First of all, it's a pity to say that there is no New Year game this year.

The last blog update was two months ago. During this period, I wrote many drafts intermittently, all of which were forced to be put on hold due to work commitments, including the New Year game for 2025. The game is currently in a semi-finished state (and the complete gameplay has not even been determined😭), so I'm sharing one of the more interesting ideas for this year's New Year game here.

Game Inspiration💡

Kryptos is a sculpture located in the courtyard of the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters in Virginia, USA, designed and built by James Sanborn, and completed on November 3, 1990. The name of the sculpture comes from the Greek word for "hidden," and its theme is "intelligence gathering." The sculpture is inscribed with 865 characters, which are divided into four sections of ciphertext, each encrypted using a different method.

• The first section: has been decrypted, and the content is "Between subtle shading and the absence of light lies the nuance of iqlusion." The word "iqlusion" is a deliberate misspelling of "illusion."
• The second section: has been decrypted, yielding the coordinates 38°57′6.5″N 77°8′44″W.
• The third section: has been decrypted, describing the scene when Howard Carter opened the tomb of the Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun.
• The fourth section: remains undeciphered to this day.^{[^1]}

The second section of the sculpture uses the Vigenère cipher for encryption.^{[^2]}

Game Idea

This New Year game will be divided into two stages.

• The puzzle for the first stage of the game has not yet been decided. After solving the puzzle, players will receive a string of characters and can claim the first-stage red packet reward🧧.
• In the second stage, players will be given a Vigenère cipher table (of course, without being told that it is a Vigenère cipher table) and a piece of ciphertext. Players need to use the string obtained in the first stage as the plaintext to deduce the key in reverse. This key will be the final result of the game and can be used to claim the second-stage red packet reward🧧.

I've also created a verification tool that I hope will be helpful for your understanding.

If you have any better ideas or suggestions, please let me know✌️

Finally:

Happy New Year

May your future be pure and bright, like your lovely gaze right now.

Recommended Viewing

[Video]The Unbreakable Kryptos Code

References