Thinkies

Now you can get all the latest news from Shinteki through Facebook or Twitter. You can also join the discussion, post photos and more by becoming a Shinteki fan on our Facebook page.

Facebook.com/PlayShinteki

Twitter.com/PlayShinteki

Thanks for being part of the Shinteki community!

No Comments »

Putting together your roster for Shinteki Decathlon can be a daunting task. Maybe you’re new to the game and don’t have any teammates, maybe some of your old team members have scattered across the globe and you need some newbies, or maybe your regular game team is too big for the Decathlon limit of 4 players (if that’s the case, I recommend making 2 teams so everyone, and more, can play). Whatever the reason, you need to find some players. Here are a few guidelines to get you started, but please add your comments, too.

Look for people that you can spend 12 hours with. In my opinion, there are two possibilities– good friends and near strangers. Here’s why. While fun, Decathlon is long, challenging and sometimes downright stressful. Good friends have already been through some intense times with you. Like that night you drank all that tequilla and then made them take you through the Krispy Kreme drive through, like, 3 times. If they’re still friends with you after that, Decathlon will be no problem. Near strangers are also a good choice, since everyone is on their better behavior and usually stays pretty polite even when things get tough. Also, if there is a conflict, you don’t have to see them again right away at work, in your dorm, or on a date.

Speaking of dating, Decathlon is not the best place for a first date. It may not be the right choice for some couples, ever. Don’t get me wrong, if you and your sweetie both enjoy puzzles, exploring the bay area, and being a little bit crazy, by all means get a team together. But if one of you doesn’t really like watching the other geek it up for 12 hours, you’re probably won’t be great teammates. It can also be awkward for the other people on the team if the two of you begin a lover’s quarrel, or start making out, in the middle of the game.

Whoever you choose for your team, make sure you’re all on the same page about your playing style before the event begins. I suggest a short team meeting before the event, where you can figure out who will bring what gear, what your uniforms will be, and how you’d like to play. For those of you who don’t yet know how you’ll play, ask yourselves this: what are we trying to get out of Decathlon? Are you avid puzzlers who want to solve everything on your own, no matter how long it takes? Do you just want to have fun, keep the pace fast, and take hints as soon as you get stuck? Is it more important to stop for a nice lunch and dinner during the day, check out the interesting locations while you’re there, take a lot of pictures and maybe solve a few puzzles along the way? Whatever your style, make sure your team is in accord and you’re off to a great start.

No Comments »

Here are some gifts that we would love to receive this holiday season. They are also good suggestions for gamers in your life, so follow the links and make someone happy.

Brent

I love the Schott’s Miscellany books. The amount of interesting and bizarre information you can find is almost endless. And, it’s a good place to start to get inspiration for a clue idea.

Linda

I want new Talkabouts with rechargeable batteries and headsets. These have a 25 mile range!

Martin

It’s time for a GPS upgrade. Decrease your chance of getting lost on the way to a clue site. I like navigating, but maps are cumbersome, and I can’t even fold them correctly.

Dave

There’s nothing more useful than a Shinteki clipboard and pad, with the most important codes right on the custom graph paper. Get one for every potential gamer in your life!

Jesse

How about a crossword and anagram solver app for the iPhone? It’s got the internet, it has GPS, but can it help you solve puzzles or win at Scrabble?  Now it can.

Reading

I need a new tool! There’s a new titanium Leatherman with 19 different gadgets to help you with any task you might encounter.

Happy Holidays!

The Shinteki Crew

No Comments »

Here’s a simple tip to improve your Shinteki game play experience. Whether you are stuck on a puzzle and hoping for insight, suffering from low team morale or simply looking for a way to celebrate completing a challenge, try a snack.

I admit, this advice probably makes me sound a little bit like your mother. But she really knew what she was talking about, believe me. My team even developed the term “hangry” to describe the grouchy attitude that comes along with hunger. I think it’s much better to eat early and often, having lots of small snacks instead of waiting until everyone is starving, then eating a big meal. So here are a few examples to whet your appetite.

The brainstorm- Your whole team is staring at a clue and no one is having any new insights, especially you. Step away from the clue and get some small, pre-made sandwiches out of the cooler, making sure to offer them to others, too. I prefer Hawaiian sweet rolls with salami and cheese, individually wrapped. DeeAnn from team Snout told me they use Uncrustables PB&J. You’d be surprised how a little sandwich can give you a new outlook on clue solving.

The social- Energy on your team is low. Maybe you took a wrong turn and are backtracking, thinking about how much time you’ve lost. Maybe someone is dozing off in the back of the van. Time for a toast! Get out the Red Bull (or Frappuccinos or little yogurt smoothie shots) and have a quick social. This works best if you’ve set up the rule that when someone calls a social, everyone must join in. It also helps to have a team chant, slogan or song that you can enjoy before your beverage.

The reward- You’ve just finished solving a clue in record time. I mean, you guys rocked that clue! Reinforce the behavior with a quick treat while you drive to the next location. I like having a small bag of Halloween candy on hand for just such an occasion. If you prefer something healthy, try those cute little cheeses, dried mango slices or some other one bite snack. It works for dog training, and it will work for you and your teammates.

Good luck, and remember, you can eat your way to victory! Or at least have a good time trying.

2 Comments »

This is just a quick note to let you know that the Shinteki Puzzle of the Month for September has been posted. The puzzle will come out on the 21st of the month for the time being, but we will not announce it again on the blog, so if you would like to get an email the minute the puzzle is posted in future months, just send an email to potm@shinteki.com with the subject heading “Notify” and we’ll take care of it.

You’ll still have access to the puzzles from previous months on the web site, including previous leader boards.  Happy solving, everyone!

No Comments »

I’m often asked where I get the ideas for the puzzles I write. I wish I had a good answer. The truth is that some of my best ideas come from what feels like thin air at the time, just popping into my head seemingly out of nowhere. Of course, this means that in order to maximize my productivity, I need to be ready for an idea whenever or wherever it strikes me. This can be a bit tricky, to say the least.

The upshot? Over the past 15 years, my life has become a tangled pile of little notes. Hastily jotted cryptic references to this or that idea for a puzzle, activity, or theme. They’re pretty much everywhere. Every now and then I make efforts to gather, collate, transcribe, or otherwise make sense of it all–and sometimes it even helps. But for the most part, I’m resigned to the fact that this army of paper scraps will never succumb.

Sure, I’ve tried notebooks. I’ve tried every filing system known to man. I’ve tried electronic gadgets of every size and flavor. But when push comes to shove, if an idea hits, I invariably just grab the nearest piece of paper and start writing. How can you change a lifetime of disorganized habit?

Sometimes I wonder if the best puzzle I ever came up with is one that I never actually wrote. It could be lying dormant under a mountain of other forgotten concepts, just waiting to be rediscovered. Or tucked into some book that I was sure I’d get back to. Or frazzled into lint-screen snow in the dryer. It’s almost enough to make me strap on the hip boots and start wading through the sea of paper that’s flooding my life.

Maybe in some future installment I’ll tell you about some of the things I do to help enable those ideas to come to me at all hours (it’s not *entirely* dumb luck, after all). Or about one of my personal favorite scraps of paper: the one with the puzzle idea that came to me directly from the Great Beyond (insert angelic choir here). But for now, I’ll leave you with one piece of advice. When you’re amassing your own personal paper battalion, avoid the temptation of using post-it style notes: the sticky strips will turn your beautiful scrap sculpture into an uncontrollable, ravenous monster. Definitely not worth it!

-Brent

No Comments »

You love to solve puzzles. We know it because we love to solve puzzles. This month, we are giving you more of what you want by debuting our Shinteki Puzzle of the Month. Every month on the 21st, a new puzzle will be available from the Connect section of the Shinteki site. That’s today, for the calendar challenged among us.  So, when you finish reading, close the blog and go check it out. If you like competition, and we know that some of you do, see how fast you can solve the puzzle and compare your speed against the puzzling community at large. We will put the first 10 solvers on the leader board in order, so your prowess will be on display all month. Good luck!

For those of you newer to puzzles, we have also put up a sample challenge. There is no pressure, just a good puzzle for you to try to solve, complete with animated hints and the ability to play all the hints if you just want to know how it works or want to check your own work. The sample challenge is linked from the Learn:Challenges section of the Shinteki site. We encourage everyone to take a look, especially if you’re wondering what Shinteki is all about.

No Comments »

Remember your first time? I sure do! I was just 19 years old when I first went all night with a bunch of geeky guys. And although I’ve played, well, a whole bunch of times since then, it’s never been quite the same.

For those who are destined to love the Game, there’s a spark that happens when you first play. Suddenly, everything around you looks like a challenge to be solved, from the decorative nautical flags at the marina to changing a flat tire. For me, an impressionable young girl, the Game showed me that there’s nothing I can’t do. Of course, now that I’m older there are quite a few things I can’t do, but who knows that when they’re 19?

Anyway, here’s picture of me and some teammates (including Martin and David) on our first Game, Mission Improbable, run at Stanford in 1991. Check out the team vehicle– we stored most of our gear by duct taping things to the inside of the roof. Hey, it may not have been the best Game ever run, but it’s still my favorite.

1 Comment »

Hello and welcome!

We are very excited to launch our new Shinteki website. We’ve added several new features, including this blog, a Shinteki store, and information about our corporate and private event offerings.

With this first entry, we would like to give you a short tour of the site. Since our company is all about conveying information in interesting ways, we wanted our website to do the same. You’ve made it here, so you have already loaded our home page and seen the way the text fades in. In addition, you may have noticed that there are two ways to navigate the site: using the bold words that appear in the text, or using the more traditional menu bar below. We invite you to explore our whole site using your preferred method of navigation.

For certain pages such as this blog, we have chosen to open a large window on top of the site. If you click on links within these pages, you can use the browser’s back button to move back to the original page. However, when you are done reading, please click “RETURN” at the top or anywhere outside the window, and you will be restored to the place from which the window was launched.

The blog is a bit of an experiment, with many of us taking turns contributing about a variety of topics. They may include info about other puzzle-related things going on in the world, stories from Games of the past, tips about running your own events or whatever else comes to mind. But most importantly, we’d like to hear your comments, and encourage a fun and interesting dialogue.

We hope you’ll come back to visit often, share your comments with the community and recommend us to others. Thanks!

-The Shinteki Crew

2 Comments »