MIT Mystery Hunt 2020/Safari Adventure

Safari Adventure is the ninth round of the 2020 MIT Mystery Hunt unlocked after 77 feeder puzzles are solved.

Description

Partial overworld menu for Safari Adventure

Safari Adventure is a safari park: an attraction with animals freely roaming about what is typically an open plain. Most animals in these parks are relatively large and not native to the area (typically African)—lions, rhinos, and the like typically come to mind—but this particular safari park also hosts animals that would not be part of a traditional safari park, such as farm animals, aquatic animals, and rats, not to mention a few animals without a real-life equivalent.

List of Puzzles

Each feeder puzzle is represented on the map by the corresponding animal.

• Bear
• Bobcat
• Chicken
• Crocodile
• Dog
• Dragon
• Frog
• Golden Wolf
• Horse
• Hyena
• Lion
• Monkey
• Orangutan
• Ox (Bull)
• Phoenix (Firebird)
• Pig
• Rabbit
• Rat
• Rhino
• Sheep
• Snake
• Turtle
• Whale
• Wolf
• Zebra

Notably, this round has multiple metapuzzles, each one represented by a figure in park ranger attire.

• Zeus
• The Trainer
• Jack
• The Cryptozoicologist
• The Astrologer
• Mr. Patel
• The Captain
• The Cubs Scout
• Sam
• Ms. Cunningham
• Anne

• Safari Adventure - The metameta, a rocky outcropping at the end of the trail.

Puzzle Elements

 

Multiple Answers - Every feeder puzzle in the round has multiple answers. How this is implemented differs between puzzles; some are sequential (e.g. Bear), others branch off at some point (e.g. Snake). Some branch off at the start, and require interpreting the same data in two different ways (e.g. Phoenix). Others are essentially just two different puzzles with a shared theme (e.g. Hyena).

Meta-matching - The round has multiple metapuzzles, each one taking in a subset of the animals. The description of each one makes it reasonably clear which feeders' answers are relevant—for instance, Mr. Patel wants animals featuring in The Life of Pi—but not the particular answers.