On the Subject of Identification Crisis

Just like in hell.

• Hi. I’m the identification module. I used to be just one module, but now I’ve lost count. Sorry for interrupting your very fun and engaging experience with Shape Identification, but I think you would be a little surly too if your very being was shattered into 10 pieces... or was it 12? 16?
• If you’ve been irritated by the amount of identification modules published, just think about me. They’ve turned me from an enjoyable novelty to a scapegoat for bland, soulless ideas. But I’m no longer here to offer a simple recognition challenge. I’m here to torment those who dragged my name through the cold dirt.
• The creepy face, as well as any other mysterious occurrences, serve no purpose. They’re just there to unease you. Enjoy.

Creating the Encryption Grid:

Every key except the enter key, backspace key, and 8 of the letter keys has melted into my surface, but they can be used to type all 26 letters. Start by creating a column of 26 letters with A at the top, and 2 “buckets” on each side of the column. For each serial number character, in order:

• If the character is a letter and is already in a bucket, move it to the other bucket.
• If the character is a letter not already in a bucket, take it and any adjacent letters in the column. Push each one into the left bucket if its alphabetic position (A1Z26) is odd, the right bucket if it’s even.
• If the character is a number, index into the column using that number with 0 being at the top and push that letter into the bucket with fewer letters in it, or the right bucket if they are equal.

After each push, letters fall down into place to occupy empty spaces. Once all the serial number’s characters have been processed, push letters from the top of the column going down into alternating buckets, starting with the left. However, if during this step a bucket has 13 letters in it, push every other letter into the other bucket.

Sort the contents of each bucket alphabetically, then use them to create a 2×13 with the left bucket giving the top row.

Excluding the two letters in the middle column of the grid, six 2×2 squares with no overlapping letters can be made from the grid. My keyboard will contain one letter from each of these squares, as well as the two middle letters. To encrypt an English letter into a string that is typable on my keyboard, three letters are used:

• The first letter is the letter on my keyboard which can be found in the same square as the original letter.
• The second letter is the top-middle letter if the original letter can be found in the left bucket, and the bottom-middle letter if it can be found in the right.
• The third letter is the top-middle letter if the original letter is on the left half of its square, the bottom-middle letter if it’s on the right.
• However, if the original letter is one of the middle letters, it is encrypted by simply repeating itself three times.

Identifying and Inputting answers:

Like other identification modules, I have three stages. However, upon pressing the enter key, I will display an image originating from one of the following:
Morse Identification
Boozleglyph Identification
Plant Identification (rearranged)
Pickup Identification (rearranged)
Emotiguy Identification (condensed)
Ars Goetia Identification
Mii Identification
Customer Identification
Spongebob Birthday Identification
(In Morse Identification, the screen flashes Morse Code using two colors, with white being the off color.)

The three stages from Shape Identification played a sound effect from my respective stage’s module when the enter key was initially pressed. While not necessary to solve me, they may aid the searching process if recognized.

• If a letter in Morse Code is shown, take its letter’s corresponding word from the NATO phonetic alphabet.
• Otherwise, if a boozleglyph in set A is shown, take the name of the disease that corresponds to its letter in Dr. Doctor.
• Otherwise, if a boozleglyph in set B is shown, take the name of the color that corresponds to its letter in Phosphorescence.
• Otherwise, if a boozleglyph in set C is shown, take the name of the player that corresponds to its letter in Phones.
• Otherwise, simply take the name of the displayed image as it appears in its respective manual.

Take whatever word you got from the previous step, put every letter in uppercase, and remove any whitespace, punctuation marks, and digits. Then, take the first n letters of this new string, where n is my current stage (within Identification Crisis, not including prior stages of Shape Identification) plus the number of letters in the serial number. If n is larger than the string’s length, take the whole string.

Then, Caesar shift this string forwards a number of times obtained from the table below, using the module the displayed image comes from and the shape displayed in the respective stage of Shape Identification.

Morse	1	19	6	21	16	3	0	12
Boozleglyph	25	5	0	6	14	17	20	15
Plant	8	10	16	19	22	11	4	0
Pickup	18	15	1	0	7	19	25	14
Emotiguy	0	4	3	15	21	5	20	1
Ars Goetia	8	19	2	10	0	17	22	9
Mii	0	18	3	23	2	13	17	11
Customer	24	17	10	24	16	0	23	18
Spongebob	13	0	5	11	8	12	7	20

Type the shifted response into me using the encryption grid and press the enter key again to submit. An incorrect response will strike, and the stage’s corresponding shape will briefly flash. Upon a completed third stage, I will revert to Shape Identification, having been forced into a tamer state. Correctly input one final shape to solve me.