Puzzlehunt

Promotional poster for the annual Manbites Dog puzzle hunt.

Part of a series on
Puzzles
Types Guessing Riddle Situation Logic Dissection Induction Logic grid Self-reference Mechanical Combination Construction Disentanglement Lock Go problems Folding Stick Tiling Tour Sliding Chess Maze (Logic maze) Word and Number Crossword Sudoku Puzzle video games Mazes Metapuzzles
Topics Brain teaser Dilemma Optical illusion Packing problems Paradox Problem solving Puzzlehunt Syllogism Thinking outside the box
Lists Impossible puzzles Maze video games Nikoli puzzle types Puzzle video games Puzzle topics

A рuzzlehunt is a puzzle game where teams compete to solve a series of puzzles at a particular site, in multiple sites or via the internet. Groups of puzzles in a puzzle hunt are often connected by a metapuzzle, leading to answers which combine into a final set of solutions.

Puzzle Hunt Events

Some famous annual puzzlehunts are:

• the D.A.S.H. (Different Area Same Hunt) takes place on the same day in multiple cities in the USA using ClueKeeper as the interface.^[1]
• the MIT Mystery Hunt (Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA)^[2],
• the Melbourne University Mathematics & Statistics Society (MUMS) puzzlehunt (Melbourne, Australia),
• the Sydney University Maths Society (SUMS) puzzlehunt (Sydney, Australia),
• the TMOU (Brno, Czech Republic)
• the Microsoft Puzzle Hunt (Redmond, Washington, United States),
• the Miami Herald's Tropic Hunt (Miami, Florida, USA),
• the Washington Post's Post Hunt (Washington, DC, USA),
• the Gen Con Puzzle Hunt (Indianapolis, Indiana, USA),
• Mezzacotta (formerly the Canon Information Systems Research Australia Puzzle Competition) (here).
• The Phish.net Quest puzzle sequence (summary here).
• The Great Puzzle Hunt in Bellingham, WA every April (next event: April 1, 2017)

College puzzlehunts include the aforementioned MIT Mystery Hunt as well as:

• PuzzleCrack (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA)
• College Puzzle Challenge (Multiple Locations, North America), hosted by Microsoft as a recruiting event on college campuses.
• Palantir's Puzzle Challenge, a recruiting event on multiple campuses hosted by Palantir Technologies
• Google Games, a multi-part competition that usually includes logic puzzles, coding, trivia, and building challenges that utilize materials like LEGO bricks
• APT Puzzle Tournament, a recruiting event on multiple campuses hosted by Applied Predictive Technologies
• Puzzle Hunt, put on every semester by a student organization called PuzzleHuntCMU at Carnegie Mellon University's Pittsburgh, PA campus
• Nova Quest, a campus-wide puzzlehunt organized by the Nova Quest student organization, taking place each spring at Villanova University
• Puzzle Hunt, open to all students and organized by the Rice University IEEE student chapter
• The VT Hunt, an annual puzzlehunt at Virginia Tech that involves both abstract puzzles and physical clues
• Puzzlehunt, a puzzlehunt made annually by the Stanford University Mathematical Organization
• Berkeley Mystery Hunt, a puzzlehunt at UC Berkeley made by The Campus League of Puzzlers

Sometimes, the prize for winning a puzzlehunt is to create the next one.

Related puzzle events

• The Game (a puzzlehunt combined with a road rally)
• Microsoft Puzzle Safari (Redmond, Washington)
• Race In The City (an Amazing Race-style event in Toronto)
• Puzzled Pint (a monthly puzzlehunt aimed at beginner to intermediate teams)
• Prehistoric Puzzlehunt (an annual event at the Museum of the Earth in Ithaca, NY) www.priweb.org/puzzlehunt
• Mission Street Puzzles (San Francisco, California)

Puzzle Hunt Event Calendars

• Puzzle Hunt Calendar
• Puzzle Pile Event Calendar

See also

• Letterboxing
• Geocaching
• Alternate reality game
• Treasure hunt (game)
• Geohashing
• Encounter (game)
• La chouette d'or
• The Last of Sheila, a murder mystery film set at a puzzlehunt

References