The Da Vinci Code Quest on Google |
Information Center |
For general information on the contest and an analysis of the first twelve challenges including commentary on the puzzles and some of the solutions, go to our initial page on Google's Da Vinci Code Quest.
We are now at the halfway point of the first phase of the contest. The challenges in this section are of the third difficulty level.
Below, I will describe below some of my thoughts as I solve more of the puzzles.
The puzzle for today was nearly identical to the one from day 7.
The task was to place 5 sets of 5 symbols into a 5-by-5 grid such that each row, column and outlined region contained one each of the five symbols. Five of the symbols were pre-placed (compared to 8 on day 7).
I was a little more methodical in solving this puzzle. I never had to make a guess. At every move I was able to find at least one piece that had to go in a specific location.
My question after completing the puzzle was "Translate amour from French". Of course I knew the answer was "love"!
It is interesting to note that Google is trying to get people to use another of their services. The hint for this question was as follows: Looking for a language guru? Use your mobile phone to send a translation request to Google SMS.
Other puzzle solvers have reported the following questions and answers:
I honestly do not understand the challenge of this particular type of puzzle. Either I've been extremely lucky, or there is nothing to it. I click on a piece of debris, and one or two others start to flash. I click on one of them and it merges with the one I first clicked. Repeat until the art work is cleared...
The resulting question involved another type of translation. As with several of the recent challenges, there are many different questions being asked. Mine was "Translate relib from Atbash.".
For those that haven't figured it out yet, Atbash is a code whereby A replaces Z, B replaces Y, C replaces X, etc.
The answer to my question was "ivory".
Other puzzle solvers have reported the following questions and answers:
This challenge had another fairly easy puzzle to solve but it was definitely a little harder than the previous two puzzles where art work had to be hung. My puzzle had two pieces of art work already hung and six that I had to place.
My question on solving the puzzle was another translation: "Translate design to Italian". The answer was "disegno".
If you are stuck, follow the Google SMS link and enter the question exactly as given. Note that you don't really have to do this from your cell phone. You can use the virtual phone on the SMS webpage.
Other puzzle solvers have reported the following questions and answers:
Today's puzzle was another three-move-checkmate scenario. But this one had many more pieces to contend with than the previous two chess challenges. My board for this challenge showed 13 black pieces and 13 white pieces.
As with the previous chess challenges, the moves were controlled by answering multiple-choice questions.
Question 1: The Louvre's famous Pyramid was designed by: (1) Tadao Ando, (2) I.M. Pei, (3) Richard Meier or (4) Frank Gehry. I knew the answer to this question and selected (2).
Question 2: What French king built the Louvre? (1) Francis II, (2) John II, (3) Philip II Augustus or (4) Louis XIV. Since I didn't know the answer, I used Google to find the Wikipedia article for the Louvre. Therein I found the answer to be (3). (The answer to the first question can be found in that article as well.)
Question 3. Which of these people in history never set foot in Notre Dame? (1) Henry VI of England, (2) Joan of Arc, (3) Pope Leo IX or (4) Abelard and Eloise. I used my knowledge of chess to determine that the final move had to be by using the answer (3).
Last week I thought the observation challenge was one of the more difficult challenges. Today's was much easier.
The keywords wit, wisdom, quest and fascinating were given as clues to use in a search on Google Video. The result of the search was a 44-second clip titled "The Da Vinci Code - Meet Sir Leigh Teabing".
Question 1: Speaking of fascinating characters, there's only one letter in the entire video that is clearly written in lower case. What is that letter? The answer to this question can be found at 0:31 where we see the writing "SO DARK THE CON Of MAN". The answer was "f".
Question 2: In just one word, the noble Sir Leigh describes the pursuit that both he and you are on. What is that word? The answer was "quest".
Question 3: And to bring this back to the topic of movie spectacles, how many times is Sir Leigh shown wearing his? His spectacles, that is. The answer was "7".
This challenge started with assembling a jigsaw puzzle. As with the previous jigsaw puzzles, there were 16 pieces in a 4-by-4 format. Given that four of the pieces are corners and eight others form the rest of the edges, these puzzles are easy to assemble.
The resulting image was an aerial view of a city. When I completed the puzzle, the "Submit" box appeared to the left of the image. There also appeared to be some text above the "Submit" box but the text was obscured by a black blob. I assumed that I needed to identify the location, so I followed the hint above the image: "Feeling lost? Find your bearings on Google Maps."
I figured that the city would have some importance in terms of The Da Vinci Code. My first guess was Paris. I then tried London. Sure enough, that was it! It was easy to identify the water features on the two maps.
On entering "London" as the answer, I received the following information: "Well done! There are four Blades hidden around the city. Please find them and click on them."
The four Blades (which look like small triangles) were located as follows. One was at the top of the image just to the right of center. One was on the left edge just above the center line. The remaining two were near the bottom of the image about one third and two thirds of the way across the bottom.
After clicking all four blades, pairs were connected by two lines creating a large X on the image. The following text appeared: "You have found all four Blades, and lo! they draw an X over a place just slightly north of the Victoria and Albert Museum, home of Leonardo's Codex Forster. What is its name?"
Using Google Maps, I zoomed in on the area just to the north of the museum. The area was labelled "Imperial College London". So I tried "Imperial College" as the answer and it was correct!
Many thanks to those who have contributed through the blog and via email!
| DAResler.net | Information Center |
Updated on October 12, 2007 |
Displayed on November 20, 2008
Copyright © 2006 D. A. Resler. All rights reserved. |