Thank you for your puzzle feedback. My limited testing prior reiterated many of the comments you had expressed here. The “command line” app idea is interesting. If I recreate the game, I will include a hint system, perhaps with that theming. The “no hints” philosophy is a holdover from the game’s limited time budget, and also them not being very common in ARG / CTF games.
I had deliberately overtuned the puzzles to increase their difficulty relative to the game length, especially with puzzle 008 acting as a hard roadblock, with its alternative solution being rather cryptic. As far as I can tell, nobody who has played the game has actually solved it without using the spoiler file. I broadly consider this a success, but I understand that my puzzle design is inconsistent and could definitely use less “moon logic” elements.
So, thank you for reading the story, and for appreciating the QT mark joke /)