Sabotages and Clues

Season One

The Background of the Poke-Mole

Take yourself back to late June 2003. I was thinking about The Mole, the popular gameshow. Both myself and Psythor are big fans of it. Then an idea struck me: what if we could do a PUK version of The Mole! Using members as contestants! No. It would be far too complicated, and if the Mole blabbed then....... the whole thing would fall apart. Psythor came up with the great idea of a reality show using the Pokemon. Yes it would be a good idea, but Psythor can't just pass decisions by himself, he needs to consult the admins before making a decision. So it took me a couple of days to come up with a basic draft for the whole series. I showed it to Psythor and he discussed it with the admins. It was agreed: The Mole: PUK (as it was called then) would go ahead. It took me a further 2 weeks of planning until the whole series was written, complete with clues, sabotages and challenges. It then took a couple of days to write episode 1. It looked like, on Saturday 26th July, 2003, the Poke-Mole (as I'd started to call it- the name eventually stuck) was going up. Ah.... a problem. It was decided then that the series would go up when all the episodes had been written. :S So it took me a further 3 weeks to write all the remaining episodes, and a special "Meet the Contestants" to go online before the first episode. So it was done. It needed a bit of messing around with structures on pages but it was done. It still needed coding, but Psythor is a busy man. After me reminding him a couple of hundred times, by Xmas 2003, it was ready to go online.

The Sabotages

Staryu's main job as the Poke-Mole, was to stop the team from earning money. These were the times Staryu didn't exactly help...........

Challenge 1: The sabotages started in the very first challenge.

Quote from Episode 1:

Staryu: It is OK really. It's just the jumping out thats a bit..... you know. You really enjoy it after that. If I had the chance to do it again I would, but no-one's going to force you to jump. Please though, if you can, jump.

Staryu had previously said, after being the first to jump, that it was terrifying, but worth it in the end. This is an attempt of making the other contestants scared to jump, but dressing it up to try and seem kind. Sneaky.

Challenge 2: This challenge not only contained sabotage, but also a potential clue. The contestants had to battle against an Onix. Staryu went up and lost on purpose. There is one particular way this could have been spotted, and that is that Staryu is a water type. Water types are super effective against rock types. Staryu however, failed to use any water attacks.

Challenge 6: Staryu started off by trying to casually answer the first question wrong. But someone else got it right. Then came the second question (the one the team got wrong):

Quote from Episode 2:

Staryu: Yeah i've got a suspicion it's LV 45, but I'm not 100% sure.

That was the wrong answer, but Staryu cleverly managed to get the team to go for it, without (in my opinion) seeming too blatant.

Challenge 9:

Quote from Episode 3:

Staryu: Go forward. Now turn right. Yeah. Left, LEFT. Forwards, forwards, STOP. There's a guard behind the hedge in front of you. Go left, slowly. NO TURN AROUND!

Presenter: But it's too late. The path Wobbuffet was taking led to the other guard patrolling, and Wobbuffet got tagged.

If you thought about it carefully, you might have realised that Staryu was purposely directing Wobbuffet towards the guards.

Challenge 12:

Quote from Episode 4:

Staryu: What grade Pokeblock, can be made from the berry which grows on Mirage Island?

A little research needed for this one. If you look carefully at the "Two Secret Islands" page, you'll find that this information isn't given :P.

Challenge 13:

Quote from Episode 4:

Staryu: I'm really disappointed with myself. My trick was very similar to another one, but I still should have been able to tell the difference.

Very simple sabotage: get it wrong on purpose.

Challenge 15:

Quote from Episode 5:

Staryu: There were some very steep hills, and I fell down one. I bumped into Wobbuffet who stopped me from falling further, and thankfully stopped my egg from breaking. But we lost anyway which was a shame.

Wobbuffet: I don't know how my egg got broken, but I'm sure many people will now be very suspicious of me.

This was probably Staryu's most blatant piece of sabotage. The slip was on purpose, obviously aiming to break Wobbuffet's egg.

Challenge 16:

Quote from Episode 6:

Vulpix: I can't believe Staryu missed the Dugtrio, but we still earned £10,000 anyway.

Another clever piece of sabotage. Staryu caught quite a lot of Diglett, but purposely was lucky enough to miss the Dugtrio.

Challenge 19:

Another sabotage containing a possible clue (see below). Staryu jumped from 5m. This is contributing to the teams efforts, but lessens the chance of completing the challenge.

Challenge 22:

Another simple piece of sabotage: Staryu lost again on purpose.

The Clues

In order to spot the identity of Staryu, various clues were left through out the series. Hardly ANY of them were spotted, and all guesses made were to do with the sabotages. You really do make life hard for yourself's don't you?

1. The first ever clue was left in the forums. It said: "The Poke-Mole is not one of a kind". This is true. Staryu begins with "S". So do Skitty and Snorunt.

2. I advertised that there would be clues on my forums and website. That was true. My site had a secret page:

http://www.geocities.com/puk_rules/whoisthepoke-mole.html

Also, on my forum news faders, there were 6 odd capital letters in one of the paragraphs: S,T,A,R,Y and U. Do I need to say any more?

3. At the eliminations on some episodes, the contestants were all shown in alphabetical order. The only Pokemon not in order was Staryu, who would have fitted in if you'd used the word "Mole".

4. The Poke-Mole was always referred to as "it". Staryu was the only genderless Pokemon in the game.

5. Quote from Episode 4:

As "Tar Yuletide" was such a success, we have all decided to invite you all to a party. That includes the Poke-Mole. The party will be held downstairs tonight, and will begin at 9pm. Please let down your hair, and just enjoy yourself. See you later.

Look at it again:

As "Tar Yuletide" was such a success, we have all decided to invite you all to a party. That includes the Poke-Mole. The party will be held downstairs tonight, and will begin at 9pm. Please let down your hair, and just enjoy yourself. See you later.

As you can see, it really does include the Poke-Mole.

6. Quote from Episode 6:

Staryu: I knew both the questions anyway, but excemptions are really important this late in the game. I'm pretty sure I know who the Poke-Mole is, and I've suspected this person from around Day 1.

By thinking about it, you may have realised that Staryu was in fact referring to itself.

7. Take yourself back, to when I mentioned that a clue was linked to a sabotage before. The "High Cliffs" game. Staryu said it was proud of jumping from five metres, as it was scared of heights. If you look at Staryu's Profile, on "Meet the Contestants", you'll see that it doesn't mention that Staryu is scared of heights.

8. A trivial clue here:

Quote from Episode 7:

Presenter: Staryu, are you the Poke-Mole?

Staryu: One of those 2 is lying, because I'm not the Poke-Mole.

This is exactly the same answer that Bill gave on the episode before the final on the American series "The Mole: The Next Betrayal". Bill turned out to be the mole.

9. Go back to episode 2, to the "JailBreak" game. The two correct conbinations were 19201182521 and 782798. Take a careful look at each number:

19201182521 = 19 20 1 18 25 21 (if a=1, z=26 etc, then these numbers spell out Staryu).

Take a closer look at the second combination:

782798 = 7 8 2 7 9 8 (This spells out Staryu on a phone).

10. Look at the opening paragraph from Episode 5:

Presenter: Natu scored the lowest on the quiz, and so was eliminated last episode. Do YOU still have your suspect in the game? Have YOU spotted any clues? Do YOU know who the Poke-Mole is?

The emphasis on the "You" is obviously is a referral to StarYU.

11. At the elimination of Episode 3, the following note was on the wall.

"oh yes oh yes
i will beat
you again! hey?
beware the tar!
you ask why?
HA HA HA! at the end you
will see who I - the Poke-Mole is"

Now look at it again.

"oh yes oh yes
i will beat
you again! hey?
beware the tar!
you ask why?
HA HA HA! at the end you
will see who I - the Poke-Mole is"

As you can see, at the end, you really do see who the Poke-Mole is.

Did YOU spot the Poke-Mole?

Whether you did or didn't, these people did:

1st- Irrevilent (Episode 2)
2nd- 151 (Episode 2)
3rd- NK-u3r10 (Episode 7)
Well done to all of you! Apart from Irrevilent and 151, who left me swearing at my computer screen. Both gave the minimum answers that I was accepting. NK-u3r10 actually sent me a long list of reasons, and was by far the person who would have won if the reasons were the deciders. Still, Irrevilent was first to submit a correct answer (only by 40 minutes!), and so is the "official" Poke-Mole Champion of Series 1. Thanks to everyone who played! :D