Sniderman's CodeBuster Giveaway-Tomarc/Barbarian at stake!

[Snider-man]

OK gang, here we go with the biggest Sniderman giveaway ever posted to AtariAge. First up, I'll let you know what the giveaway game is. You're competing for a 2600 Xonox "Tomarc the Barbarian" single-ender - a rarity of *7* and valued between $40 to $50. (The screws are showing and the end-label is torn, but it's still a worthy prize rarely found in the wild anymore.)

 

Now that I have your attention, the rules are simple. At the end of this message is a numeric code. Once cracked, the code spells out exactly what must be done to claim the prize. The prize will be shipped free-of-charge anyplace in the world to the first person who can crack the code and do what it says.

 

Look here for the key to solving the bizarre message below:

 

1. The code is in English and contains a question and instructions on what to do with the answer. First to do so wins the giveaway game.

2. If you're having trouble decoding the message, just remember where Robin wore his cape on TV's "Batman." (This is one of "those" clues, so be warned.)

3. How can the numbers go as high as 48 when there are only 26 letters in the alphabet?

4. I have no plans to offer any clues as EVERYTHING you need is enclosed in this message (though I may clarify something if it's a legitimate, non-stupid question). I'll know immediately when we have a winner. And I'll announce the winner in this thread as soon as we have one. As long as I haven't announced the winner, the code remains uncracked.

5. When a winner *is* announced, I'll also post how the code was solved for those of you still going nuts.

6. Don't expect any help this time, because this is quite a prize. You'll work if you want it bad enough.

 

OK my little codebusters, here's your chance to win a Xonox Tomarc the Barbarian single-ender. Good luck.

 

18/16/25 47/35/16/32/27/45/25 12/41 25/24/41/26/41/14/37/41/42 10/27 35/14/48/20/25/41 1/24/33/37/8 8/37/33/26 17/33/48/33/8/23/24/42 36/5/12 9/19 43/46/18/31/27 42/25/24/15/34/10/48 22/41/25/31/26/24/7/2 6/5/12 20/41/48 12/33/5/48

[General Atarian]

what if we never watched batman?

[Snider-man]

I'm *giving* away a rarity 7 cart and you ask a question like that? Well, if you want it bad enough, I guess you'll do some research on your own. You have Internet access with a world of information at your fingertips. Use it.

 

You're lucky I didn't make it an "ancient Babalonian rulers" or a "4th-dimensional logarithms" clue.

[General Atarian]

*Good* *luck* *I* *hope* *you* *find* *a* *winner*

 

 

some of us are not that old.

 

Best regards and lots of luck to all who play.

[moycon]

Wow, Must suck to be so young you haven't developed the skill to research yet!!!

 

 

MwaaHaaa One less to stand in my way!!!

[mark]

wohaaaa! i am one of those who is standing in your way!!!

[Scooterb23]

I haven't figured out the code yet, I just want you to know that the first three numbers were the exact combination of my locker in high-school...

[FND]

2. If you're having trouble decoding the message, just remember where Robin wore his cape on TV's "Batman." (This is one of "those" clues, so be warned.)  

[/b]

 

Holey mathematics sniderman he wears his cape in Prime time

 

Drew

[Thomas Jentzsch]

I know it, I know it!

 

I hope...

[MattyXB]

I know it, I know it!

 

I hope...

 

I already own this game, so I don't need to solve this riddle.

 

So good luck Thomas (The german Master of Riddles).

[Snider-man]

Sweet mother of mercy, we have a winner after only a few hours of competition. Thomas Jentzsch was the first to crack the cose and do what the message said. Heaven only knows how he did it so fast, but he is forbidden to use that big old brain of his for future contests.

 

OK, here's how he did it. First up, it's obvious that it's a "simple" letter-to-number cypher. But, as I said, there were 48 numbers and only 26 letters. Therefore, something of length of 48 letters must be the key to the code. Well, there was one sentence of 48 letters length in the message and it clearly told you that is was the key. It was the sentance reading:

 

"Look here for the key to solving the bizarre message below"

 

If you number the letters in the sentance in order (L=1, O=2 and 3, K=4, H=5, etc.), you have the key to the code. (Several numbers represent more than one letter!) Applying a simple letter-to-number substitution to the code, you get:

 

TEN OREZTEN TA NIAGAEMAG OT REWSNA LIAME EMAG YAWAEVIG EHT FO ELTIT GNIKROW LANIGIRO EHT SAW TAHW

 

Or, when read in the other direction:

 

WHAT WAS THE ORIGINAL WORKING TITLE OF THE GIVEAWAY GAME EMAIL ANSWER TO GAMEAGAIN AT NETZERO NET

 

Thomas was first to e-mail me at the address above the answer of "Thundarr the Barbarian," the correct answer to the contest.

 

I'm assuming Thomas figured out the code was backwards on his own and didn't need the "Batman" TV show clue. Get ready to groan:

 

Robin was played by Burt Ward on TV's Batman. He wore his cape on his back. So, the answer was "WARD'S BACK" or, when said backwards: "BACK WARD'S." (I told ya it was bad.)

 

Thomas, you'll need to private message your address to me again and I'll fire this off to you. Future contests will be impossibly hard, as I thought this one would go on for weeks rather than hours.

 

Congrats Thomas!

[Thomas Jentzsch]

Sweet mother of mercy, we have a winner after only a few hours of competition. Thomas Jentzsch was the first to crack the cose and do what the message said. Heaven only knows how he did it so fast, but he is forbidden to use that big old brain of his for future contests.

Well, your code was very similar to a code Ben used for his Pitfall! contest. Thanks again, Ben!

 

Solving took me about 1.5 hours. First I counted the number of occurences of each number. Then after some unsuccessful try-and-error, I realized, that you used continous blocks of numbers and only skipped a few numbers before the next block. Here is the pattern I got:

 

XX__XXXXXX_X_XXXXXXX_XXXXXX___XXXXXXX___XXX_XXXX

 

That gave me the idea, that the key was a sentence of your message (skipping unused letters). And the right sentence was the most obvious one. After that, the final decoding took me about 5 minutes.

 

I'm assuming Thomas figured out the code was backwards on his own and didn't need the "Batman" TV show clue.

Correct.

 

Thomas, you'll need to private message your address to me again and I'll fire this off to you. Future contests will be impossibly hard, as I thought this one would go on for weeks rather than hours.

For future "impossibly hard" contests you better keep my address this time.

Or ask directly for something very Atari specific...

[Snider-man]

My next contest will require the use of an Enigma machine! Good work Thomas.

[Mayhem]

Which has given me an idea too, being big on the codes... except nothing to give away!

 

Unless I design your next one Tim...?

[Snider-man]

I'd be happy to supply something, Mayhem. The harder the quiz, the better the prize. Though I thought my quiz was pretty hard. Looks like we'll need to develop something involving 4th-dimensional hypercubes, Moebius strips, and Klein Bottles.

 

Let me know what you come up with, though I'll need some time to recover from this one. The wind got totally sucked out of my sails. I'm still stunned. Wow.

[bcprs1]

Holy codebusters Batman!!!

 

I would have never got that. Good work.

[King Atari]

Robin was played by Burt Ward on TV's Batman. He wore his cape on his back. So, the answer was "WARD'S BACK" or, when said backwards: "BACK WARD'S." (I told ya it was bad.)

 

HA! The only part of the riddle that I got was that he wore it on his back!

[Mayhem]

Sure thing Tim... heh already got ideas brewing... a couple of which may be just too crazy... I'll let you know...

[Cap5750]

Like King Atari, I picked up right away that he wore it on his back. So I presumed that "something" was backwards. Now granted after about 15 minutes of looking at it, I decided my brain hurt to much, so I gave up...but here's some other thoughts I had....

 

----

Okay something is backwards...but what about the 48 numbers? Is/are some form of punctuation being used? Not likely...there must be a key (Okay I was on the right track there!)..something which creates another number which you add on to the existing number (Doh! Wrong path). So I wonder if Robin actually wore his cape in Gotham City? Perhaps Gotham City is the key? Maybe backwards is not the answer to the first riddle, maybe back or neck are the key?

----

It was about this time, that the headache occured and so I quit looking at it. Good thing too, because I was getting further and further away from the correct path I had originally started on!

 

Cap

[FND]

Well, I was way off. I was sure it had to do with prime numbers

(Robin wore his cape in prime time).

Spent a few brain cells trying different methods like factoring the

original number to prime numbers, adding them to get a new number.

Also spent some time adding the original number like 18 ( 1 + 8 )

and factoring that number to prime numbers even tried using the next

closest prime number to the original number.

As you see I spent a lot of time running in the wrong direction.

But it was a good challenge Thanks

 

Drew

[Turnspike]

Snider-man once again sends his legions of Cart Collectors to do his bidding! «Cut to the scene of Snider-man finishing his plans for world domination, and luck would have it he has an extra copy of Halloween. BWHA-HA-HA!»

[Big Player]

 

Solving took me about 1.5 hours.

 

This translates into 1.5 years of Big Player time.

 

Cool contest.