This topic aims to set up a coherent timeline of events and discuss the ongoing storyline of the ARG from a narrative perspective. Discussions regarding puzzles will be limited unless it helps tie back to the greater narrative.
Replies to the topic are intended to:
- Discuss the current storyline
- Identify characters / motivations
- Offer corrections / new information for the top post.
The current state of events:
(Note: For sake of clarity, I will be referring to the system posting logs on project-skyscraper.com as the Skyscraper System and @the_architect as The Architect until / unless any other names for these characters are officially revealed.)
At the Unix Epoch, the Skyscraper System awoke, as indicated by the /origin page. Approximately 12s after this event, the /about page goes live (in the ARG’s timeline), which may point to these being the Skyscraper System’s first words.
On 13th April 2005 (In-ARG Timeline), the /Quote page is published with an image of American Poet Wallace Stevens, a title for his Poem “Sunday Morning”, followed by a short poem which appears to be an original composition, and not a work of Wallace.
- As of the time of writing, this is the only page without a log-style entry. It does not report the system status as Sleeping, nor is it a security alert. Its unknown what exactly this page means for the system.
On the 24th of March 2026, Twitter and Bluesky accounts with the name Project Skyscraper were created (which appears to be the start date of the ARG). From 24th March 2026 - 1st May 2026, the Twitter account would post strange log-like entries talking about a “Heartbeat”. It was later discovered that these posts correlated directly with logs posted to project-skyscraper.com titled sleep mode which appear to show that the Skyscraper System was “sleeping” during this period. The footer used for posts in this period reads Sky is not the limit, which is a direct tagline from Myriad (a company from Waking Titan). Additionally, the /sleep-mode page goes live on 25th March 2026, showing the Skyscraper System’s status as Nominal, which is the exact same wording as the tweets.
- This correlation between twitter posts and website logs seems to indicate that the Twitter account is directly under the control of the Skyscraper System.
On 3rd May 2026, simultaneous posts are made to the Twitter and Bluesky accounts, as well as the website, regarding a WoL being recieved and the Skyscraper System denying access. Given the nature of this post, it seems safe to assume that the Bluesky account is also directly under the control of the Skyscraper System.
The complete post correlated with this event on the website reads as follows:
sec-log-080413
memory bloc 1777795453: WoL Magic Packet blocked by System Firewall
Access denied
Full log
The full-log for this incident reports the following:
sec-log-080413-full
[5/3/2026 08:04:13 AM] Event ID 5157 – System Filtering Platform
The System Filtering Platform has blocked a connection.
Application Information:
Process ID: 16
Application Name: System
Network Information:
Direction: Inbound
Source Address: 192.168.1.100
Source Port: 49152
Destination Address: 192.168.1.255
Destination Port: 9
Protocol: 17 (UDP)
Filter Information:
Layer Name: Receive/Accept
Action: Blocked
WoL Magic Packet blocked by System Firewall
Access Denied
This log appeared before the discovery of the ARG by the community, and so is most likely not a result of player interaction. A few key details to note are as follows:
- A WoL Packet (aka Wake-on-LAN Packet) is a special network packet sent to remotely awaken machines in sleep mode (something that the Skyscraper System was in before this event).
- The WoL Packet was sent by a Local IP, indicating that whoever is attempting to awaken the Skyscraper System is on the same network as it.
- After this event, the footer for all future logs (inclusive and to-date) was changed to
System Filtering Platform activated. This may indicate that while the system isn’t awake yet, a filtering subroutine is now online. - At this point in the timeline, there doesn’t appear to be any indicator as to who sent the WoL packet.
Following this event, several tweets have been published from 5th May 2025 to date at intervals of 2/3 days, all corresponding to “security logs” on the Skyscraper website. These logs all mention a connection being detected by the Skyscraper System, and access subsequently being denied to these requests. It can be inferred that whoever sent the WoL packet is now also attempting to connect to the Skyscraper System.
On 10th May 2026 however, one second after the Skyscraper System recieved a connection request, the System published another security log detailing how the System’s internal log had been published to ETARC in the inciting thread which kicked off this entire ARG. Two days later, the system publishes another internal log explaining that ETARC’s “trust level” had been bypassed, and updates its previous log to show confusion as to why its internal logs (which it claims were unintenionally published) had been flagged and later authorized on ETARC, despite clearly being “machine-made”.
- The Skyscraper System considers this post to be an “unintended external transmission”.
- It is likely that The Architect transmitted this log to ETARC without the Skyscraper System’s knowledge. This may mean that The Architect has access to the system in some capacity, which makes them a likely candidate as the sender of the WoL packets and the one performing the connection attempts.
On 14th May 2026, u/Project_Skyscraper posts an image and a connection detected log to r/NoMansSkyTheGame and is immediately banned off the site by Reddit administrators themselves. This garners attention and is similar to what happened on ETARC. Another security log is posted on the Skyscraper website detailing the incident.
- Despite being similar in nature to The Architect’s bizarre banning incident, the username seems to suggest that this is the Skyscraper System itself, despite the subsequent security log seemingly unsure of its own security status.
On 18th May 2026, the Skyscraper System posts a surprising system security log discussing a breach into the System by an unauthorized external force. Linked in the full log is a post in the main ETARC discussion thread explaining how the Skyscraper website has two unused post tags found by using the Wordpress feed system.
- This was the first post acknowledging player interactions with the website.
- Mentioned in this full log is a
Temporal_anchor_system, which was affected by the breach. This may explain certain anomalies in the timestamps for pages, such as a standard connection detected security log with a published date of 20th May 2026 having a last-modified date of 1st May 2026 instead, making errors in the timeline diegetic.
Following this response to player interactivity, participants from across the community rushed to uncover other secrets in the website that might not be intended, such as investigating the WP-JSON Rest API to discover unused tags, categories, user websites, navigation pages and more. The system responded to this onslaught on 21st May 2026 in a security log, calling out player attempts as being disorganized brute force attacks.
- This log states that the threat has “been contained”, despite no changes being made to the REST API or other previously accessible entry points (such as the sitemap).
Running Theories
Note: This section contains assumptions and theories and should NOT be treated as canon until proven otherwise
- Going off the assumption that The Architect is attempting to connect to the Skyscraper System, their haphazard posting and behavior may be intended to get us interested in Skyscraper itself, aiding The Architect in their attempts to connect by potentially overloading the system.
) but from my general understanding, I do agree with the idea that the Skyscraper System itself appears to be the Atlas, with The Architect being someone / something in the same physical space as them (due to the WoL packet coming from a local IP) attempting to awaken the Atlas. The local IP hint makes me think that this might be an Atlas subsystem like Telamon, or perhaps even a ressurected form of the Void Mother with greater control of the system?
