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The Eggs Files III
I'd love to spend some entries talking about how everyone did at The Eggs Files III, but I can't. See, I wasn't actually there. Oh, I was there at first. I cleaned everything up and put out some food. I welcomed the guests. I handed out the introductory materials. I went outside to test my new two-way radios.
Then, I was kidnapped. That put a damper on my observing.
But we'll get to that. First, let's talk fonts. I've enjoyed choosing fonts to set the mood for the puzzles. As before, the official FBI publications (mostly introductory materials) were given in the X-Files font. For the puzzles themselves, I wanted something that resembled the hand-written notes of someone running for his life, so I chose Con Jitters, which is based on the writing of people (like Dart) who solve crosswords for speed. You should download and install these fonts for the best viewing experience of documents.
Four pages were laid out on the coffee table. There were guides to being Field Agents and Supervising Agents, which were nearly identical to the ones from last year. The introduction page explained the story and was accompanied by another page that explained the structure of the game.
The Cigarette-Smoking Bunny was trying to find a vaccine that counteracted a deadly disease that the aliens had created. Peep Throat had found this vaccine and hidden it somewhere, then shredded his notes. The agents were called to find and decipher Peep Throat's notes before the CSB found the vaccine.
Twenty-four eggs were hidden around the house. Each one held a scrap of one of the notes as well as a clue to the location of another egg. The egg clues were numbered and in sequence, to make them easier to keep track of. When the eggs had been found, the notes could be reconstructed like a jigsaw, then solved. The answers to the notes gave an instruction that led to the endgame.
Things got more complicated when the Assistant Director (viz. me) was kidnapped by the Cigarette-Smoking Bunny, who demanded the vaccine as ransom. The agents were mostly on their own, except for occasional menacing phone calls from the CSB and panicked radio messages from the Assistant Director.
Background and Construction
I got the idea for a kidnapping back in the beginning of January. The plans were much grander, then. (I'd tell you about some of the flourishes, but I may still use them elsewhere.) Anyway, it became clear that, if I'm going to absent myself from the process, it'll only work if I make sure everything is as easy as possible. That's something I've been striving for generally with The Eggs Files, but it'd be even more crucial. If something went wrong, it'd be really hard to fix. So I made everything a bit simpler.
Agents in Action
Things went mostly smoothly, from my side of things. I was put into an unusual acting position while playing the panicked Assistant Director and the cutthroat Cigarette-Smoking Bunny. Nobody was taking it as serious as I was, and I was taking it uberseriously, since I thought that'd be more fun. So while I was pretending to be dying of an alien-manufactured disease, the people in my house were telling me that they were all having beer. Things were even worse during conversations with the CSB, but I'll get to those later. I felt a bit like a video-game character, who acts with deadly seriousness, even though you've renamed Link "Kittykat" or something. And later on, I had to have the memory retention of a Metal Gear Solid guard, when they told their enemy things they shouldn't have.
But it was fun, and everything went smoothly. I'm going to write about the individual puzzles, but for specifics, you'll have to go to someone like![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cramerica, who was actually there.
ThuNYTX: 7:25.
Then, I was kidnapped. That put a damper on my observing.
But we'll get to that. First, let's talk fonts. I've enjoyed choosing fonts to set the mood for the puzzles. As before, the official FBI publications (mostly introductory materials) were given in the X-Files font. For the puzzles themselves, I wanted something that resembled the hand-written notes of someone running for his life, so I chose Con Jitters, which is based on the writing of people (like Dart) who solve crosswords for speed. You should download and install these fonts for the best viewing experience of documents.
Four pages were laid out on the coffee table. There were guides to being Field Agents and Supervising Agents, which were nearly identical to the ones from last year. The introduction page explained the story and was accompanied by another page that explained the structure of the game.
The Cigarette-Smoking Bunny was trying to find a vaccine that counteracted a deadly disease that the aliens had created. Peep Throat had found this vaccine and hidden it somewhere, then shredded his notes. The agents were called to find and decipher Peep Throat's notes before the CSB found the vaccine.
Twenty-four eggs were hidden around the house. Each one held a scrap of one of the notes as well as a clue to the location of another egg. The egg clues were numbered and in sequence, to make them easier to keep track of. When the eggs had been found, the notes could be reconstructed like a jigsaw, then solved. The answers to the notes gave an instruction that led to the endgame.
Things got more complicated when the Assistant Director (viz. me) was kidnapped by the Cigarette-Smoking Bunny, who demanded the vaccine as ransom. The agents were mostly on their own, except for occasional menacing phone calls from the CSB and panicked radio messages from the Assistant Director.
Background and Construction
I got the idea for a kidnapping back in the beginning of January. The plans were much grander, then. (I'd tell you about some of the flourishes, but I may still use them elsewhere.) Anyway, it became clear that, if I'm going to absent myself from the process, it'll only work if I make sure everything is as easy as possible. That's something I've been striving for generally with The Eggs Files, but it'd be even more crucial. If something went wrong, it'd be really hard to fix. So I made everything a bit simpler.
Agents in Action
Things went mostly smoothly, from my side of things. I was put into an unusual acting position while playing the panicked Assistant Director and the cutthroat Cigarette-Smoking Bunny. Nobody was taking it as serious as I was, and I was taking it uberseriously, since I thought that'd be more fun. So while I was pretending to be dying of an alien-manufactured disease, the people in my house were telling me that they were all having beer. Things were even worse during conversations with the CSB, but I'll get to those later. I felt a bit like a video-game character, who acts with deadly seriousness, even though you've renamed Link "Kittykat" or something. And later on, I had to have the memory retention of a Metal Gear Solid guard, when they told their enemy things they shouldn't have.
But it was fun, and everything went smoothly. I'm going to write about the individual puzzles, but for specifics, you'll have to go to someone like
cramerica, who was actually there.ThuNYTX: 7:25.
Earth saved! Bunny thwarted!
Artistry and I got to the scene late, due to a lengthy but critical brunch holdup. Also in attendance were Agents
Most of the 24 eggs were readily found by our sharp-eyed agents. Each one held a piece of a puzzle and a clue to the location of another egg, making things flow smoothly. These clues were usually clear, but we were memorably on the wrong track for one: "Eaten by horses." We did not recall seeing any haystacks at the scene, so one of the agents jumped to the next logical possibility: "It's in the oatmeal! Quick, call the AD, who fortunately still has his radio on him, and ask him where he keeps his oatmeal!" His response: "What!?!?" It turned out that the egg in question had itself been "eaten" by a nearby saw horse (are they what tablesaws ride?) but was none the worse for wear.
The puzzles were, as always, puzzling, but at least this time were not designed by fiendish aliens. There was one based on the covers of several music CDs in the area, which I didn't work on. I believe the clue received from this puzzle was "CHOPSTICKS." I think. I didn't see it. Another puzzle that I didn't work on was very creative: "Taste the Rainbow". This involved discerning the flavor names of a bunch of Jelly Bellies, and getting a clue, "PICKUP" from the names. Tough work, but the team was up to it.
The first puzzle I worked on was a walkabout, which had me and John following the lead of Mrs. Tablesaw and her uncanny knowledge of the area. We ventured across Ventura Blvd. to a nearby building that just happened to have a small mosaic of a famous movie scene on each of its fence pillars. The building itself had no sign describing what went on there, and appeared well-kept but abandoned. This made for a surreal combination with the jaunty, colorful mosaics. I still can't figure out what on earth was going on there. The various movies, placed in the correct order, yielded another clue: "GOLDEN."
The last of the four egg puzzles was my favorite: a set of eight "make your own poetry" cubes all in a row, that we assumed needed to be arranged somehow to get an answer. The hints were subtle but perfectly done. We noticed that there were six clue sentences, with four "cube" words each. Also, the instructions kept referring to a single cube, as opposed to eight... hey, wait a minute, we need to form one larger cube from these! When we did that, we eventually found the correct configuration to get the four correct words on each of the cube's six sides, and got our last clue: "FOR FOX."
"PICKUP GOLDEN CHOPSTICKS FOR FOX."
To be continued after LJ post length break.
Ham rescued! Ham eaten!
Inside the fortune cookies, which Artistry boldly sampled, were four fortunes, complete with lucky numbers. The numbers actually referred back to the 24 numbered "where are the eggs" clues, and when put in order, the first letters spelled out a message "A perfect fake in toilet tank." Lo and behold, a fake vaccine. This was what we would give the Bunny in return for the AD. When we called the Bunny, however, one of our agents became a little too exuberant, and yelled, "We got the fake vaccine! You want it?!?" Hence the "Metal Gear Solid guard" comment above.
The AD was, fortunately, returned to us, though he was still exhibiting flu-like symptoms. And, according to those who brought him back from the Bunny's car, ham-like symptoms as well. I personally missed the sight of an enormous (yet visible) humanoid bunny, adorably cute and yet menacing at the same time, at the wheel.
Once the AD was back, we got started on finding the real vaccine to cure him. It was not a can of Red Bull, as we thought for a couple of minutes. The cryptic messages on the four fortunes were the key. These boiled down to "Real solution in ____". We were a bit misled by the clue to that last word ("look into crystal ball," "a complete title in your future") that seemed to point to an episode of Futurama sitting in the DVD player. Pulling apart all of the Futurama packaging yielded nothing. The clue was actually pointing to the CD of "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets", featuring Dumbledore and a crystal ball. I think Deb made the leap to check the bookcase.
There was the (glowing) vaccine, in a carved-out niche in the pages of the Harry Potter book. The AD assured us, once cured, that he had a backup non-carved copy.
A great time was had by all.