Our The Message from Deep Space guide will show you how to progress the main story from humble beginnings through the complex alien puzzles. You start the game trying to translate alien signals alongside your team members, Bautista and Akers. The game rarely holds your hand, so you will face difficult math, geometry, and chemistry problems.
We actively gathered these solutions from community discussions. Again, remember that many errors come from incorrect formatting rather than wrong puzzle answers.
What we cover:
Transmission Walkthroughs and Hints
You will find the game heavily relies on math and logic early on. We broke down the hardest transmissions in the game below. We provide hints to guide you, as the aliens require very specific answers.
Early Game Puzzles
- Transmission 16: You might feel confused if you think Signal -2 is a Fibonacci function. It acts as a separator. You can derive the meaning of Signal -5 by looking at what goes before and after it in existing examples.
- Transmission 30: This puzzle asks you to find what follows logically in the sequence. You do not need to do a math operation here. The output ends at Signal -2 (AND), which is intentional.
- Transmission 61 (Group 8): You need to continue the sequence pairs. The correct answer is “4 -3 7”. If the compiler throws an error, try adding a newline at Signal -2, and avoid putting a newline at Signal -3. You can also add a space next to Signal -13.
Geometry Puzzles (Where the Full Game Begins)
- Transmission 75: This puzzle introduces point coordinates. Every Signal -15 is paired with a Signal -14 with a number in the middle. You should think about how multiple numbers are used together in math.
- Transmission 86: This transmission intentionally breaks a pattern. It does not use Signal -20. You should look around the newly added References menu for a hint.
- Transmission 87: This puzzle plays off Transmission 86 and shares structure with Transmission 85. Check the word you’ve defined for Signal -20, and compare the formula here to the one from Transmission 86, the connection between them is the key.
- Transmission 89: You might enter more information than the compiler wants. You need to adjust the way you format the answer.
- Transmission 106: By this point you also have the word ‘object,’ covering points, lines, shapes, and numbers alike. The new word this transmission asks for is Signal -23, community consensus lands on ‘amount,’ though some players initially read it as ‘missing’ (the missing piece from a group). If ‘amount’ doesn’t click, try thinking of it as the count of objects in a pattern.
Formatting Traps and Logic Statements
A few of the entries below (110, 124, 126, 136, 137) reflect one player’s close reading of the puzzle design rather than a confirmed answer, so treat them as interpretive guidance.
- Transmission 110: You might notice the aliens simplified the area formula to use PI instead of TAU.
- Transmission 115: You must represent a fraction. The game gives you an example of how to represent 1/3 using Signal -25. You do not need to round the number.
- Transmission 116: The game wants the answer formatted exactly as (x0, x1).
- Transmission 120: The top of the message tells you exactly what X0 and X1 are. You must include Signal -14 at the start and Signal -15 at the end.
- Transmission 124: The “NOT” operator acts as a prefix boolean logic operand here. It means the “opposite of”.
- Transmission 126: You will notice the logic operands are infix here, even though the arithmetic operands were postfix previously.
- Transmission 136: The game uses a logical inclusive-OR to specify answer options.
- Transmission 137: You cannot apply the logical AND to “TRUE” and “Statement 2” to form another equality with “Statement 1”.
- Transmission 139: You should not overcomplicate this puzzle. Signal -31 is not XOR. Signal -36 acts like “thus”. The exact formatted answer you need is: -14 -27 -3 -27 -3 -28 -15.
- Transmission 145: You need to look at the relationship from Transmission 144, which was greater than or equal to. This is just a formatting issue.
- Transmission 147: You must compare two different shapes. Shape 0 is not larger or smaller than Shape 1. This means they have the exact same area or circumference, and they share the same “frequency -22”. The “NOT” operator acts as a postfix here.
- Transmission 237: Multiple players report this transmission displaying inconsistent atom counts for Molecule 5 (some see “2 Atom 8,” others see “3 Atom 1, Atom 7”) after a recent patch, and the numbers as shown don’t add up chemically no matter how you approach the equation. This looks like a text bug introduced by the update rather than something you’re misreading. If your version shows Molecule 5 as “2 Atom 8,” the puzzle solves cleanly. If you’re seeing the newer text, treat it as a known issue and check the steam discussions before assuming you’re missing something.
Advanced Translations and Chemistry
- Transmission 154 & 155: You will face a base-10 conversion bug here. An answer of “5 1 2” is not acceptable if the expected answer is “512” in Base-10.
- Transmission 157: You need to move or displace the points. You can plot the points visually to see how they relate to the previous points.
- Transmission 175: The answer is not the number of individual oscillations. You must count the number of something that the game references multiple times. The final answer is 1.
- Transmission 179: You must return something to the Aliens. Half of the message describes facts, and the other half is a request. You need to reverse the sequence given to you. The answer translates to: “Receiver/earth/humans” “move” the “meteorite” to “Aliens”.
- Transmission 180: You need to compare the formula of @-18#0 versus @-18#1. The puzzle requires you to copy the logic directly.
- Transmission 181: You will get an error if you answer 6.2. It rounds incorrectly in Base-10. If you write in Base-10, the answer should be 6.25.
- Signal 183: You are not calculating a circumference. The shape is a circle, and the radius is 1. It does not have a perimeter, but it still has a measurable edge.
- Transmission 227: You’re asked to compare the ‘size’ of beryllium and oxygen. The game accepts Be < O. The community flags this as scientifically ambiguous, by atomic radius, beryllium (~89–112 pm) is actually larger than oxygen (~60–73 pm), the opposite of what’s wanted. The working theory is that ‘size’ means atomic weight here (Be ≈ 9.01 vs. O ≈ 16.00), but it’s unconfirmed, so treat it as a best guess if a similar comparison trips you up later.
- Transmission 235: The aliens use a confusing chemical compound. The formula is H2CaO2.
- Transmission 239: You must provide the balanced equation. The correct format is 4 Fe + 3 O2 -> 2 Fe2O3. You cannot use “Fe4”.
- Transmission 278: At the time of writing, the community hasn’t landed on a confirmed answer here. Most players who get stuck report understanding the message but still getting rejected, which usually points to formatting rather than misunderstanding. Double-check your boundary signals and spacing against nearby transmissions before assuming you’ve misread the content itself.
Signal Meanings and Definitions
You will define many words in your dictionary as you play. Some of these signals change their meaning slightly depending on the context.
If you look closely at older sequences, Signal -2 appears after every number. This signal acts as a separator or an “AND” statement, not a math function. You can derive the meaning of Signal -5 by looking at surrounding examples in the text.
The aliens use their vocabulary in flexible ways. Signal -40 translates roughly to “MAKE”, but it has two different meanings. In early puzzles, it means “constitute”, as in parts making a whole. When you reach later puzzles, the definition stretches to mean “produce” or “create”.
When you reach the geometry section, you get a new word for Signal -23. You can define this as an “amount” or a “missing” object. It relates to a group of objects where one is missing from the pattern.
Formatting and Compiler Errors Explained
A Compiler Error usually means you have the right idea, but the wrong structure. The aliens require precise syntax for every answer.
When you write a sequence or an equation, you must mark the boundaries of your statement. You must include Signal -14 at the start of your answer. You must also include Signal -15 at the end of your answer. If you forget these boundaries, the game will reject your solution. How you space your signals matters greatly. If the compiler throws an error, you should try adding a newline at Signal -2. You should avoid putting a newline at Signal -3.
Early in the game, Bautista figures out a converter for the numbers. You will spend a lot of time working in Base-8. When the game switches to Base-10, it causes confusion because there is no on-screen indicator. Akers complains about Base-8, which prompts this change. Some outgoing transmissions do not convert back to Base-8 properly. If you see rounded numbers, you need to check if the game expects Base-8 or Base-10.
How to Fix Launch Bugs and Performance Issues
Because The Message from Deep Space recently launched, you might run into a few technical errors. Here is how to handle the most common bugs reported by the community.
The game can push high-end graphics cards to 85C in under a minute. You need to open the settings menu and look closely for a hidden scrollbar. You should turn the graphics setting down to Low and turn off all extra graphical features. This drops temperatures significantly.
If you played the demo before buying the full game, your save file might trigger achievements too early. Players report unlocking Act 4 and Act 5 achievements immediately after Transmission 78. You might unlock Triple digits?? and Employee of the week right after solving Transmission 75. You might also miss the Baby’s first words achievement entirely.
Sometimes the dictionary autolog system glitches. The autolog for Signal -18 triggers early when the computer shuts down after week 7. When you start week 8, Bautista and Akers do not talk about it, and it goes missing from the log tab entirely. You might also notice the in-game periodic table stops at Uranium and misses elements 87 to 89.
