Or at least maybe one of those things. I'd settle for amusing. Anyways here is how it works!
You take a chess board, and a glue a configuration of chess pieces where a chosen side can make a checkmate in one move! I have chosen black. The movie can vary in difficulty, though chess skills vary so wildly between audience that child's play to one person could take another minutes to figure out.
The Black King fell off and is currently MIA, his position doesn't really matter but he is supposed to be on the glue stain in the lower left hand corner.
As you can see there are also tiny numbers on every square. Or maybe you can only see that there are green smudges on the square, in which case I will let you know that they are numbers. Each number is three digits long and has no apparent use, the only hint is that attached to the chessboard is a box with a combination lock keeping it shut.
Each set of three numbers is half of the combination. In this case the numbers are 340:
And 034
The squares these numbers are placed are indicate the piece to be moved, and the square to be moved to in order to produce the desired checkmate. So the Black Knight, takes the White Queen, and the resulting number is 340034.
This in itself is not immediately translatable into a combination, as one could suspect it to mean 3-4-34, or just use the first half for 3-4-0, or the second half for 0-3-4. In truth they must be separated into 34-00-34 and then input into the lock to turn this:
This in itself is not immediately translatable into a combination, as one could suspect it to mean 3-4-34, or just use the first half for 3-4-0, or the second half for 0-3-4. In truth they must be separated into 34-00-34 and then input into the lock to turn this:
Into a satisfying click.
The next step is to open the box to reveal:
Another box!! Always good for a laugh, this box within a box merely served as a visual shield in case the first box got open enough to see inside of it despite the locks best efforts. The small blue box can be easily removed and opened....
To reveal the prize!
A slightly fancier set of the two key pieces of the puzzle, a Black Knight and a White Queen.
The prize could have been anything, in this case just a physical reminder of a hopefully fun little puzzle.
This short, relatively simple puzzle is short and attainable, it involves a satisfying feeling when the lock unlocks and can be reset easily to amuse any number of people.
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