100827 Locations; Locker Combo + Yearbook Puzzle Prototypes

We had another productive meeting last Thursday. Present were: Allen, Dwight, Erik, Lisa, Melissa, Sean, Trisha, and Wei-Hwa.

LOCATIONS

We reviewed a few new candidate locations for the central lab. Allen will visit a few more, such as Dogpatch Studios. Sean will contact his artist friends post-Burning Man and ask for leads.

In September we'll pick the top 3 or 4 locations and then have a scouting day. Allen, Sean, Erik, and Melissa expressed particular enthusiasm (a/k/a willingness) to participate, but all are welcome. Target date for this scouting trip is 9/18 or 19.

HIDDEN MESSAGES REVEALED IN PART III

We discussed the possibility of having the Part I puzzles reveal additional messages in Part III as a way to make the start of Part III more interesting even though they'll be presented with the same puzzles. The general feeling was that this is something we should do once if at all. Doing more than that might be a pain for us to implement and might erode the verisimilitude of this story we're trying to immerse the players in.

The players *do* need to get some new information in Part III to help them figure out that they have to break the infinite time loop and how to do it. The Jiffy Pop puzzle will probably be a key conduit for this information.

The original conception was that the Jiffy Pop puzzle would be a physical puzzle that makes a grand entrance via the time machine near the beginning of Part III. There was general enthusiasm for an alternate approach: the data of the Jiffy Pop puzzle could be present at the start of even Part I, but we'd be so subtle about it that the players wouldn't even realize that it's data. Then along the way in Part II they learn a key (or some such) that shows them how to notice and decode the data. Then in Part III they have the key and the data. Finally, at the end of Part III they have to send the data back to the beginning of the Game so that it appears there. [I'm still a little fuzzy on how all this will work both on a game mechanic and storytelling level, but the gang seemed quite excited about this approach.]

LEAD TIME FOR DRY RUN OF GAME

There was general agreement that we should err on the side of having more lead time rather than less between the dry run of the game and the real thing (at least four weeks).

PUZZLE PROTOTYPE TESTING

We split into two groups. One group tested Sean's locker combo puzzle prototype. The other tested Lisa's yearbook puzzle.

Next session: 9/9!