Solving the 2019 Easter puzzle
Once again, Easter is over and with it the Easter puzzle. This time, too, some heads have smoked, some keyboards have burned and one or the other has gone mad trying to solve it. But mostly, we hope you enjoyed it.
However, some of you have been spared a few questions and a few answers. To ease your suspense, here is the solution we want to take you down the rabbit hole and let you in on all the secrets of our art of riddling and of course solve all questions.
25% of all participants made it past question 10, only 17% of participants made it past question 20 and so on. From question 30 onwards, only the hard-core puzzlers among you remained with just under 11% of the total number of participants. And if you are one of the 5% who had the answer to the last question ready, you really are a rarity!
One of the few and at the same time the first to crack the correct solution to the last questionkindly left us his impressions, which we would now like to share with you.
This winner has decided to donate part of his winnings to charity. We have therefore donated €150 to the comforters of the soul for him. 😊
But now to his own puzzle story. Perhaps some of you will recognize yourself in his explanations.
The getDigital Easter puzzle 2019 - a success story
Every year anew it's time for us: GetDigital Easter puzzle. We have been puzzling together for a long time as a team of two couples who are friends. As there was unfortunately no Christmas puzzle, we were already suffering from withdrawal symptoms and were all the more pleased when it finally started. As Maundy Thursday was still a working day, we had to solve the first tasks on our smartphones before we got home. We made good progress at first, even if we had to look something up at one point or another.
By early evening, we had already reached question 20 without any major blockages. Then it became a bit more internet-intensive, or you needed more computing power or a sheet of paper to approach one or two puzzles. Well equipped, we continued - until question 22 came up, which we didn't actually think of until the next day. But luckily you can skip questions, so we carried on until the next hurdle - question 27! Sometimes it's nasty when you're right at the beginning of the questions and one or two additional clues aren't there yet. Well, and if you try to solve this question so logically, then it doesn't work. And not like this either - and not like this either. After a while, a partial solution helped us to find the right path and thus answer the question. And then it went smoothly again - until math came up - stochastics - we don't like stochastics - really. So it took a while again until the right solution appeared. The rough path is clear, but the details sometimes get in the way. Then came a few smaller "tricky tasks" that could be solved with logical thinking, knowledge of trigonometry and a little VBA. And so it was actually quite relaxed until question 38, which was supposed to be the end of the first puzzle evening - it was already really late - or early.
After a rather short night, we started the puzzle on Good Friday, freshly refreshed. The 22 and also the 38 were suddenly no longer a big problem - sometimes a little rest helps. The 39 was no problem either - it was only the 40 that tried to annoy us again. We immediately had the right idea, and it actually led to a good solution, but this solution was not accepted at the time - what a shame, it would have saved us a lot of headaches! 😉😉 We admit, we don't know the complete way to solve 41 - we were a long way, but the last little step was missing - and then it was the lucky hand that had a brilliant idea and thus also brought the solution word. After the first day, which solved a huge number of questions, the second was rather sobering. And it was about to get worse. :P
By now it was Sunday, and question 43 was not going to be solved that day. It was only later that we realized that what was actually such a cool idea was not exactly met with approval on the other side - who could have guessed that they were like that? Well, although we knew directly what we really needed and where to find it, we couldn't get it. We did have someone from the very top on the phone, but they just didn't want to give us the information and were even more unfriendly. So we gave this as feedback to GD, and only the subsequent change to the question/answer option got us any further. (Basically, the idea was great, but it's always difficult to involve everyone in this type of question - because if you don't have any contacts, you're definitely out of luck - just like Gran Canaria! And that's a real shame!)
Easter Monday and the new working week were slowly approaching - and the end of the puzzle suddenly seemed a long way off! Excitingly, however, we really should make it to the last question by Tuesday morning. And then it stagnated - for a long time. On the way to question 49, ideas kept popping up about how we could use various clues from the livestream to come up with solutions to possible other questions. Unfortunately, this led to a bit of confusion, as we already had information that we didn't actually need and ignored other information, even though it was important. Attempts to communicate with certain counterparts failed. And even though the first part of the solution to question 49 was known very quickly, we didn't get to the second. Very annoying! And so the weekend came. It's amazing what ideas you come up with when you try to find out what the getDigital team has come up with for the questions. You discover sites on the Internet that you never knew before (and didn't really want to know), you see pictures that burn into your eyes, and you find videos and songs that you can't get out of your head. But you can't find the way to the solution.
Then the weekend was over - not a new realization, and slowly the tone became harsher in all channels - obviously it wasn't just us who were so close to the solution and yet so far away. From here on it gets a little boring, as the days got longer and longer, the nights shorter and shorter, and the ideas fewer and fewer. One thing was clear: if we don't solve this week, then it's over. This constant little man breathing down your neck, whispering stupid and good ideas, but none of which are any good. And then it feels like you already have all the information, but the last step is missing. But then came the decisive idea - Friday night. More than two weeks of puzzling - almost two weeks just working on the last task, and then the flash of inspiration - should it really be that easy? No, it wasn't easy even then, but the idea was the right one - and so was the path. After that, it was just a matter of reading carefully, not overlooking anything and drawing the right final conclusion - and there it was, the solution! So simple and yet so ingenious! And we were the first to find it on what was actually the right path. (At least there were two attempts to find the solution, which produced the result in a different way - and were extremely demotivating).
This is the first time in all the time we've been puzzling over this that we've succeeded. Yes, it's a great feeling! After all that work, you want to be rewarded for it! :D
Finally, we would like to thank the entire GetDigital puzzle team for the great puzzles, all of which were easy to solve, even if you do go off the beaten track and explore new paths (of thought). And even though we don't speak Korean, don't like EVE Online and stochastics isn't our hobby, it was still possible to solve all the puzzles with more or less effort - that's how we like it! And of course, thank you for making it possible to donate to an organization of our choice!
Keep up the good work, and see you at Christmas! 😊😊
Best regards, JF'n'Co.
And here's what you've all been waiting for: all the questions and answers. And here we go:
Solution to all questions of the 2019 Easter puzzle
They all were. Would you have known? Or did you even know? Are there still things left unclear? Let us know 😊
We're definitely looking forward to next year and the next Easter puzzle with you!
Personally, I had a lot of fun discussing with you and helping you solve the puzzle. I hope you all enjoyed it more or less and that you don't mind that some of the questions have turned out to be quite difficult. (hehe)