The Code Challenge - a maths treasure hunt by the BBC

adrianhon — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 12:14:42 -0800

I helped make the games and treasure hunt for a BBC Two series called The Code, a fantastic three-part series about maths in the world around us presented by Prof. Marcus du Sautoy. While it's just finished, you can still watch clips; play games about tessellation, prime numbers, symmetry (this one is awesome), and physics; and tackle our beautiful, free 84 page book of puzzles. Then there's the treasure...

...a silver, bronze, and steel 3D-printed sculpture of the five platonic solids, designed by maths sculpture expert and Mefi favorite Bathsheba Grossman! We revealed the treasure by sending out 1024 postcards each with a slice of the treasure and individually-numbered by a string from pi, and they were quickly photographed, normalised, and reassembled by players into extremely impressive 3D reconstructions.

The puzzle book has a nice mix of easy mazes, trivia and Sudoku, along with some very tricky brainteasers and a whole number of meta-levels that you need to solve. To unlock it, it does require you to enter three 'Codebreaker passwords' which you can get by playing the games and watching the clips (or perhaps by asking on our our Facebook page, if you're in a real hurry!). If you're one of the first three eligible people* to solve the book of puzzles, then you could in our Finale to find the treasure.

PS: If you liked Perplex City, then you'll like The Code - I was the lead designer of Perplex City, and some of the puzzle designers from that game are involved in this treasure hunt.

*Only UK residents over 18 can win it, I'm afraid, but anyone around the world can play - and isn't that where the fun is?

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The Code Challenge - a maths treasure hunt by the BBC