A gathering of gamers banded together recently in order to solve an in-game puzzle.
Players from all around the world who were on the hunt for the brand-new Lucid Nightmare purple unicorn mount in the enormously popular multiplayer online role playing game World of Warcraft went on to flood threads, join chat channels by the tens of thousands, and even crashed a voice server after over a thousand players began talking simultaneously before managing to solve the mystery.
The Mount the Latest in Puzzle Series
The purple unicorn mount was the most recent of a series of puzzles which developers for the game have inserted into it which require the community to decipher. Earlier examples include:
● The Long-Forgotten Hippogryph
This was a pink/purple gryphon mount that required clicking on crystals scatter near and randomly around the Warcraft: Legion expansion zone, Adzuna.
● The Sun Darter Hatchling pet
This spawns at the rear of caves in a long-abandoned zone and requires nothing less than a total of 15 individual potions and consumable items to gain.
● The Riddler’s Mind-Worm
A flying eel/worm mount which came as a result of clicking on scattered pages throughout the universe of the World of Warcraft.
The Riddler's Mind-Worm, a flying eel/worm mount which comes from clicking on scattered pages throughout the World of Warcraft universe.
The Search Began with the Opening of Argus
The search for the Lucid Nightmare began when patch 7.3 was released in World of Warcraft, and this opened up Argus, a new world. With only two bases currently available in the new world it was tough to get the player base started in on the new mystery, but it was enough. As has been proved with the sometimes difficult calls required in eSports bets, this part of the world loves a good challenge!
Players Joining at Unbelievable Rates
Carbonitex server stats revealed that participation rose astronomically, at one point topping more than 38 000. Players were eventually joining at a rate of over 1000/hour, and more than 1 200 people were making use of the voice chat simultaneously yesterday, which caused the client to crash. Admins who had volunteered for a 14-hour day put the 60-second, then two-minute slow-mode on the chat function, and it still scrolled by too quickly for most people to read.
A Difficult Puzzle, but One to Solve
The puzzle was difficult, and it took players from all areas of the in-game world everything from mini-games to clickables, written clues, to mathematical manipulation to crack. At one point, gamers managed to break through a floor with a light puzzle situated in Ulduar. Gamers from China assisted in breaking a binary-code impasse which related to the low-level dungeon of Gnomeregan. Players even made maps based on Excel of places in which they had tried, failed, and then tried again within the individual areas!
A player on the Malygos server, Egargiss, stated that it took him in excess of two hours alone in order to solve a maze –just one in the long list of steps provided. He added that he was watching Discord, and solving the puzzle at the same time that they were.