Yuga Labs Debuts Cipher Puzzle Contest on Bitcoin

Credit: Yuga Labs

Yuga Labs, the creators of the infamous Bored Ape Yacht Club, is spicing up the long bear market winter. This time, the company has launched a cipher puzzle series based on its TwelveFold NFT collection where users, holders of the collection, and the general public, can compete for BTC prizes. Yuga Labs made the announcement on X yesterday:

For the next 12 weeks, the company will release a single “Moon Puzzle” for anyone to solve. The puzzles will play on the Bitcoin cryptography protocol and TwelveFold, which, according to a Yuga Labs blog post, embodies themes related to time, mathematics, and variability. The prize for solving a puzzle is 0.12 BTC, about $3,076 at the time of writing.

While anyone can take a crack at solving the puzzles, to receive the prizes, a user will need to have an Ordinals bitcoin wallet and pay a fee to inscribe their answer on the blockchain itself — a small amount between $4 and $8 depending on network traffic. They also must fill out a few tax forms and agree to Yuga Labs’ terms and conditions.

To give an example of the puzzles to be solved, the first image placeholder looked like this:

Downloading the puzzle revealed six TwelveFold Ordinals organized into three rows and two columns, with the Ordinals in one column slightly blurred. It also came with the sentence, “Having two together during hibernation can make all the difference.”

There may be fierce competition to solve these puzzles. According to the Yuga Labs cipher puzzle website, the first puzzle has already been solved. One X user claimed that, after using a variety of cipher-breaking techniques, they had revealed the first answer to be “JIGSAW.” The company hasn’t confirmed if that is correct yet.

After Yuga Labs releases the 12 Moon Puzzles, there will be a special “Sun Puzzle” up for grabs. The user that solves that puzzle will receive a TwelveFold Ordinal, which has an unknown value.

Yuga Labs Stays Busy During Bear Market

Yuga Labs, perhaps the top non-fungible token company around, has remained busy during the bear market. From launching Web3 games to debuting new NFT collections, the creator of BAYC has created, innovated, and delivered during this long winter. Here are three stories involving it, all from the past five months.

First, one month ago, Yuga Labs expanded its Otherside Metaverse with the acquisition of Roar Studios. According to Daniel Alegre, the CEO of Yuga Labs, Roar Studios’ focus on creative content and social connections will help Yuga Labs build its metaverse, although the exact specifics weren’t revealed at that time.

Next, four months ago, Yuga claimed a ‘landmark victory’ in an NFT trademark case. The victory came through a summary judgment that found two Web3 grifters — Ryder Ripps and Pauly0x — had used Yuga Labs’ trademarks to deliberately deceive people interested in buying NFTs from the Bored Ape Yacht Club collection.

Lastly, five months ago, Yuga Labs partnered with Gucci to sell phygital jewelry usable in the Otherside Metaverse. The “Otherside: Relics” series consisted of 3,333 KodaPendants with both physical and digital components. Buyers received a real-life silver pendant modeled after the Koda NFT, along with a corresponding pendant to be worn in that virtual world.

As these stories show, Yuga Labs has remained busy during the bear market. And with its new cipher puzzle series, it will continue to be. Rarity Sniper will keep an eye out for more stories from the company and report back if needed.