Riddle

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Trials Evolution : The Secret ARG That Spans a Century

When Trials Evolution launched in 2012, most players saw it for what it appeared to be: a fast-paced, physics-driven motorcycle platformer with over-the-top crashes and chaotic charm.

But for a dedicated few, it was something more.
Much more.

Beneath the dirt trails and flaming wreckage, Trials Evolution concealed one of the most intricate and long-term Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) ever created—an international treasure hunt encrypted in ciphers, encoded in soundwaves, and quite literally buried in the real world.

And its final chapter is scheduled to unfold in the year 2113.

This is the true story of how a motorcycle game dared to hide a century-spanning mystery in plain sight.

The Puzzle Begins

Shortly after Trials Evolution hit digital shelves, players began noticing strange words and symbols hidden in certain tracks. These weren’t mere Easter eggs—they were clearly part of something larger.

A pattern began to emerge: fragments of a message scattered throughout the game, waiting to be uncovered.

Once assembled, the message appeared to be gibberish—until players realized it was encrypted using a Vigenère cipher, a classic code that requires a keyword to decode.

But the keyword wasn’t simply lying around. To find it, players had to solve a much deeper in-game puzzle.

The Fibonacci Sphere and the Hidden Key

The cipher’s key was hidden in a bonus level called « Moneyball ». Unlike the rest of the game, this level put players in control of a metal sphere, not a motorcycle. The clue? Use the Konami Code—a legendary cheat sequence in gaming history.

Upon inputting the code, a secret room appeared, unveiling a new kind of challenge. Players had to trace a Fibonacci spiral—a mathematical curve following the sequence (1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8…)—using precise movement mechanics.

Successfully completing it revealed the long-sought keyword.

This wasn’t just a cipher. It was a multi-layered riddle requiring:

• 3D physics manipulation

• Recognition of mathematical patterns

• Decryption of classical encryption

With the keyword in hand, the community decrypted the original message.
And things got even stranger.

A Woman Sings in the Night

The decrypted instructions led players back to a specific level. Using a designated bike and riding to an exact location, they input a sequence of timed button presses.

The game’s sky darkened. A ghostly woman appeared, singing a haunting melody.

Players recorded the audio and ran it through spectrogram analysis—a tool that turns sound into visual patterns. Hidden in the waveform was Morse code.

The message urged players to investigate other in-game songs. They did—and found that multiple tracks contained Morse signals, all pointing to a mysterious website:

fixedpatternencodes.com

fixedpatternencodes.com: The Secret Site

The website featured 26 unique illustrations, each representing a famous figure from science, art, or music—Darwin, Tesla, Newton, Beethoven, and more.

Each illustration matched a unique symbol, forming a custom alphabet.

By decoding a final message using these symbols and the data gathered in-game, players uncovered a cryptic phrase:

« Big Freeze will not completely end. »

This poetic line refers to the heat death of the universe, a theoretical scenario where entropy reaches its maximum.

But even this wasn’t the end.

Entering the phrase on the site revealed something astonishing.

Real-World Coordinates

The website updated to reveal four GPS locations across the globe:

• San Francisco, USA – A public park

• Sydney, Australia – Under a bridge

• Bath, England – A cemetery

• Helsinki, Finland – Inside a Finnish gaming magazine’s office

Players visited each location. At each site, they discovered a buried metal box, each containing:

• A unique metal key

• A plaque etched with the inscription:

  “It seems that it started an eternity ago.”

But the most important message was engraved on the back:

“At noon on the first Saturday of August 2113, one of these five keys will open the box under the Eiffel Tower.”

The Fifth Key and the Box in Paris

Only four keys had been found—but the inscription clearly mentioned five.

The fifth was eventually uncovered in Trials Fusion (2014). By earning a hidden achievement and using the level editor in a specific way, players triggered the appearance of a digital fifth key—a backup in case one of the physical ones is ever lost.

RedLynx, the studio behind Trials Evolution, confirmed the ARG’s authenticity. Creative director Antti Ilvessuo even met with a player beneath the Eiffel Tower to finalize arrangements for the mysterious box.

There is, allegedly, a real box buried beneath the Eiffel Tower.
And it can only be opened in August 2113, with one of the five keys.

Why It Matters

The Trials Evolution ARG isn’t just a hidden game secret—it’s a conceptual art piece, challenging how we think about storytelling, legacy, and time.

It required players to:

• Solve encrypted messages using classical ciphers

• Trace Fibonacci spirals with in-game physics

• Analyze sound files for Morse code

• Travel the world in search of buried artifacts

• Accept that the final step may not be completed in their lifetime

It dares to ask:

Can a video game create a mystery so profound that it survives its own era?

The final act of this ARG is not for us, but for our descendants—or perhaps even strangers, stumbling across clues left behind by long-forgotten gamers.

On the first Saturday of August, 2113, someone might finally unlock the box beneath the Eiffel Tower.

And when they do, they’ll finish a puzzle that began over a century earlier—
with a motorcycle and a spark of curiosity.

Here is a summary video of the Evo riddle, by Speed :

Coming soon. If you would like to contribute to writing this section, click here.

Coming soon. If you would like to contribute to writing this section, click here.