Artifact Guesser
Three real museum artifacts a day: place each on the map and in time.
Every day: Today's Run: the same three museum artifacts for every player, with a daily leaderboard to compare scores. New puzzle: Midnight UTC (the daily run is keyed to the UTC date).
Artifact Guesser home, with unlimited and multiplayer modesr/artifactguesser
Artifact Guesser shows you photos of real objects from museum collections and asks where they come from and when they were made. Its daily run gives everyone the same three artifacts, and a leaderboard shows how your score compares. Outside the daily you can play unlimited rounds or join a multiplayer lobby.
About Artifact Guesser
Artifact Guesser is a guessing game built on museum open data. The site says it draws on more than 230,000 artifacts from ten museums, among them the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Cleveland Museum of Art, from bronze vessels and coins to textiles and sculpture.
The daily mode, called Today's Run, is a set of three artifacts that is the same for everyone on a given date. For each one you look over the photos and the object's details, pick the country it came from on a world map and set a date on a timeline that reaches back thousands of years. The closer both guesses are, the more points you score, and your total goes onto that day's leaderboard. You can play the daily without an account, and signing up records your run.
The rest of the site is open-ended: an unlimited single-player mode, multiplayer lobbies and a searchable list of artifacts. The project describes itself as in alpha and has a subreddit and Discord where players suggest features.
It suits players who like map-and-year games such as TimeGuessr but would rather date an object than a photograph, and who want something short: three rounds take a few minutes.
How to play Artifact Guesser
- Open artifactguesser.com/daily to start Today's Run.
- Look at the first artifact's photos and the details shown with it.
- Click the country on the world map where you think it was made.
- Move the timeline to the year you think it dates from and submit.
- Read the answer and the object's real origin and date, then go on to the next.
- After the third artifact, check your score on the daily leaderboard.
Tips
- The material and technique listed with the object are strong clues: bronze repoussé, glazed stoneware and lacquer each point to particular regions.
- Date and place score separately, so a good guess on one still earns points when you are unsure of the other.
- Use unlimited mode to learn museum collections' styles before the daily.
- Sign up before playing if you want your daily run kept on the leaderboard under your name.
Questions
How many artifacts are in the daily?
Three, the same for every player that day.
When does the daily run change?
The run is tied to the UTC date, so it changes at midnight UTC.
Is it free?
Yes. The site says play is free and supported by donations.
Do I need an account?
No, but signing up records your run on the daily leaderboard.
Is there more than the daily?
Yes: an unlimited single-player mode and multiplayer lobbies.
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