Time Travel Log # 1

One of the things we wanted to have in our games at the new location was an element of realism.  In “The Time Travelers” experience at our new location we have a portion of the game set in a museum of communication (communication is kind of fundamental to escape games).  We thought it could be fun to demonstrate three different types of communication used by countries during times of war.  Probably the most challenging puzzle devised was the display of Cold War Spycraft: Number Stations.  

If you oversaw a spy ring, can you think of a way to pass messages to your spies when they are far away that won’t look suspicious?  Well, the answer is simple and something you have easy access to, the radio.  At a certain time of day, you could have your radio station play a series of numbers that won’t mean anything to anybody except the person they were meant for.  Better yet, the code is unbreakable because the numbers are randomly generated by an encryption machine.  The only way you could crack the code was if you had the “One Time Pad” (a premade cipher for the number station code).  

In The Time Travelers you get the opportunity to attempt crack a Number Station Code just like the spies of 40 years ago.  Here are some link to learn more about Number Stations and how they are still used today. 

The Rabbit hole: 

Astonishing Legends Podcast Deep Dive on the Topic: