Rules

BASICS

The hunt starts at 22:00 Singapore time (GMT +8) on Friday, 29 September 2017 and ends at 22:00 on Sunday, 1 October 2017.

The hunt is open to teams of one to four people, located anywhere in the world. Teams may register at any time until the hunt ends.

Puzzles will be released in two main rounds:

Round 1, comprising 12 puzzles and one metapuzzle, will be released at the start of the hunt.
Upon solving the Round 1 metapuzzle, teams will gain access to Round 2, comprising 7 puzzles and one metapuzzle. Round 2 will also be released to all teams, regardless of progress, twelve hours before the end of the hunt.
Teams can gain access to the final puzzle only by solving the Round 2 metapuzzle.

Hints will be released at two points in the hunt (see Timeline). There is no hint request system.

A ~mystery prize~ will be awarded to the first team to complete the final task (see The Prize).

TIMELINE

All timings are GMT +8.
What’s the time difference for me?

Fri, 29 Sep 2017
22:00 Hunt begins
Sat, 30 Sep 2017
22:00 Hints released for Round 1
Sun, 01 Oct 2017
10:00 All teams gain access to Round 2
16:00 Hints released for Round 2 and final puzzle
22:00 Hunt ends

SOLVING

Each answer is a string of letters (A-Z). Capitalisation is immaterial and any other characters (e.g. numerals, punctuation) will be stripped from the answer before it is checked.

When logged in to your team account, you will be able to submit guesses for each puzzle on its respective page.

Teams have 20 guesses for each puzzle. If you’ve legitimately used up your 20 guesses for a puzzle, you may contact us. We’ll decide whether to grant more guesses based on your team’s guesslog. Teams which appear to be randomly guessing thematic answers or trying to brute-force the answer will not be granted additional guesses.

SCORING

Each puzzle is worth 10 points when first released.
After its respective hint has been released, a puzzle will be worth 5 points.

In other words:
Round 1 puzzles are worth 10 points until 22:00 on 30 September 2017 and 5 points thereafter.
Round 2 puzzles are worth 10 points until 16:00 on 1 October 2017 and 5 points thereafter.

Teams are ranked in the first instance by the total number of points scored.
Teams with the same total points are then ranked by the number of puzzles solved.
Teams that are tied both on points and puzzles solved are then ranked by their last solve time.

THE PRIZE

Once solved, the final puzzle will direct teams to a physical location in Singapore. The first team to complete the task at this location (represented by any number of actual team members) will win a ~mystery prize~.

This does mean that only teams with at least one representative in Singapore will be able to win the prize. Nonetheless, teams are welcome to participate even if they have no representatives in Singapore (and they won't miss out on any actual puzzle-solving).

ETC.

Teams may use external resources such as the internet or other people, as long as these other people are not also taking part in the hunt.

Teams may not work together, receive help from or give help to other teams.

No person can be part of more than one team.

Obvious stuff: please don’t attempt to hack our website or otherwise cheat. :(