csua.org/u/744 -> www.ece.ucdavis.edu/~jowens/game/jackpot/writeup.html
I received a 13 CD (thanks to 14 Alexandra Dixon for scanning) that had both music and data files on it. The music files were from an album called " 15 Jackpot: The Las Vegas Story" - lounge music, mostly. The music wasn't complete - pieces were missing from the ends of the songs. The 16 data file was a PDF with a long piece of coded ciphertext. Frequency analysis indicated this wasn't just a plain cryptogram, and it didn't have any word breaks that would make it easier to decode. The coding system turned out to be Vigenere -- we broke it the hard way, but it turned out that if we'd used the song lengths we could have derived the key (using CDDB and the album they'd entered there). The application also had two secret bits: first, the 17 Macintosh desktop file that came with the data segment of the CD had a secret message inside that indicated using the number 604 in the application would receive a bonus; The code sequence itself decoded to instructions to submit a 2-5 minute video as an application. With the help of my brother and his roommate Kenny Meehan we spent a day in Santa Cruz filming the video and doing an initial edit, then another evening doing a final edit. The 19 result turned out pretty well, and we were accepted. We were one of two teams to find both bonuses in the application. In a Jackpot 20 questionnaire, we also submitted food requests and a logo and chose "roles" on the team named after creatures in the desert; I was a roadrunner, and some of the other roles were cactus, coyote, and so on. The Jackpot website also had several 21 prepuzzles, which, when decoded, indicated that bringing a large protractor, Simpsons information, and an almanac would be useful. Our family was to visit the "Scruem, Ova, Agin, and Agin" timeshare seminar over the weekend. Game Control was actually members of the Pyrite family, and they reported that Bob Scruem had found coded directions to a treasure and to its rightful owners. The treasure was hidden by Jack Pyrite, progenitor of the Pyrite family. Bob intended to steal the treasure for himself, and our task was to find the key to the treasure and to find the rightful owners. We were asked to be in Las Vegas by 4 pm on Friday, 19 April, and that the festivities would begin at 6 pm. We were picked up at the airport by a Jackpot representative and brought to the 23 Stratosphere Hotel north of the Strip. They gave us an information binder with Las Vegas and US maps. We assembled in our 24 rooms and had social hour in the ground-floor bar with the other teams before taking the elevator to the Stratosphere's 25 tower (the highest structure in Las Vegas) for a banquet dinner. For the banquet we wore costumes: full-body clean room suits with our "Team Advil Asbestos Installation Squad" 26 logo on the back and nametags on the front. We were seated with the rookie team "Batamonium" at one table. There were several filming crews at dinner, and several members of the press as well; On each table was a large playing card per team (joker, in this case) with a character name and part of the plot. It contained information on timeshares, including 29 photos from the videos, and he spent a lot of time on 30 one particular slide that showed in which countries SOAA had timeshare interests. Though we didn't decode it properly in time, it told us to be ready at 8 am. Anyway, it was a nice way to meet a member of each of the other teams. Morning We'd agreed to be ready by 9 am (calisthenics were on the schedule for 9). Instead, we were awakened at 8 am with breakfast and the first clue. We were given a "Neo" (a Handspring Visor) and a playing card (queen, I think) which had a code on the bottom. Entering the code in the Neo started a timer, and hints for the puzzle were given out after a certain amount of time had passed. Scott, Deirdre, and Moe were in the other room, so we called them and they came down. The clue was a small paper booklet with Jack Pyrite's biography. We immediately went to the van to work on the clue there. Filming crews were waiting on top of the parking structure: "You guys are in the lead! We were passed by several teams who finished while we were working on it, led by Bloodstone ( 32 Blood & Bones). The clue involved making a calendar per month and marking the dates mentioned in the book on the calendar. The dates went from the 1800's well into the 2000's, making it tough to use the Neo or our Palms to get the day of the month. The perpetual calendar in the almanac and a phone call to colleague 33 Kekoa helped get the rest. The answer sent us to the 34 Ethel M Chocolate Factory in Henderson, 10 miles southeast or so. At the chocolate factory, we had our pictures taken and put on a chocolate bar. While we waited, we looked at the other apps on the Neo: a blackjack guide and a moving-box puzzle. The chocolate, when finished, had our picture and the phrase "Maguey Verde" plus a five-digit number. Next to the chocolate factory was a cactus garden, and finding the 35 Maguey Verde cactus gave us the other 5 digits of the number. We called the number which directed us to the 36 Callville Bay Marina on 37 Lake Mead. At the dock, we were given a speedboat and a lake map, and we set off for a specific cove mentioned in the phone message. We left at the same time as "Mukiltoneum" (the 38 White team from 39 Microsoft Games). Moe and Greg did some excellent piloting, never letting off the throttle, on the 20 minute ride each way. Lake Mead is 40 beautiful - very blue water with desert all around. When we arrived at the cove 41 Maguey Verde was waiting with the clue on land, so I stripped down to boxers and had a 42 short swim in pretty cold water. The clue was a series of 9 discs with pictures of celebrities on them with dates. The first letters of the last names of each spouse spelled "HOOVERDAM" on one side and "ELEVENLOT" on the other. We crossed Hoover Dam to the Arizona side (parking lot 11, overlooking the dam) and met "Barley Corn", who told us a story of his girlfriend on the other side of the dam whom he couldn't visit because of trouble with the law. Moe and Alex dashed over to the other side and returned with a large 46 semaphore flag, and we gave Barley the message from her. Grateful, he gave us a worksheet used for deciphering the metapuzzle of poker games. The puzzle was semaphore based - it had a 15x15 grid of points. Afternoon We left at the same time as Bloodstone and we reached Dry Lake together. Arriving at the lake we found 48 12-foot high PVC dodecahedra and "Big Red", who inserted a small ball into the pipes making up the structure and locked it off with a padlock. We had to figure out how to manipulate the dodecahedron to make the ball fall out the hole coming from the other direction, without allowing the dodecahedron to touch the ground. This was complicated by most of the pipes being blocked. Fortunately, this didn't take too long, and the clue to the next place was inscribed on the ball. Engraved on the ball was "Matt Simon" (a character in the plot) and " 49 Techatticup". It turned out that it's a 50 small mine town 10 miles southeast, but that the version of the map that we'd been given did not have this town on it (though all the other teams did). We arrived at the mine and received a tour from the owner. Until very recently it was an abandoned mine, but now it's used for tours and movie sets (" 51 3000 Miles from Graceland" was a recent movie filmed there). In the mine we met " 52 Matt Simon", a skeleton, who had a map next to him that led to two clues in the other buildings at the site. One clue led to a 53 Magic 8 Ball with the "8" written as "1000". The clue in the window of the 8 Ball said "I am unable to see the answer". The other clue was a grid of pool balls, 6x6, with a 1, 2, 3, and 4 ball on the outside at each of the N, E, S, and W directions. We called a hotel in Boulder City to get exact directions, since the statue wasn't on the map. We were told to drive north to Las Vegas at this point, so we stopped in a gas station parking lot (where we were approached to buy marijuana, thanks, guys). Arranging the postcards in chronological order and superimposing ...
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