Maximillian Laumeister

Achievement Hints

Here are some hints to go with this website’s achievements, in case you’re stuck on any! The hints and answers are hidden behind spoiler tags - click them to reveal.

The Adventure Begins

Visit the Achievements page

Hint I'm not sure how you got to this hints page without visiting the achievements page first, but maybe try poking around a bit for it?
Answer Click here to go to the Achievements page!

Pioneer

Visit 5 unique pages on maxlaumeister.com

Answer Click around on the site a bit! Start with the navigation menu up top.

Pathfinder

Visit 10 unique pages on maxlaumeister.com

Answer Keep clicking! Remember, each blog article counts as a unique page, too.

Become a hacker

Find the “secret” hacker terminal

Hint You can get to the hacker terminal from the "xtra" page in the navigation up top!
Answer Click here to go to the hacker terminal!

Collect the keys

Find and collect all 5 colored keys

Hint On several pages of this site, there are little colored keys you can click on to collect. I promise they're not buried too deep!
Answer The keys are located on each of the main pages of this site: Press, Software, Orchestra, Articles, Contact. Find them in the navigation menu up top!

Astute

“Read” 3 blog posts

Hint I also call my blog posts "articles".
Answer Click "Articles" in the top navigation menu. Then visit three of the blog posts in the list. No need to actually read them for the achievement!

Cheater

Attempt the konami code

Hint This is a classic arcade cheat code that you can type into your keyboard. It works on most of this site's main pages, including this one. Go for it!
Answer Click on this paragraph to make sure that this web page will receive your keyboard input. Then, using your keyboard's arrow keys and letters, type ↑ ↑ ↓ ↓ ← → ← → b a

Sourcerer

Find the secret in the source code

Hint Use the "View Source" feature of your web browser!
Answer In the source code of most pages on this website, I've included the following little snippet. From the last line of this snippet, copy the URL of the secret and paste it into your browser's address bar. Or, just click here! 
<!-- Hello humans and web crawlers, my name is: -->
<meta name="author" content="Maximillian Laumeister">
<!-- I created this site using: -->
<meta name="generator" content="Jekyll">
<!-- You are currently viewing the source code of the page: -->
<title>Maximillian Laumeister | Personal Website</title>
[...]
<!-- Happy surfing! Or if you're a web crawler, then happy crawling! -->

<!-- Oh, and here's that secret! https://www.maxlaumeister.com/true-sourceror/ -->

Header Hero

Find the secret in the HTTP headers

Hint HTTP headers are little bits of information that are transmitted along with a web page, but are usually invisible to the user. Look up how to use your web browser to check the HTTP headers of this web page (or any other page on my site, they all have the same secret)! Alternatively, there are some HTTP header checking tools available online where you can just paste in the URL of a web page and it will show you the HTTP headers for it.
Answer Here are some of the HTTP headers from this page. Check the one that's second-to-last, called "x-achievement". Copy and paste that URL into your web browser to collect the achievement! Or, just click here! 
cache-control: max-age=600
content-encoding: br
content-security-policy: frame-ancestors 'self'
content-type: text/html; charset=utf-8
referrer-policy: strict-origin-when-cross-origin
server: cloudflare
strict-transport-security: max-age=31536000; includeSubDomains; preload
vary: Accept-Encoding
x-achievement: https://www.maxlaumeister.com/soccer/
x-content-type-options: nosniff

Is this Wordpress??

Attempt to log into and hack this website

Hint Wordpress is the #1 most popular web hosting software in the world. And every Wordpress site has a standard URL where the owner can go to to log in. Navigate to that URL on maxlaumeister.com!
Answer The url is https://www.maxlaumeister.com/wp-admin/`, but I also accept a bunch of variations to the end of the URL including /admin/, /login/, and /wp-(anything). Click here to visit the correct page!

Consolation

Open the console and type “gimme()”

Hint You'll need to open your web browser's JavaScript console somehow...
Answer If you're using Google Chrome, the shortcut is Option+J (Mac) or Control+Shift+J (Windows, Linux, ChromeOS). Then, click next to the ">" prompt in the console and type "gimme()" and hit your Enter key.

That Was Pointless

Click 100 times on the same page

Hint It works on this page, too!
Answer Keep clicking! Pick an empty, neutral spot on the page so that you're not clicking on anything important.

Animal Spirit

Use the address bar to visit /(my favorite animal)/

Hint I'm a big fan of canines.
Answer I love wolves! Though lately, I've been appreciating coyotes a lot too. The key is to visit https://www.maxlaumeister.com/wolf/. Click here to visit the page and claim the achievement!

One with Nothing

Get your first 404 Page Not Found error

Hint A 404 error occurs when you try to visit a URL that doesn't exist. Yet again, try fiddling with your address bar!
Answer Let's pick some random URL that definitely doesn't exist on my website. Something like https://www.maxlaumeister.com/some-random-stuff-that-doesnt-exist/. Click here to visit that nonexistent page! Hopefully nobody will mind that I intentionally included a dead link here.

Marbles? Puzzles?

Find the tribute page to my favorite 90s game

Hint You can get to the tribute page from the "xtra" page in the navigation up top!
Answer Click here to visit my tribute page for the 90s game Marble Drop!

Can You Dig It?

Find the secret DNS TXT record

Hint DNS is the internet name system that translates names like "maxlaumeister.com" into a server IP address that your web browser can connect to. To find this secret, you'll have to look up the DNS records for maxlaumeister.com. If you're on Linux or Mac OS, you'll likely have a command-line DNS lookup tool like `dig` available to you. There are also plenty of tools online that will look up DNS TXT records for you, just an internet search away!
Answer Here are the DNS TXT records you get back when you query the DNS TXT records for maxlaumeister.com. (If you're using the "dig" tool, you would run "dig maxlaumeister.com TXT"). 
maxlaumeister.com. 300 IN TXT "v=spf1 include:icloud.com ~all"
maxlaumeister.com. 300 IN TXT "achievement=https://www.maxlaumeister.com/dug/"
maxlaumeister.com. 300 IN TXT "apple-domain=BFqhtQmPnsMwIaxK"
maxlaumeister.com. 300 IN TXT "google-site-verification=E55I1nc1XQkSawY7yvn5LcVSBzORI2We1kMihUWKUH4"
maxlaumeister.com. 300 IN TXT "openpgp4fpr:790b1cfee7d457d7f33ef0b97b8c6295c1be6abe"
The second record has the achievement URL in it! Copy and paste it into your browser's address bar. Or, just click here.

Searching For Love

Everyone’s searching for love. Can you find it?

This is a tough one, so you get two hints!

Hint 1 You'll have to search this website! I think I left a search function somewhere, but ironically it's a bit buried...
Hint 2 Click the "xtra" page in the top navigation bar. The Extras page links to the Search page! Or, just click here to be taken directly to the Search page! But what to type in the search box...?
Answer Once you're on this website's Search page, type in "love" and click "Search". The first result will take you to the page that grants you the achievement!

Paper Star-io

Collect the hidden star piece on the home page.

Hint This achievement is a reference to one of my favorite games, Paper Mario for the Nintendo 64. Throughout the game, there are hidden flip-panels on the ground that Mario has to ground-pound near to collect a star piece. This achievement is only collectable on the front page of this website, and it requires a device that has a mouse cursor that can hover without clicking (like a laptop or desktop computer with a mouse or trackpad).
Answer In the lower left corner of the front page of this website, there's a hidden panel that will reveal itself if you hover your mouse cursor near it. So try moving your mouse around slowly near the bottom left corner of the page, scanning for the panel! Once you find the hidden panel, click it (and then click on the revealed star piece) to be awarded the achievement! As stated in the hint, this achievement requires a device that has a mouse cursor that can hover without clicking (like a laptop or desktop computer with a mouse or trackpad).

In Your Thoughtspace

Read about Miku the bird-fox.

Hint Miku is extra! I added her to this website after I created most of the main content.
Answer Click the "xtra" page in the navigation up top. Then, find the "Meet Miku" link. Alternatively, click here to visit Miku's page!

And that’s all, folks! If you’re still stuck even after reading an achievement’s hint and answer, that means I haven’t properly done my job to explain it. Drop me a line so I can edit this page to make the answers more clear!

Perhaps now you’d like to go back to the achievements page, or the website’s home page?