Getting started
The first thing you’ll need to do is register and log in. You can use your Steam account to log in, or create a glyph account.
We suggest you form a team of around five people. When creating a team, make sure only one person from your group does so - once you're on a team you can't join another.
I’m stuck!
Don’t worry, it happens to us all! We can’t tell you the answers, but there are some general hints that might help.
Anything on the puzzle page could be or contain a clue: pay attention to the title and story text as well as the obvious content.
Type anything you think could be relevant into the answer box. Even if it’s not the right answer, it could unlock a hint if you’re along the right lines. Puzzles will also show hints over time without you guessing anything. There are no penalties for incorrect guesses apart from a short cooldown during which you can't guess again.
If you’re very stuck or if you think a puzzle is broken, contact the puzzle admins on Discord by using the !stuck discord bot command and one of us will get back to you. Make sure not to reveal any details of puzzles in public, no matter how trivial. We want to keep it fun and fair for everyone.
The admins are constantly monitoring teams’ progress and what they’re trying. We actively try to make sure nobody falls too far behind. If a particular puzzle seems to be unduly difficult or even has a mistake, we might add hints or extra answers.
Accessibility
By their nature, some puzzles are more difficult for some teams to complete - this might be for mundane reasons (e.g. your team is just really bad at spotting Braille...) or because all the people contributing have a disability which makes it hard or even impossible.
While the first thing you can do is to create a diverse team with a broad range of abilities, it might still be that your entire team is, for example, colourblind or deaf.
If you are struggling with a puzzle in this situation the admins will be able to help you past the puzzle one way or another. We will rely on your honesty for this as we don't have the ability to determine reliably anyone's claim to have a disability. This does therefore mean that you will not be able to win if you make use of this - consistent with our principle that diverse teams have the best chance at winning!
If you anticipate this happening you can chat to us in advance to get more information about how we might be able to help. We can also talk - in general terms only - about what kind of puzzles we write and whether you're likely to be affected.
Things to try
Here are some general tips that could be helpful for any puzzle:- Run it by someone in your team, or someone else you know
- Try not to overthink – keep it simple
- Go away and think about something else, then come back with fresh ideas
- Eat or drink something to keep your energy up
Useful Free Software
- A collaborative document editor such as Google Docs
- An image editor such as Paint.NET or The GIMP
- A sound editor such as Audacity
- Phone OCR software such as Google Lens
- A barcode scanner app such as Google Lens
- A good text editor such as Notepad++
- CyberChef
Techniques
These next tricks are more specific; some puzzles might not use any, but they're always useful to bear in mind. The majority of puzzles will use an idea at least similar to one of them.
- Google it!
- Google Search
- Google Image
- Google Books
- Google Scholar
- Check the source code
- Reverse image search
- Think about the puzzle title
- Convert data to another representation:
- Between hex, binary, decimal or other bases
- From Braille, Morse, sign language, ASCII or numbers to letters
- Cook it in CyberChef
- Break numbers into prime factors
- Rearrange the information:
- Alphabetise
- Reverse
- Chronological order
- Take initial letters
- Treat information as something else:
- Phone numbers
- IP addresses
- Seat numbers
- Dates
- Atomic weights/numbers
- Coordinates
- Radio stations
- ISBNs
- Codes of railway stations or airports
- Say it out loud
- Cryptanalysis:
- Try common cipher tools (Rumkin Cipher Tools)
- Graph numbers or letter frequencies
- Make patterns and pictures:
- Connect the dots
- Overlay it on a map or picture of something
- Make it into 3D
- Fold it
- Look at letters on a computer keyboard
- Open files in a program to inspect or manipulate:
- Try changing the file extension such as from .jpg to .mp3 and opening it
- Open it in an image editor
- Look at metadata
- Use a hex-editor
- Guess the correct answer...