Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is a puzzle lover's dream, providing puzzles small and big, simple and complex. Some of them can be head-scratchers, while others can be deceptively simple-looking. One particular puzzle that requires players to understand how a 1937 cipher table works can cause a player to want to tear their hair out. Puzzle gamers never want to cave and look up a guide, but sometimes it's necessary to progress, and there's no shame in it.
The Captain's door code looks easy enough until a player realizes they are not exactly an expert at using a cipher table. Taking place within the shipwrecked Nazi warship, KMS Kummetz, that has somehow found itself crashed into the side of the Himalayas, Indy and Gina must explore the boat for clues and the next piece of The Great Circle. Eventually, players will find themselves in a small conference room with dead, frozen Nazis and a handful of clues to solve the puzzle.
How to Solve the Captain's Cipher Table
A Note Left by the Captain Suggest He's Locked Himself in a Room Protected by a Code-Locked Door
Walking into the room with the puzzle immediately presents players with clues strewn about and fills them with confidence that this puzzle is going to be easy enough. Until they actually reach the cipher table. No, most players don't know how an obsolete decrypting device works, and now it's going to drive them insane. Here's how players can maintain their sanity, however.
There's a note from the Captain on the conference table indicating the code needed for the cipher table, along with two clipboards containing code tables. The cipher table's four discs will be scattered on the ground below it, and the door will have a four-number lock code. With all the necessary materials and information gathered, it's time to decipher.
The Captain's Leftover Code is What Will Trip Players Up
A sheet of paper will contain three scribbled-out codes—don't worry about them; they're not a misdirect—and the actual code: JÖGM. When players go to the cipher table and place the discs, they'll find that all of them have specific letters and have to be switched around until the code can be inputted in the right order. Just swap until the discs are in the right place and turn them until JÖGM is written, and let Indy close the cipher table, showing the code in the spots where the arrows on the cipher table are pointing.
This is where it gets confusing. Despite seemingly inputting the right code, nothing will happen. Indy won't even let go of the cipher table, and when he does, it'll pop back open. This will lead players to believe they entered the wrong code—even scouring both clipboards for that particular code and coming up blank—but don't worry, that's not the case. Cipher tables are indirect in their decryption; the code players are looking for is what appears below JÖGM. Below JÖGM—still lined up with the arrows of the cipher table—will be BLUT.
Now, players can look at the code table clipboard—the one on the conference table—and find the door code corresponding with BLUT. The code is 3666. Enter the code into the door, and it'll unlock. Puzzle solved, no thanks to Gina continuously pacing in front of Indiana while trying to decipher it.
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle
- Released
- December 9, 2024
- ESRB
- Teen / Blood and Gore, Drug Reference, Mild Language, Violence, In-Game Purchases
- Developer(s)
- MachineGames
- Publisher(s)
- Bethesda
- Engine
- id Tech 7
- Franchise
- Indiana Jones
- Number of Players
- Single-player
- Steam Deck Compatibility
- Verified
- PC Release Date
- December 9, 2024
- Xbox Series X|S Release Date
- December 9, 2024
- PS5 Release Date
- April 17, 2025
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Nintendo Switch 2, PC
- Genre(s)
- Action, Adventure
- X|S Optimized
- Yes
- OpenCritic Rating
- Mighty
