I've been quiet for the past few days because I've been busy running a puzzle hunt at Microsoft for about 400 people. The event began Saturday morning at 10AM and concluded at 5PM on Sunday, for a total of 31 straight hours of puzzling (yes, most teams stayed through the night). There were 34 puzzles and 2 meta-puzzles, 3 filmed video segments, 3 live performances, nine organizers and 43 teams of up to 12 people each. Four teams "solved" the hunt, with about 5 more teams getting very, very close as time expired. The hunt was planned over a period of about eight months, although as usual with group activities much of the work actually got done near the end of that time period. I wrote six of the puzzles and both metas, and overall I'm pleased with the way things turned out. Players seemed to have a great time. I crashed at about 8PM last night and woke up at noon-- there's nothing quite so blissful as the long recuperative slumber after an all-nighter. Now I need to feed my body and catch up on various things that I've let slide while focusing on hunt prep.
Posted by Peter at May 19, 2003 1:32 PM