Trial Two and the Zangief Magic Eye

For the Gnome's Minneapolis quest during Year Two, we planned out a grand adventure ahead of time. Complex as the final product became, it was originally envisioned as an even longer-term event of an even more epic scale. Some alternate agendas for the weekend included inviting Kolin to an abandoned warehouse to fight off people in robot suits, staging a fake hijacking on the cross-country bus he was on, and trapping him in a haunted mansion with only his guidebook from the future to see him through the night. Budget constraints proved restricting, however.

In the end, we took Year Two as an opportunity to construct a series of puzzles that we, were we in Kolin's position, would like to try to solve ourselves. We really liked the idea that people from the Future, tasked with creating a series of "trials" for someone in the early 2000s, would do their homework and try to relate those tests to the appropriate time period. For example, let's say I'm from the distant Future. What do I think the "primitive" people of 2003 consider the height of technology? A TI-82 calculator, of course! What's the most popular visual medium of the day? Why, it must be these curious "Magic Eye" puzzles! Surely, these are the most relevant ways to communicate our message, I would say, twirling my Cy-beard.

Both the TI-83 calculator and the magic eye puzzles were made by a long-time acquaintance, one Mark Newman. Newman has a knack for...unique technical skills, so naturally we turned to him when we needed a Magic Eye puzzle made entirely out from images of Street Fighter II's Russian wrestler, Zangief. Pictures of Zangief were a common occurrence throughout the entire project; "Zane Figiam", Kolin's son from the future, was an anagram of "I am Zangief".

This is the original file used to as part of the Second Trial. Kolin brought home the print-out included in his Trial clue and put a scan on his site, but many internet viewers have commented that it's hard to spot the hidden image on a scan of print-out. If you're one of these people, your long wait is finally over: this original image is much easier. But unless you grew up in Minneapolis driving past Cedar Lake all the time, you probably have no idea what the hidden image is.

SPOILERS AHEAD! It's the "Loch Ness" sculpture next to Cedar Lake in Minneapolis: http://www.ackerberg.com/art/stillman-lochness.html
The clue leading to Trial Three was cleverly hidden under the Loch Ness, as seen in this original video where Gnome and Shags uncover it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pbet3XySpb8

The underlying lesson of "Trial Two" was that Zangief (Zane Figiam) was guiding the Velocity Gnome to the site of the very first robot to gain sentience (the "Loch Ness" sculpture), leading to the inevitable Robocalypse. Kolin was to witness a tragic irony first-hand: even though this robot was to become the genesis of humanity's downfall, mankind would be helpless to stop it, for it is a piece of art -- and of course you can't destroy art; that's censorship!! Ah, the hubris of the human race!

I'm pretty sure Kolin appreciated that nuance.