Speed Puzzle Competition
What is it?
Teams of 2 will compete to complete a 300 piece puzzle as fast as they can. Both members of the winning team will receive gift certificates to Stay and Play Game Cafe as well as a cash prize (to be determined based on number of participants). All participants, regardless of whether they won, will receive a puzzle to take home.
Competition will begin promptly at 6:30pm. Participants are welcome to arrive early and enjoy food and drink from Stay and Play Game Cafe's menu. Please note that food and drink orders will be allowed during the competition.
Logistics
When: Wednesday, January 29th - 6:30pm to 9:30pm
Where: Stay and Play Game Cafe
3932 W Irving Park Rd
Chicago, IL 60618
(note: parking lot in back)
Logistics: We are using Eventbrite for the management of registration and tickets. If you have a predefined team of two, you must purchase two tickets. If you are entering as a single, you can just purchase the one ticket. Purchase tickets here.
We are using Meetup for awareness raising, community communication, and management of teams; in particular those participants coming in as individuals and looking to team up with other individual participants. Join the community discussion here.
At this time, we are capping the competition at 8 teams. Participants are welcome to arrive early and enjoy food and drink from Stay and Play Game Cafe's menu. Please note that food and drink orders will be allowed during the competition.
Rules
While there are planned prizes to the participants of the winning team and monitoring from event official(s), the spirit of the event is one of friendly competition amongst fans of puzzling within the community. As such, it is expected that all participants play fairly and treat others with respect. Any participants/teams found to be cheating, studying opposing teams' puzzles, distracting to other teams, or exhibiting other unsportsmanlike behavior will be eliminated from the competition.
Event official(s), assigned from Stay and Play Game Cafe staff, will have final rulings.
The competition will begin promptly at 6:30pm. All teams will be assigned individual tables and will complete the same puzzle. The puzzle box will be placed with the image facing down until an official announces to begin and starts the single, overarching timer. Once competition starts, teams will be restricted to their own table and may not approach or study other teams' tables. Participants wanting to listen to their own personal music may do so as long as headphones are utilized. Use of other personal devices are disallowed, unless presented to official(s) and approved prior to competition start. Late-arriving participants/teams will still be allowed to participate, but cannot distract other teams or impede their progress.
Once a team completes a puzzle, they will signal to the official(s) as such and step away from the table. All other teams must cease active puzzling and discontinue studying their own tables by turning backs to table while the official(s) investigate. The official(s) will take note of the timer and a picture of the puzzle state before rendering a ruling. A puzzle is considered to be completed if:
a) all 300 pieces have been placed in their correct locations (as designed) resulting in one fully contiguous and gapless puzzle. A fully-completed puzzle in this manner results in a clear winning team and marks the end of the competition.
or
b) all non-missing pieces available have been placed in their correct locations (as designed) resulting in one fully contiguous puzzle. A new countdown timer will be established, reflecting 10 seconds for each identified puzzle piece gap (not to exceed 30 pieces) from this partially-completed puzzle. All other teams will then resume puzzling until another team fully completes a puzzle or the countdown timer reaches 0. Note: in the extremely rare case that another partially completed puzzle may occur during this countdown timer, event official(s) will convene and make a ruling.
Puzzle manufacturing defects, while unlikely, may occur. The most common defect is missing pieces. Should the amount of missing pieces exceed 10% of total piece size, the puzzle will be considered fully defective and event official(s) will discuss remedy solutions with the applicable team.
9:30 will mark the end of the competition. If no team completes a puzzle prior to that, the official(s) will announce "times up" and all teams will immediately cease puzzling. All puzzle pieces should be immediately be dropped onto the table and participants should step away from tables. Official(s) will walk around and take pictures of all puzzle states before rending a ruling. The team with the least amount of "loose" puzzle pieces will be deemed the winner. A puzzle piece is considered loose if it does not contribute to a group of three or more correctly joined pieces.