Popular Post StrickenBiged Posted December 9, 2016 Popular Post Share Posted December 9, 2016 (edited) Hello PSNP Introduction So, for a little while now, I've been giving away a year's worth of premium membership when the mood strikes me. Basically, I've already bought a lifetime's premium membership for myself but I use the site so much that I'd like to keep supporting it and this seems like a fun way of doing so. Usually, there's a little challenge or puzzle attached to them - first person who posts the answer wins, that sort of thing. I thought I'd try and do these a little more regularly and start a thread so that I could make the puzzles a bit harder, give them a bit more visibility as compared to status updates, and allow more people to get involved. This post is mainly to introduce the giveaway, lay out the rules, that sort of thing. This first post will be edited to include current and past puzzles, prize winners, etc, as the thread develops. When I do a new giveaway, I'll add it to this post under the "The Current Giveaway" section, and also do a new post on the thread to give the whole thread a bump. I'll keep the thread locked in between giveaways to keep it free of off-topic discussion (once I figure out how to lock threads on the new-look forums!). I'll try to do them roughly one a month. Follow the thread if you'd like to be notified when a new giveaway is live. The Rules Quite simple really: The first person to post the correct answer in this thread wins. Do not edit your posts! A player could edit an earlier post to make it appear as if they found the correct answer first when, in fact, it had been found by another player later in the thread. Please feel free to spam with shorter posts - I would rather see lots of posts than there be any confusion as to who found the correct answer first. Do not PM me in relation to an active giveaway. I will ignore your message if you do. Clues may or may not be given, at my discretion. I'll monitor ongoing giveaways as appropriate. The prize is One Year's Premium PSNP membership ONLY. If Sly changes the price of the prize, then I can call this whole thing off at my discretion, even if there is an ongoing giveaway. If the prizewinner is already a premium member, they may nominate a non-premium member to receive the prize. The prize cannot be held until your current premium membership expires, if applicable. You must nominate a non-premium member to receive the prize within a reasonable time when asked. I will buy you the premium membership as soon as possible once I notice the correct answer has been given and you have confirmed which member you would like to receive the prize. Collaboration is allowed, but only one prize will be awarded per giveaway. If you work with other members on a puzzle, please agree between yourselves who will receive the prize and be honest about it when I ask who you would like to receive the prize. You are free, of course, to discuss the puzzle and post your guesses and thoughts but remember that if your answer is wrong-but-along-the-right-tracks, you might just be helping someone else! Refer to Rule 1! Where I do a non-puzzle giveaway (for example, posting a picture and asking for amusing captions) then the special rules which apply to that giveaway will also be posted. In such cases, I will provide a reasonable time for entries to be made and my selection will be final. I will do my best to be fair to all participants, but my word will be final in all matters relating to the giveaway. If it turns out that these rules need to be amended following developments within the thread, then I reserve the right to do so. The Current Giveaway Nothing on at the moment. Why not subscribe to the thread so that you get a notification when the next one goes live? Previous Giveaways and Winners 18 December 2017 Spoiler Puzzle: Spoiler Winner: @jem (who is going to add the prize - a year's premium - to a separate contest here.) Solution: Spoiler The puzzle was 4 overlapping dot-to-dot puzzles. You would notice that the numbers are oriented at 90 degrees of rotation. Solving each dot-to-dot reveals the 4 outlines which are: Sir Dan's head from Medievil, James Pond from the James Pond series of games, the Primal logo and 24 in a digital clock format, like from 24: The Game. If you stick those 4 titles into Google together, the first hit should be a database of game credits, which will show that Chris Sorrell worked on all of these games. Chris Sorrell was the correct answer. There was a little confusion early on because there are conflicting sources online for whether Guerrilla Cambridge (before it was shuttered and under its earlier names) worked on all of these games, but some sites don't list James Pond as something they worked on. I therefore posted a cropped image from Prototype 2's marketing material, as that was a game that Chris Sorrell worked on, but which was not developed by Guerrilla Cambridge. 24 March 2017 Spoiler Puzzle: Spoiler Winner: @jem12345 Working out: Spoiler Deciphering this message will take some trial and error. The puzzle solver might initially try a number of encoding languages which use 2 bits (on/off) like binary, morse code, etc. However, these will not give you any useful result. The fact that I used the letter i is a clue... what you're looking at is a lot of i's... i's... hmmm... eyes? Solution: Spoiler The message is encoded in braille, with the i's that have a dot representing the larger bumps and the ones without the dots the smaller bumps. The message needs to be divided into rectangles of two letters across and three letters down to be read. This reveals the message: "What belongs to you but is used more by everyone else?" The answer, of course, is "Your name". 28 February 2017 Spoiler Puzzle: Spoiler Clues: Don't over-analyse the picture. What is pictured? You won't find a pattern unless you know how to move. Looking at the ? might be a good starting point. Winner: @reckscollie Working out: Spoiler A number of words are hidden in the grid. The knights in the picture are a clue that you need to move around the board like a knight moves in a game of chess, i.e. two squares in one direction and then one square perpendicular to that. Moreover, you are looking for a closed knight's tour, i.e. a sequence of moves that takes you to every square on the board and back to where you started. You should start and end on the square with a question-mark. Solution: Spoiler The hidden message is: zurkonomniwrenchdrekcombustor or, with spaces, zurkon, omniwrench, dreck, combustor. These are all objects or characters from the Sony franchise Ratchet & Clank, which was the correct answer. 27 January 2017 Spoiler Puzzle: Spoiler Winner: @Komrade_Konrad Working out: Spoiler It's quite simple once you spot it. Letters have been rotated either clockwise or anti-clockwise. You need to "wind" the letters back into their upright positions, moving forward or backward through the alphabet as you do so. For example, an F which has be rotated clockwise 90 degrees needs to be "wound backwards" twice, so you go two letters backwards in the alphabet - F>E>D. Go forward in the alphabet for the ones which are slanted anti-clockwise. Do this to all rotated letters and you'll see the question which gives you the solution. Solution: Spoiler Bangkok 20 December 2016 Spoiler This one was a Christmas Special, and a lifetime Premium Membership was up for grabs. As such, Rule 4 was varied so that a contestant who already had an annual premium membership would be allowed to hold it over until they needed to renew. Puzzle: Spoiler Winner: Dragon_Archon Working out: Spoiler The puzzle has replaced letters and spaces with emoji (which were deliberately chosen to be visually similar in order to confuse). To solve it, you need to figure out which emoji represents which letters through a combination of frequency analysis (compare each emojis frequency with letter frequencies in English), educated guessing (e.g. a repeating triplet could be the word "the", which starts you off with 3 letters), and trial and error. Solution: Spoiler Roadhog is a hero from the game Overwatch. Googling "Roadhog winter skin" should have found some images showing the limited edition skin Blizzard released in December 2016 for the character. On his belt buckle, it says "HOHOHOG", which is the solution to the puzzle. 9 December 2016 Spoiler Puzzle: Spoiler Winner: Danny_Johansen Working out: Spoiler The pictures encode a message in Morse Code. The doge facing left is a dot and the doge facing right is a dash. The doge in space is a clue that these are the spaces between words, and the underscore marks the beginning and end of a letter. Once decoded, the message is "What day did Muttnik disintegrate?" Solution: Spoiler Muttnik was the American nickname for Laika, the dog that the USSR sent into space during the space race. On 14 April 1958, Sputnik 2 and Laika's remains re-entered Earth's atmosphere and burned up. Googling the question would have taken you to Laika's wikipedia page, where you could find the correct answer. 28 November 2016 Spoiler If 1000110 is STIR and 1000110001100 is COPY, then what string of digits is ANGRY? Winner: DaivRules Working out: Spoiler You need to realise that the numbers can be expressed as Roman numerals. 1000 is M, 1 is I, 10 is X, and so on. 1000110 then becomes MIX, which is a synonym of STIR; and 1000110001100 becomes MIMIC, which is a synonym of COPY. You then know that you're looking for a synonym of ANGRY which uses only Roman numerals. The only word which fits is LIVID. You then need to write LIVID out in Arabic numbers, (without any of the adding/subtracting you would normally do when reading Roman numerals), to arrive at the correct answer. Solution: Spoiler 50151500 25 October 2016 Spoiler Picture Menace Khan Clones * * Home Hope Frontier Back Winner: Avatar_Of_Battle Working out: Spoiler The words are all taken from the last word in the titles of Star Trek and Star Wars movies in canonical order, and the *'s are a little clue to be thinking about "stars" too, for those unfamiliar with the films. You need to recognise this, then give me the last word in the 3rd Star Trek and 3rd Star Wars movie titles respectively. Solution: Spoiler Spock Sith 15 February 2016 Spoiler Make me laugh: What's the difference between Sonic & Knuckles? Winner: Lion of the Lolis, with Sonic will always have blue balls, Knuckles won't. The original joke answer was: I can't fit all my Sonics up my a**. Edited December 19, 2017 by StrickenBiged 12 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TigressLion Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 I still am thankful for this today haha. I plan on competing everytime and than I can share that joy by premium'ing friends if I win haha. Always a generous member, thanks Stricken! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaivRules Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 Thanks for doing this @StrickenBiged! Hopefully, I'll be sharp enough to figure out another riddle or two in the future. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dragon-Archon Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 Nice giveaway Stricken . I'm looking forward to try and solve a riddle for fun. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrickenBiged Posted December 9, 2016 Author Share Posted December 9, 2016 Oh, I have cooked up a fun one. Memes inbound... gimme a few minutes! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrickenBiged Posted December 9, 2016 Author Share Posted December 9, 2016 Here's the first puzzle of this new format. Everything you need is in the picture, don't waste your time looking for hidden metadata or anything. Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sir_Bee Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 Just putting my thoughts out there, but my first thought was the direction the doge is facing indicates which hand would type the letter on a QWERTY keyboard, if typing properly. That said, I am not sure what to do with the odd ones out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrickenBiged Posted December 9, 2016 Author Share Posted December 9, 2016 @Sir_Bee - You might be overthinking it. When I was making the puzzle, I was like "This is easy, someone will get this in 2 minutes" but, on reflection, this one might stand for a little while. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sir_Bee Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 Overthinking is what I do best Going to let it stew in the back of my mind while at work, and see what else I can come up with. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danny_Johansen Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 Zonday 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrickenBiged Posted December 9, 2016 Author Share Posted December 9, 2016 1 minute ago, Danny_Johansen said: Zonday I have no idea how you got that but no, that's not the correct answer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danny_Johansen Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 Just now, StrickenBiged said: I have no idea how you got that but no, that's not the correct answer. I translated it to morse. The question was what day did Muttnik disintegrate? And that was Nov 3 1957. The day was a Zonday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danny_Johansen Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 (edited) Wait, It is monday! My mistake was that I though disintegrate ment passing away, after reading the wiki It says that Over five months later, after 2,570 orbits, Sputnik 2—including Laika's remains—disintegrated during re-entry on April 14, 1958. That was a Monday! Edited December 9, 2016 by Danny_Johansen 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrickenBiged Posted December 9, 2016 Author Share Posted December 9, 2016 12 minutes ago, Danny_Johansen said: I translated it to morse. The question was what day did Muttnik disintegrate? And that was Nov 3 1957. The day was a Zonday. You are so, desperately close. Read the question again. 3 minutes ago, Danny_Johansen said: My mistake was that I though disintegrate ment passing away, after reading the wiki It says that Over five months later, after 2,570 orbits, Sputnik 2—including Laika's remains—disintegrated during re-entry on April 14, 1958. That was a Monday! DING DING DING! Winner! I was thinking of the date, rather than the day. By coincidence, both were a Monday, but as you gave me the right date too in the end, you get it! @Danny_Johansen I assume you want the Premium membership for yourself mate? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danny_Johansen Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 (edited) 19 minutes ago, StrickenBiged said: You are so, desperately close. Read the question again. DING DING DING! Winner! I was thinking of the date, rather than the day. By coincidence, both were a Monday, but as you gave me the right date too in the end, you get it! @Danny_Johansen I assume you want the Premium membership for yourself mate? Yes and a nice puzzle, I enjoyed solving it. Thanks for the Premium. Edited December 9, 2016 by Danny_Johansen 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrickenBiged Posted December 9, 2016 Author Share Posted December 9, 2016 @Danny_Johansen You're welcome mate. I knew someone would come along who would figure it out quite quickly! Congrats! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sir_Bee Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 @StrickenBiged Just out of curiosity, what was the logic behind making a left face a "." and a right face a "_"? If I were trying to guess, I would have instinctively gone the other way with "L"eft representing "long". @Danny_Johansen Congratulations on solving it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrickenBiged Posted December 9, 2016 Author Share Posted December 9, 2016 @Sir_Bee No logic at all. Just picked one. Part of code breaking is trial and error. If you guessed wrong the first time, then you'd have had to try it the other way around when it would have worked. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaivRules Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 Congrats @Danny_Johansen!! I like the puzzle! Wish I hadn't scarfed down two pounds of pasta an hour ago and checked the site instead. Yet another thing I missed out on because I was stuffing my face with shameful carbs. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrickenBiged Posted December 9, 2016 Author Share Posted December 9, 2016 @DaivRules I obviously made it too easy! I'll do better next time, and you can have another go. Don't feel too bad though, you won the last one! I'm going to have to start layering these things so that they take longer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sir_Bee Posted December 9, 2016 Share Posted December 9, 2016 3 minutes ago, StrickenBiged said: @Sir_Bee No logic at all. Just picked one. Part of code breaking is trial and error. If you guessed wrong the first time, then you'd have had to try it the other way around when it would have worked. Oh, I understand that I am not suggesting I was even close enough to get to that stage. I was only asking because I was curious if there was an underlying logic that I just wasn't thinking of. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dragon-Archon Posted December 10, 2016 Share Posted December 10, 2016 9 hours ago, StrickenBiged said: I have no idea how you got that but no, that's not the correct answer. If you're interested in the logic behind that: fellow Dutchman Danny meant to say "zondag", which is Dutch for "Sunday", but they got mixed up somehow . 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danny_Johansen Posted December 10, 2016 Share Posted December 10, 2016 5 hours ago, Dragon-Archon said: If you're interested in the logic behind that: fellow Dutchman Danny meant to say "zondag", which is Dutch for "Sunday", but they got mixed up somehow . This is correct, trying to quickly say the answer made me mix them up. It seems that my posts with a single word are still full of spelling errors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrickenBiged Posted December 20, 2016 Author Share Posted December 20, 2016 (edited) Puzzle 2 is a Christmas special! If you crack this one, the prize is a Lifetime Premium Membership to PSNProfiles.com! Holly hell! I must be mad. Because of the special nature of the prize, Rule 4 will be varied so that those currently on an annual Premium membership can hold their prize over until their current membership expires and they need to renew. With that said, here is your puzzle: Good luck! (Sorry about the issues with embedding there! Still getting used to the site update. Enjoy!) Edited December 20, 2016 by StrickenBiged Fixing the image embed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dragon-Archon Posted December 20, 2016 Share Posted December 20, 2016 2 hours ago, StrickenBiged said: Is the answer: HOHOHOG? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts