this post was submitted on 19 Jul 2026
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The Button

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The Button is a social experiment game where the objective is to press a button.

Yes. You read that right.

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In case anyone wants to talk about The Button or Season 4 outside of the game. Plus, will take any new ideas here too please :)

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[–] PatrickYaa@feddit.org 8 points 1 day ago (2 children)
[–] Dave 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Whoo that was fun, and finished so unexpectedly.

Now can someone explain all about the puzzle?

[–] PatrickYaa@feddit.org 5 points 1 day ago (2 children)

you start with the Note. A morse code appears at the top of the fishing interface. The morse code tells you: atlas hail. you type /atlas hail in the chat and get a new message, to watch for the lantern, it appears every third hour. (I would assume that is based on UTC, it was just there when I went fishing, I was lucky apparently). The lantern sings you a song (another morse code). [I don't actually remember what I did with that morse code,, something is missing here] Then you get a text in Base32 that you have to translate, which leads you to the bronze key. The bronze key has an inscription, which is a keyed caesar chiffre, or Vigenère Chiffre . The inventor of that chiffre was Vigenère, which is the key to the chiffre and gives you the final instructions (don't remember this part again). Then you get another message where you have to decide to pay it forward or get some reward for yourself. The people that kept the reward (some increase in fishing chance?) were marked with a candle next to their name.

[–] Dave 4 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Thanks! I only got as far as the base 32 message to watch for the lantern.

I never saw the lantern and spent a lot of time in the game. Did anyone grab a screen shot of it? I also played with sound off so might have missed it if the clue was audio.

[–] MarauderIIC@lemmy.zip 2 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

Yeah I never managed to see the lantern either - that's where I had to stop. I was assuming the lantern was local time. And I couldn't manage to get on on the hour except once anyway. Womp

[–] Dave 1 points 35 minutes ago

I had assuned the lantern would show for the full hour every third hour? If it was a shorter window that might explain why I didn't see it!

[–] Deebster@infosec.pub 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It appeared on the top-right of the fishing window, but I didn't screen shot it, sorry.

[–] Dave 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I feel like I might have seen it, I remember some icon that was only there sometimes. But clicking it did nothing. If I was supposed to listen, well, the audio was off 🤷

[–] Deebster@infosec.pub 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I think after clicking it it disappeared and you got a new note instead (the icon on the top bar lit up).

[–] Dave 2 points 1 day ago

Ok in that case it probably wasn't it.

[–] Deebster@infosec.pub 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The morse code said "FOUR CREWS TONES ASK THE DEX FOR THE ORDER". I don't think it was very helpful, since you needed to put the tones in order in a new section and you didn't need the morse to tell you! I don't know how you were meant to figure out the order, I just brute forced it.

The key to the Vigenère cypher was "atlas" and gave "OPEN FORGOTTEN TIDE" which was a new chat tab.

[–] PatrickYaa@feddit.org 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

AH, I remember. The order was given by the appearance of that animal in the fishing log / almanac (the "dex")

[–] Deebster@infosec.pub 2 points 1 day ago

Ah, I see - dex as in codex. It's weird that you had to figure that out, but then the final puzzle told you exactly how to solve it (first animal in the almanac = A, etc).

[–] Deebster@infosec.pub 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

so long, and ⬆

[–] Alfredolin@sopuli.xyz 4 points 1 day ago

u/comradepupivy@lemmy.ml did you ruin the town while I was sleeping?

[–] freeman@feddit.org 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

great, addictive game! what was the ultimate reason it stopped? Did the timer run out? We had so many presses left...

[–] Demigodrick@lemmy.zip 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The heart was corrupted and people spammed the button to death :(

[–] freeman@feddit.org 5 points 1 day ago (3 children)

aah, as I suspected, the reds probably

[–] tarball@lemmy.zip 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

hey, I was on the red team and all I wanted was to collect fish and scraps

[–] Firnin@feddit.org 3 points 1 day ago

I won't stand for this slander of my fellow crabs!

[–] Dave 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

There was hardly anyone online and not that much earlier the button came within a second of hitting 0. Plus you can see the final press was not by a red player! And that player did a lot of presses while the heart was corrupt.

You should be able to tell from the replay that's now available on there, but it keeps freezing up for me. O can only see the ending which had two reds and the purple all furiously clicking.

[–] PatrickYaa@feddit.org 4 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Is there a full list what each symbol next to the name meant? The list at the end of the leaderboard didn't include the candles for example, or the anchor.

[–] Dave 4 points 1 day ago

According to another comment here, the candle was to show who finished the puzzle quest thing.

[–] Demigodrick@lemmy.zip 1 points 1 day ago

I have added this to the main pinned end of season post :)

[–] Fleece@feddit.uk 4 points 1 day ago

Thank you for the fun experience. Definitely best fishing game.

[–] spicehoarder@lemmy.zip 5 points 1 day ago

This is the best season so far. Took me a day and a half to finally get into the fishing mechanic. But it's really fun. Thanks!

[–] almost1337@lemmy.zip 5 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Minor UI annoyance... At the start of a sea monster battle the health bar has a nice red to green gradient. However, as the health depletes the bar shrinks but the gradient remains red to green (image just scaled down). I think it would be better if a mask was applied over the health bar instead, so that there isn't a tiny green tip when the boss is almost dead.

[–] Demigodrick@lemmy.zip 3 points 3 days ago

this should be fixed soon :)

[–] rumba@lemmy.zip 7 points 3 days ago (1 children)

one of the participants in my group is deaf, audio puzzle could have used a vu meter.

[–] Snoopy@piefed.social 1 points 3 days ago

Oh thank for relaying it :)

[–] almost1337@lemmy.zip 5 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I still haven't gotten the wire needed for my boat after 124 casts... some bad luck protection would be nice.

[–] almost1337@lemmy.zip 5 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

Finally got my boat, but another point of feedback - I had a voyage event pop up over an active cast and subsequently lost the fish because I couldn't tap to catch it.

Edit: same thing happened with a sea monster spawning during a cast.

[–] Deebster@infosec.pub 2 points 3 days ago

Same, it would be nice if new ones popped up behind the old ones, or next to them for larger screens.

[–] its_prolly_fine@sh.itjust.works 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I can't get past the puzzle. When am i supposed to tell atlas I'm listening. I'm so confused

[–] almost1337@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Just type /atlas listen in chat

[–] Macallan@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I've done that and nothing happens

[–] almost1337@lemmy.zip 1 points 1 day ago

What is your most recent note?