h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Seems like your character's a bit of a contortionist.

How're you doing with the cards?

I'll let everyone know the minute that my cards arrive in the mail. No store in my area sells them, so the only cards I've done so far are the two that they offer online for free.

Yeah, I guessed that from your score of 41. Shame you can't get them in the area - Leeds has a few shops that stock them. I went to Travelling Man, so's I could have a gander at the board games.

I'm just going to start randomly typing in 12 digit codes. Maybe I'll just happen to locate one.

Okay, I just discovered something nifty while doing Perplex City research.

Apparently, card #251 is an insanely hard cryptogram or something of a similarly complex nature. It's so hard that a band of people across the Internet have joined forces and created a computer program that can solve it for them.

The catch, though, is that it'll take so very much time and calculation that they need as much computing power as possible.

So, I've downloaded the 13thlabour.exe file, and I've started processing for them. Maybe I'll be the lucky computer that solves the final piece of the puzzle.

Interesting. They've got a readable image of the card on their website; I think they're numbers in Hex, but they don't translate directly using ASCII code. Not that I'm going to spend too long on a card I don't have - need to get some more of my own.

I've not really spent any of my own time on it, personally. I've just donated my computer cycles, kinda like how the SETI@home program works. It didn't even take any time to download.

Reading into the history, it looks like the creators may have inadvertantly suggested this solution. The puzzle's creator basically said "Bwahahahaha, it would take 30,000 computers working in tandem for two months to solve this!" So, naturally, the players set out to do just that (they're mostly done by now.)

Even though I don't have the card, I think I'm still elligible for the prizes they're offering should my computer be the lucky one that generates the key.

I was actually wondering if they were barking up the wrong tree. For example: does converting the numbers into binary form a big picture of a cat? (Probably not, but you get the idea - it might not be susceptible to basic computer cryptanalysis.)

I need to find out which other h2g2ers are doing this. P'raps I'll set up a page.

Might not be a bad idea. I can think of four right off the top of my head, and h2g2's so big that there's bound to be someone else.

We need a smilie.

Heck, I'd settle for a smilie.

There: A15955914

I think you can get by with current smileys.

Perfect! That's the progression of my mind nearly every time I try to solve a really hard puzzle.

Update: located a store just forty-five minutes (driving time) away from my house. Now I just need to find a good week to drive up there and back.

Well done. How much do the packs cost over there? I paid £2.50 at travelling man, which is rather a lot for six glossy cards.

Most of what I see is for $5.00. Which, as you said, is an awful lot of money for six cards.

I think I might wait until I'm earning to buy another lot. Give you a chance to catch up.

You'll never crush me with that attitude. "There is no Overkill. There is only Open Fire and I Need To Reload."

Be that as it may, I dread to think how much the leaders have spent on this thing. On the other hand, there's a company selling them through Amazon that seems to charge 1p. They don't really specify what you get, so I wonder if it's some people getting rid of their swaps.

Probably.

eBay also looks like an interesting place to get these cards. A lot of people are selling "The Cube" card. I wonder how many points that one is worth.

It's mostly high-scoring ones on the UK site, but one guy's trying to flog several dozen, all below 30 in the numbering scheme. At 55p inc P&P he's not having much luck.