Inspired by that, I imagined making an IFDB game title long enough to be its own CYOA (IN THIS GAME TURN TO MARKER 3 IF YOU WANT TO SKIP INTRO 2 HELLO I AM MATHBRUSH AND…)
Instead, I decided to make the smallest game I could that could fit into a title that was both
a)interactive, and
b)fiction.
So, I present my game (it actually doubled in size to make its narrative more coherent):
I did the first puzzle, I think, but I’m stuck on the second.
I did the one-time pad and got Count Twixt Stops.
I assume “twixt” means “between” for these purposes. But… count what? Letters? Words? And do what with it?
A king has Zmtmr Quhwr Prnoq = 28 letters, 6 words
daughters = 9 letters, 1 word
named for reason = 16 letters, 3 words
1 pad key is XYZZY = 18 letters, 5 words
K Dies = 6 letters, 2 words
inherit the treasure = 20 letters, 3 words
I guess there are only four sentences between stops; “A king has…” and “inherit the treasure” are not surrounded by stops. But none of these numbers/letters seem to do anything interesting for me.
9, 16, 18, 6 = JQSG. Maybe add in the 20 to get JQSGU?
I was kinda guessing that I’d follow the instructions to cook another one-time pad and apply it to the code words again.
But Z - J = Q, M - Q = W … I’m not off to a good start here.
It is common, but not required, to assign each letter a numerical value, e.g., a is 0, b is 1, and so on.
The Boxentriq OTP decryptor treats a as “translate 0 steps.” AAAAA leaves the original unchanged in both encrypt/decrypt mode.
In A = 0 numbering, 23, 9, 14, 14, 5, 18 = XJOOFS.
So, I had actually tried skipping spaces, but when I got XJOOFS (and tried applying XJOOFS and JOOFS to the original code) I just gave up, and didn’t bother writing it up above.
I think this puzzle would have worked better with some mention to “space” in the text (e.g. “suffocating without space STOP”), and if it had used the A = 0 OTP alphabet for numbering. It would be even cooler if my original guess to apply the new code to the original code had been right, and there had been something different to decrypt with a new key.
This is really helpful! I am interested in maintaining and updating the current version, as I think it has a lot of red herrings that detract from gameplay. There is room in the game for changing the text (for one, I could rewrite it to not use spaces at all, like a telegram). Originally, it was just “A king has Zmtmr Quhwr Prnoq STOP daughters STOP 1 pad key is XYZZY”. I doubled it just to add more narrative and hints. So some of that ‘extra text’ could be used for extra hints. I was helping two people on discord with this, and they also got hung up on tangents. So if you think of any specific improvements that would make gameplay better for future players, I could incorporate them into the current version!
If you wanted to cram another hint into the text, maybe something like “EXPLOITING A ZERO STOP” to hint that A = 0. (And, of course, then you’d have to use A = 0 for the solution.)
Making the counting puzzle result in another OTP key that reveals another clue would certainly require drastic surgery to the game you have, (hence my suggestion that this might be done in a sequel), but it’d be really cool.
This is definitely an improvement. I’m not sure this would have directly helped me with my A = 0 issue, but just by making the space issue more explicit, that might have given me more encouragement to interpret the number 23 as you intended.
One interesting feature is that the choice of XYZZY is arbitrary and can be changed at will; it just shifts all the other names. So if the final word was five letters instead of six, I could shift the codeword to interact with it to provide a different message. In fact, it would be pretty funny to have two possible solutions (one your way and one the original way).
This game required prior knowledge as well as the use of external tools and resources. Not only were there no save or undo features, but it doesn’t even run on Gargoyle! The plot was also paper-thin, being able to fit on a post-it note, and the NPCs were entirely unimplemented - that is, when you weren’t using the tired old IF trope of not even letting you talk to them in the first place. And last but certainly least, we wrap it up by hauling a Colossal Cave reference and a treasure hunt out of the attic. 0/5 stars. /s
