Finders Seekers is a monthly puzzle box that asks you to solve mysteries around the world. Each box delivers a challenging puzzle to be solved, comprised of clues related to a new city each month.
Think of it as an Escape Room adventure delivered right to your door!
My Subscription Addiction paid for this box. (Check out the review process post to learn more about how we review boxes.)
This is a review of the $30.00 a month, monthly Finders Seekers box.
About Finders Seekers
The Subscription Box: Finders Seekers
The Cost: $30.00 + free shipping
The Products: A complex, challenging mystery along with clues and virtual scavenger hunts around a new city each month.
Ships to: US.
Finders Seekers March 2018 Review
Each mystery begins with a letter from The Society of Seekers—Finder's Seekers' official name for their fearless consortium of dedicated detectives!
The letter indicates the difficulty level and estimated time needed to complete the challenge, along with details of the mystery and the clues intended to help you in your quest.
This month's mystery took place in London! I've never been to the UK, so I was giddy to learn quirky details about a fascinating city that I may have never discovered without exploring it myself!
The gist of the challenge revolved around finding missing diamonds that were stolen from the Royal Crown Jewels. The main landing page gave a lengthy breakdown of details behind the mission:
The National Crime Agency of London has been working around the clock to gather intel about the missing Royal Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom that were discovered stolen 3 days ago. Here’s what we know:
- The 140 royal ceremony objects were securely placed in their vault at 9:50 pm on Wednesday night.
- At 9:52 pm the Ceremony of Keys was performed, locking the Tower of London in a tradition that began over 600 years ago.
- 50 guests were in attendance to observe the ceremony, but none of them saw anything out of the ordinary.
- On Thursday morning, the Crown Jeweller conducted his daily inspection and noticed a discrepancy in the weight of the jewels. Upon further inspection, it was realized that all of the jewels were forgeries.
- After extensive surveillance of internet chatter, it is suspected that Lord Lockhart, a shunned and scorned aristocrat, is the culprit.
- The Crown Jewels have been buried somewhere in London.
- Lockhart has laser-etched microscopic clues to the burial place on 8 large diamonds from the Queen's Royal Pageantry Necklace. These diamonds have been scattered around the city.
- Lockhart encrypted the locales of the diamonds and necklace in a souvenir calendar.
Your mission is to pose as one of Lockhart’s accomplices and collect the diamonds and necklace from henchmen that are safekeeping the items. Use the desk calendar as your guide to visit the 9 attractions around London where the henchmen are hiding. Each locale has a website associated with it that you'll need to visit. They all begin with SeekersUnite.com/ followed by the name of the attractions listed in the calendar. For example SeekersUnite.com/Sherlock.
Once you have all of the diamonds and the necklace, you’ll need to solve for the location where the loot is buried. Return here to complete the mission and dig up the treasure.
Each calendar month and clue revolves around a different London destination. Along with vivid corresponding photographs, each month contains URL directives that lead each Seeker to a new clue.
You'll see at the bottom of the March 2018 page that it reads "/TateModern."
Attach that URL addendum to the end of SeekersUnite.com, and you'll find your clue! After solving one, you simply flip to the next month's page to find your next URL and challenge.
Now, just in case you subscribe and end up getting the London box, I'm not going to spoil all the clues for ya. I'll only break down a few in detail just so you can get a sense of how the challenges work!
This was the item that corresponded with the Tate Modern museum clue. The colorful piece of paper had a graphic design on both the front and back.
Here was the clue:
"Britain’s national gallery of international modern art is housed in the former Bankside Power station, a large brick factory that was transformed into a museum in 2000. The large and spacious building provides an industrial yet neutral backdrop to some of the world’s most famous modern art. The airy galleries make the perfect setting for massive installations while side galleries fitly display smaller, intimate works.
As you enter one of the Switch House galleries, you recognize one of Lockhart’s men (wearing the family’s crest). To secure the diamond, you must provide a password. The 2 works of art he’s standing next to contain the answer. (See the printed versions included in the box.)"
Right off the bat, this clue had me scratching my head. I immediately grabbed the magnifying glass that came in the box to see if any secret messages could be found in the design.
(The magnifying glass.) After a solid 6 minutes of close inspection, I found nothing.
Each URL contains an optional hint that can come in handy if you get stumped on specific clues. The Tate Modern hint was:
"Consider both sides of the paper. Is there a way for you to see both sides of the paper together?"
I then had what felt like a Eureka! moment and ran to my bathroom mirror to hold the design up against it. If I held it at juuuust the right angle, this would allow me to see both sides at once, right?
Still nothing! My boyfriend Robbie then had the Aha-moment that cracked the clue. What if we held the paper up to the light, allowing us to see through the paper to the other side?
It worked! The word "VISUAL" was formed when the paper was held up to the light, thanks to clever design aspects that added up to form letters when viewed together.
We entered the word in the Tate Modern submission box, and it led us to our clue's answer! This is the page we were directed to once we input the correct answer:
As we would soon discover, each answered clue gave a new number associated with each recovered diamond. We screenshotted each result page to keep our discoveries handy just in case!
Now, onto another clue!
June's calendar page featured a gorgeous picture of Big Ben, along with the URL: SeekersUnite.com/BigBen.
Here was the clue:
Many may not know that Big Ben is actually the nickname of the largest bell located inside Elizabeth Tower as it is officially named. Completed in 1859, the tower is 335 feet tall and is part of the Palace of Westminster. Throughout the years, the clock has had its share of malfunctions and breakdowns usually due to environmental factors. The clock is currently undergoing major renovation and will not resume tolling until 2021.
As part of your mission, you have scored credentials for unprecedented access to the clock tower. You climb the endless stairs until you reach the clock face and mechanisms. The complicated gears move loudly and you are glad the bells won’t be blaring while you are there. You examine the intricate machinery as one of Lockhart’s chumps approach you. Again, you must provide a password to acquire the next diamond.
We realized that the box's included gear design would likely help us figure this out.
I will tell you right now, uttered with deep, calming breaths: we STILL HAVE NOT SOLVED THIS CONFOUNDED CLUE.
We have spent over three hours on it. I even got my entire family involved—my mom, my dad, and my sister all hovered around these gears trying to figure out what the HECK its code adds up to.
As you'll see under the series of triangles, diamonds, and circles, each shape corresponds with a movement of gears. Step #1 indicates that we'd move the middle gear (labeled with a circle) two shifts clockwise. This, in turn, would lead us to the first letter of our cryptic code: I.
But, if we shift one gear, that would mean the other gears shift too, right? And would then force each gear to begin at a new starting point, right?!
Well...maybe. The hint we received seemed to lead us in two different directions. It asks us: "If one gear is turned, how does it affect the other gears?" But then says: "The clock's gears reset after each step." So how does that work?!
We've honestly tried every method. After two hours of page rotating, frantic erasing, and starting over and over again, my sister suggested that we cut out the gears to actually turn them!
We rigged an intricate setup that had our gears anchored with safety pins on top of a cardboard box. I was the gear maestro, and my mom, dad, and sister each took hold of a gear, moving their gears in time to shift with each other gear's movement.
It still led us nowhere. The string of letters we came up with was mainly consonants, spelling nothing that was remotely decipherable!
You know in movies, when the protagonist falls to their knees in the rain and reaches their arms up to the sky, pleading for an answer from above? That was basically me in my kitchen because of this clue. We joined the Finders Seekers Facebook group to see if anyone could be of assistance, but no one had posted tips for this clue. From what we did see, it seems like most people figured it out pretty easily!
I think we're going about it the wrong way, and possibly making it even more difficult than it actually is. We will push on, though. Because I want to finish this puzzle if it's the last thing I DO!
Here are the rest of the items that came in the box. They each helped us out with other clues, which we DID manage to solve!
This proper wedding invitation came in handy when trying to solve a clue about the Victoria and Albert Museum.
This chart helped us solve the Wimbledon clue and introduced me to a new form of puzzles: Pic-a-Pix!
Clues on the left of every row and on the bottom of each column revealed a hidden picture. Certain clues instruct you to color in certain boxes, which reveal a hidden design! It was TOUGH but so satisfying!
Other clues didn't need any objects to be solved and were based solely off of hints within URLs. I loved how some clues led us to other websites and social media pages for more information!
Verdict: The true value of this Finders Seekers box isn't found in its contents. It's found in the brain-flexing, teamwork-inducing, wonderfully challenging nature of its mystery! I was able to get my entire family involved in a unique weeknight activity, and it was a blast.
Even though we still haven't OFFICIALLY solved the London case, I cannot wait for next month's challenge! Getting to learn about a new city on top of such an interesting puzzle is an amazing bonus.
To Wrap Up
Can you still get this box if you sign up today? You likely won't receive the London box right away, as Finders Seekers ships a box related to a new city each month, but you may receive it soon after subscribing! Order before the 22nd of each month to receive your box as soon as possible.
Coupon - Use code CRATE5 to save $5 off!
Value Breakdown: This box cost $30.00 total, including free shipping. The items contained within the box are very inexpensive—essentially a few pieces of paper and a small desk calendar!
Check out all of our board game and puzzle reviews for more challenging subscription boxes!
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What was the most puzzling clue for you in this month’s Finders Seekers box?
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