is purely aesthetic. But that may change in time.

Press 1 to 9 - change the pixel density
Press "s" - save the image

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Crypt #8

The Cyclops Group

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