First of all, maybe bump the topic since you managed to solve this... :) bump
I'm going to assume anyone who got this far can read, so help me out here - oh, hey, you are reading this, aren't you? :)
I just bought this game, but I dunno - maybe I should read the book first? Any idea? Or maybe you didn't read the book either? Oh well.
Good luck! :)
First :) Will bump later
Comment has been collapsed.
Aha, someone found it... Good to know I didn't screw it up, was too lazy to try solving it... :) Oh well...
Wish I could have remembered how the thing I made worked, would have been easier than typing all this crap by hand... :)
Good luck if you try for it... :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Gave it another try since someone else solved it, one more to go I guess :3
Nobody(?) found that yet though so maybe I should give up for now :D
And no I've been living under a rock, haven't even heard of the book :(
Comment has been collapsed.
Aha, congratulations! :) Yeah, looks like you found the Nioh giveaway that doesn't exist yet... :) Hopefully in a day or two I can create that one...
Must be a big rock, I hadn't heard of the book either. :) I thought this game preview was interesting, and remembered it when I noticed the sale. :) Hopefully the sale won't be over when the giveaway ends, but... :)
Good luck! :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Woot! Wow. I don't feel like quite such a dumb arse now. This one took me less time than the first one. Maybe my mind just works differently to other people's. Yeah, lets go with that. :)
I haven't read the book. I have been looking at the game, though, and wondering whether to add it to my stupidly long wishlist. I can't remember if I did, though. But hey, it's a point-and-click from Daedalic; it'll be bundled in less than 12 months anyway, right?
I probably wouldn't read the book. These days I mainly just read science fiction: escapism at its best.
Comment has been collapsed.
Aha, good job! :) I can't remember which part of the puzzle this one is, let's take a look... Hmm...
Ok, 01010100 01001111 01001111 01001000 01000001 01010010 01000100 00111101
01101010 01101011 01011000 01101010 01110101 01010101 01100011 01101100 / TOOHARD=jkXjuUcl I guess. Glad I don't have to solve this stuff, ain't nobody got time for that! :)
Oh, hey, it's Daedalic? Hmmmm, you're right. Guess I didn't need to buy one for myself after all. Oops! :)
I'll probably never read the book, but before playing the game I'd feel obligated to read the book, which would mean I'll probably never play the game, either. Sigh. :(
Good luck! :)
Comment has been collapsed.
surprisingly, initially i managed somehow to write LARD instead of TOOHARD, I thought that the puzzle was mocking me at that point
Comment has been collapsed.
Hmm, itstoolard.com is probably not going to be a popular website... :)
Aha, I was wondering if you were around here somewhere... :) No idea how you managed to find only this giveaway, but maybe I didn't have any questions in the other ones. :)
It's interesting, reading the comments in these giveaways has given me ideas for other ways I could have hidden things, now that it's too late of course. :) Guess if I keep the ideas to myself I could always make a new puzzle some time, but I'm starting to remember why I wrote something to create this in the first place... :) This sort of thing is too much work for me to do by hand, plus the chance of making a mistake I may not even notice... Oh well. :)
Good luck if you try for this one, otherwise good luck somewhere else! :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Oh, I've seen your puzzle since it was first made, but decided to postpone solving it until yesterday (big mistake), since, you know, I am one of the veterans and what not at your regular puzzles. Problem is, I sorta underestimated that low entry puzzle (the one that only had 2 entries for a while now). I solved the rest, no problem, it's nice trying to get in your head, even if it might take some time, plenty of time at times, but it does feel rewarding in itself, even if I might not win the giveaway that has fairly good odds (1/10 on average) , the act of solving it, that does give me some serotonin. But that last puzzle, got me stumped, I am sure I might have been on the right path a few times, but I keep meeting hurdles, and, as I usually do, I start getting paranoid and overcomplicate things. I was planning to answer your questions as soon as I solved it all, but, from the looks of it, my brain does not want to find the right path for the last puzzle, it keeps me awake at night, conspiring, plotting...I know it is in there, I'm fairly certain that the answer is in the numbers, I have a strong feeling the question mark(s) have a meaning in this last obstacle (unless they were part of the really easy puzzle, and I am just adding extra obstructions to myself). At this point, I don't even care about that 1 out of 3 chances to win the mysterious game, which, from what I gathered from your other comments, if you were sincere, it is a sort of VN valued at 35$, I just want to get there, I know the answer is close, it is within my grasp, it has become my obsession, my compulsive preoccupation, my everything.
I do not eat, I do not drink, I do not sleep...
until the deadline comes round
and it will find me with my pants down,
naked and exposed, to this twisted world,
incapable and weak
to disentangle it.
Comment has been collapsed.
Well, if you had more important things to do instead, postponing a dumb Steamgifts puzzle was probably the correct choice. :)
I guess it's just bad luck that this time you postponed solving an actual puzzle. :) Or, I should say, the salvaged remains of an actual puzzle, with the same idea but less effort put in to creating it, since I'm pretty lazy... :(
Oh, I just noticed how lazy. Found my original "not really digits of pi" idea notes, which was going to be a lot more work for both of us. :)
There were going to be a bunch of bundle leftover giveaways, with each one containing a small chunk of something. The first letter in each game's title was going to spell out "how many of you memorised hexadecimal digits of pi as a child" so apparently I wasn't even going to tell people the chunks were digits of pi. :) And the hidden "not really digits of pi" part references http://www.steamgifts.com/discussion/n0td4/ which is a puzzle from hmm, almost four years ago. Sigh. I suggest not taking a look at that puzzle, since you still have a chance with this one... :)
Remember I'm lazy, so if you're finding something complicated, it's probably the wrong thing. :) The two (so far...) solvers appear to have simply noticed something from experience, or being clever, or just having a brainwave. But neither one noticed (or needed) the specific thing I used as a hint to suggest it. :)
Oh, forget about those question marks. It's just padding. Instead of rewriting things so they became unnecessary I said screw it. Lazy, remember. :) As a bonus they make the whole "digits of pi" thing an obvious lie, so people don't skim over it and overlook not everything in there is a number.
Good luck again! :) But if it stops being fun, there's no reason to keep working on it... :)
Comment has been collapsed.
I appreciate the hints and I am truly grateful (those early puzzles of yours seem like a handful, they would probably convince me to quit them altogether), but, at this point, it is too late for me. It is my own fault for not starting sooner, instead of taking breaks and thinking it for a long period of time squeezing it in a short amount of time, stressing myself with overcomplicated schemes. I already knew you'd make something obvious in it's own way, something that you'd just see or deduce, with a simple 'aha', not the equivalent of mining in a coalmine with a tea spoon, hoping to find something valuble, but at this point my mind is way too vexed, I have already piled tons of graphics and conspiratorial theories, trying to reverse engineer the whole thing. I won't deny, it was fun so far, trying to get in the mind of the gamemaster, try to match the wavelength of conscience, to try to deduce somehow when you are giving an obvious hint or just a red herring, with you deem complicated and what simple etc. . Sadly, when you get overlyinvested, many (even made up) red herrings start to become plausible alternatives. But, as I learned from the Freaknomics books, sometimes it is for the best to give up. No shame in that, I accomplished already more than many in certain regards, proud of that, but right now, as you already suggested on several occasions, I should focus my energy on something else (tomorrow I will be participating at my first D&D, haven't even finished my character yet and I actually have almost no clue how to play it at all, I just know that I need to roll a fancy die and be a convincing roleplayer). I am eager to see the solution, I have no doubt I will be either be surprised by the ease of it and why it did not cross my mind until now, or, I would come to realize I was on the right path at one point but just took a wrong turn or just decided to give up early. Right now (or in general) I lack that brainwave, the proper inspiration, or just probably the general cunningness to bring the task to completion, mainly because my mind wonders in all the wrong places right now, worse than a tin foil Alex Jones fan and that, despite being fun at parties, does not help me that much in this situation. Please, do not think any lesser of me since 'I Fought, I Lost, Now I Rest' and right now I can only think about 'what It might have been'!
Comment has been collapsed.
Here's something I noticed while typing up the explanation for tomorrow - which of course I should have done last week... :) But anyway, I never would have solved this puzzle. :)
I mean, I'm not trying to make you feel better about it, it's true. :( Assuming I didn't give up, I probably would have found the other giveaways, eventually... :) But whatever "eureka!" led people to find the last giveaway, it wouldn't have occurred to me at all. :) Oh well. :)
This is usually what happens, now that I think about it. Usually I take a long time fooling around with an idea, then when it's time to make the giveaways I rush through it, instead of taking a bit more time to work through the puzzle myself, add some hints if it seems to require mind-reading, etc.
Hope you have fun playing D&D
tomorrowtoday! :) It's bound to be more fun than reading the explanation for this puzzle! :)Comment has been collapsed.
I am sure the explanations were interesting for those who did not manage to figure it out, but I am sure that my unusual attempts to reach them could be even more interesting :))
I was a really charismatic half elf-bard entertainer, too bad I wasted so much time asking about how to play the game and what to do, due to my lack of experience in it.
Comment has been collapsed.
Somehow my puzzles are all the same thing, i.e. here's a bunch of stuff, now out of all the possible valid things you could do with it, try to read my mind and guess the one thing I chose... Good luck! :)
I suspect your ideas would have made a better puzzle, pity I didn't think of them...
Hmm, guess my Dark Souls puzzle was different, since there was only one valid answer, and all you had to do was "get it". Pity I don't know any other game well enough to do that sort of thing again. :)
Sounds like fun! I haven't played D&D in a very long time... :( Was it just a one-time thing, or is there a group that meets regularly? Should be a good time when you don't have to learn how the game works, so I hope you get to play some more! :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Your assessment of your puzzles is on point on how I view them. They are a a form of scientific art, if I can call it like that. I need to interpret your art, just like any piece of art is interpretable, but, since it is scientific, it can usually be just one interpretation...so, we've got that. We need to connect at a certain level, to match our wavelengths, to bond, in a sense to make sense.
Neah, not really anything better, maybe some select few in a certain manner, but most of them were more of the same like yours, I was just probably diverting a bit (too far) from the correct answer by finding methods that you would probably normally use, or I imagine you'd do if I were in your place, maybe sometimes a bit more obscure at times too, depends, it's just a cluster of hazardous ideas, trying to fit the puzzle pieces in my brain, starting with the ones that seem the most logical/lazy in my brain, slowly going towards more complicated ones.
Well, initially I hoped it would become something with regularity, but, circumstances might complicate things, since more than half of the party (including the DM) will be going abroad and only return during holidays. We are planning to continue playing it online, but, since they might be busy with work, the DM also has another group there that she plays with, time might be scarce. And, my experience from playing online games with more than 1 person, lead me to learn that things don't really go as planned when trying to sync multiple people to do an event/activity together, since plans don't match, timezones, schedules etc. I am still hopeful. I can't even start a new DM group in my city, since there is almost nobody who knows that much about it or remotely learn. I myself have only just started and a DM is the core part of the experience, so I might not even do that role well in order to orchestrate people, unless I will invest lots of time preparing myself in the arts of DMing.
We played the whole day and barely defeated the first few monsters from the first dungeon, the rest of the time we wasted in the starter town questioning everyone about everything and doing stupid jokes :)) so not a lot of progress. We barely got to level 2. Still, it was fun and now I am in a withdrawal state.
Comment has been collapsed.
Sounds like I'll never make a good puzzle... :) Maybe I should take a break from it, and go back to trying to solve other people's puzzles for a while... :) If nothing else, it would give me some better ideas to
stealfind inspiration from! :)Yeah, playing games like D&D is a different mindset compared to the superficially similar-looking computer RPGs, but I guess you already noticed that. :) The whole point of most computer RPGs is to "win", but in real life games the play's the thing. :) Hope you can find a way to keep playing! :)
Comment has been collapsed.
You are exaggerating, you have done and will keep doing good (raging from decent to great/amazing) puzzles, this one was no exception.
Via voice chat and some auxiliary program/site would prolly be the only way. I don't think I can rely on my compatriots or on my few friends for that.
Comment has been collapsed.
I might have started reading that Whittier poem religiously for a while now, it would seem :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Didn't read the book, sorry)
Comment has been collapsed.
No problem, I'll probably forget it exists in a week or so... Seems I don't read as much lately, my free time gets wasted on buying piles of Steam garbage, and then forgetting to play them... :)
Good luck! :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Didn't read the book either... maybe I try to look for the last one tmr if I'm not too lazy :p
Comment has been collapsed.
Well, don't feel bad, I only know the book exists because I read some article about this game... :) Guess I'm out of touch... :(
Oh, speaking of that, I only discovered Umberto Eco was dead because I had been curious what book was coming out next... Problem solved, I guess...
Good luck! :) But if you do decide to be lazy, thank you! :) Saves me $35 buying the last game... :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Not Nioh.... 😓
4 found. 2 to go.
We'll see if I can figure it out.
I have some ideas.
Comment has been collapsed.
Aha, not Nioh... That's interesting! I think most people found the Nioh giveaway before stumbling upon this one, but I'm too lazy to check the times...
Looks like you have about 24 hours to find them, if you keep working on it. Hopefully one of your ideas pans out, but don't throw away your entire weekend on some dumb puzzle, supplies are limited... :)
Good luck! :)
Comment has been collapsed.
too late, already threw most of my Friday and weekend in dedication for it, too many ideas, not many pan out, dumb puzzles will be the death of me
Comment has been collapsed.
Ouch, sorry about that. :( You know there's only so many weekends, right? :) Maybe this puzzle is just too dumb to bother with, go have fun and come back if you get a random brainwave... :) Or umm, this. :)
Comment has been collapsed.
doncha dare belittle your puzzle!...oh wait, it was actually me who did this, dang it... I did not actually mean it, nor wanted to refer to the puzzle itself, it was in the heat of the moment and my way of expressing myself was poor, I was somehow referring to myself as being dumb and incapable of solving a puzzle which, in essence should be elementary ( my dear PuzzleMaster) if I had the sufficient amount of brainpower .
Comment has been collapsed.
Oh, I think this puzzle's pretty dumb. :) Well, the idea of the puzzle, I mean the final part, the one only three people found, I think that wasn't a bad idea in itself, but the implementation was lacking. There wasn't enough to lead people in the right direction, so if you don't have that random brainwave you're probably screwed... Oh well. :)
Comment has been collapsed.
well, gg to me, I kept typing DAX7n and it just didn't work, oh well, at least I know I managed to figure it out on my own, the idea was neat, too bad I didn't insist on it, but the implementation could have been a tad better, still enjoyable thou After I abandoned that idea, I tried seeing other patterns like maybe a hidden morse code, since I was thinking those close clusters might have been lines and the isolated ones dots.
Comment has been collapsed.
Ouch! :( Sorry! :(
Something I only realised after pasting in the solution - I could read the message, probably because I knew what it said. :) But it's very hard to read if you have to squint at your monitor and guess... :(
Guess I should have tried solving it myself first, before making the thread. Hopefully I would have noticed how difficult the message is to read, and found a different way to draw it. Maybe put more space between the letters, or less space between the "pixels", a different font, something... Oh well... :(
I should have known you'd find the solution, unless the puzzle was faulty... :) I'll try to get a proofreader for the next one! :) Sorry again! :(
Comment has been collapsed.
Oh, you have no clue what a pain it was. I did not consider that the resolution of my screen, the font, size/space of and between characters were part of the puzzle. Even your solved version for me it still looks like a D, it might be something with my eyes, but, a bit of spacing or not such a curvy C to the edges that it won't almost unite, or a curvier C to the left or, yeah, as you said, that would have helped, for me it's a wonder I even noticed that solution to begin with (before even checking the hint article), but I was just too fixated to find a mathematical pattern of sorts, not visual one, since so far that was the case, not to mention to differentiate coincidences from intent. I knew for certain it was something involving the spacing between the modified pi numbers, since it was way too non-random compared to the rest, quite pattern like, I tried doing multiple things with it after I organised it, but no dice. .
Thank you for believing in me, again, I had my fair share of fault, if I started sooner on the puzzle, I would have had more time to relax and think it clearly, but since I pretty much marathoned your puzzles, my judgement got clouded due to exhaustion and I did not consider just replacing the D with a C or maybe a weird O or a 0 etc.
Comment has been collapsed.
Hmmm, if I ever try this again, I'll find something more legible than this... :) Or I'll require people to download an Apple 2 emulator, and draw the answer in high-resolution 280x192 graphics... :) Which should be about the size of a postage stamp on the typical screen today... :)
Or maybe I'll have to work on the puzzle more, and make sure there's a clear reason for every step, other than expecting people to randomly guess the same thing I was thinking... Sigh...
Comment has been collapsed.
Overall I guess it was just an unfortunate coincidence, if sg would have generated any other code for the giveaway, odds are it would have been more legible. In this case it was a C that was next to a letter making it look like an O or a 0 or a D or who knows, it happens.
The pattern was there, so in consequence it was logical that something had to do with it. I mean, by exclusion at least, there wasn't really much left after finishing the others. I guess the sudden transition from a mental puzzle to a visual one was the thing that bamboozled many of us. Still, I did enjoy the fact there were multiple puzzles in one large one, rather than many smaller ones. It felt like it gave people a certain level of freedom. The telescope article was a nice hint indeed, since I did try zooming out a bit more and flipping the image in an attempt to find something more, but, knowing your hints so far, I couldn't be certain if it was a real hint or a red herring :))
Comment has been collapsed.
Hmmm, in addition to making the message legible, maybe I should have made the "digits of pi" exactly 1679 characters, so people who understood the hint could get feedback that they were on the right track. :) Guess there's no shortage of room for improvement... :)
Comment has been collapsed.
I don't really think the number of characters had any major impact, the whole puzzle started from noticing the differences from the original, not the number of characters.
Comment has been collapsed.
You could have also gotten a 0CDOQ or UVWMN :)) imagine trying to read that
Comment has been collapsed.
Finally got here. :)
Like you and a few other solvers, I also learned there is a book after I first found the game and looked up some information about it. As for what to do first, in similar situations, where there is a book and a movie about something, I always prefer starting with the book, because it allows my imagination freedom in constructing the world described there and adding little touches to the characters. If you watch the movie or play the game, you see someone else's vision (even if it's close to the author's vision).
Now where would the last one hide? I don't think I'll have time to find it, but this puzzle-in-not-really-pi was umm, infuriatingly fun. :D
Comment has been collapsed.
You know, I was thinking about that recently, and had one counterexample, where I was glad I'd seen the movie first. :)
Did you ever read The Shining? Or see the movie? I saw the movie first, thought it was great. Many years later I read the book, and decided ok, the movie was great, and (as usual) the book was better. :) But by seeing the movie first I didn't have anything to compare it to, so I enjoyed it as its own thing. It's not much like the book at all, really. I think if I'd read the book first, most likely I would have been comparing them, deciding the movie just wasn't the same thing at all, all this stuff's changed, where did that come from, and where's this, why's that, etc. :) I dunno. :)
Hmm, I can't say where the last giveaway is hiding, but I wrote an explanation to be posted tomorrow, if that will help. :) Spoiler: probably not. :)
Good luck! :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Puzzle explanation is up! :)
Comment has been collapsed.
I watched Pillars of the Earth (miniseries) in the distant 2010 and I remember I liked it ^^
Comment has been collapsed.
Hmm, didn't know there was such a thing, but that would feel like cheating... :) I should probably look for a copy of the book, if I weren't already overflowing with book backlog... :(
Comment has been collapsed.