While many say that I am a genius, that no one can match my mental abilities, and that I possess THE intellect of a generation....

I have but one weakness....

I sometimes confuse east and west. Holy frick lol.

I could have gotten this such a freaking long time ago lol, feeling pretty dumb rn 😫🤣

[finally solved it haha]

Thanks again for confirming puzzle details so I could figure out I was the problem haha. I had all the right steps and all the right coordinates for such a long time. It was me, not you 😬

OK, so puzzle review/feedback:

Pros:

• The calendar was a good touch - that took me a while to recognize.
• Loved the custom route cipher
• I agree with you - breaking it into 3 parts was a good idea. Would have been too easy to figure out without
• Loved the history clues (although I'm actually still not sure how clue 1 relates to the 22nd... I eventually tried it because "X marks the spot" lol)

Cons:

• (0,0) looks like X,Y, but you had it as Y,X, and it wasn't clear if a positive "X" incremented rows or simple went "up"
• Knowing that the path doesn't wrap the grid was a helpful piece of information. Not sure how you would have been able to work that info into the clues, but thought I'd mention that anyway.

Places I was confused (not necessarily a problem with the puzzle):

• Having the picture in the background was confusing - I thought "space the final star fell into place" meant either "1" or "V" because it looks like the space between those two characters got hit with a nuke or a meteor
• I also thought the colors in the bottom right might have something to do with it, since they did in the last puzzle

Advice:

• For the next puzzle, you might link the discussions we've had about this puzzle and the last. It might help people understand what they're trying to solve. Unless of course you feel like too much has been revealed here, in which case you might want to leave it buried, haha.
• As much as you can, try to think of things that might be misleading or confusing, and if possible, go ahead a rule them out from the start (like in this case, the picture is an Easter egg, but nothing in it is needed for reasoning the solution).
• It might be helpful to have a daily "yes / no" answering session. People can leave yes or no questions, and you can choose to answer them or not. Can leave your answers once a day or every other day, or refuse to start answering until it's been a few days. Might increase engagement. It's a little bit of a risk for people to leave questions because it might point other people in the right direction, but it could make it fun.

Final thoughts:

• If you'd like, I can type up some "tips from the the guy that solved the last two puzzles" that you can paste in the next puzzle to help people get more of a head start. Or I can refrain if you'd prefer.
• I hope you keep making these, and I'm happy to continue participating and claiming them as long as you are, but I'll adhere to the honor system if you'd rather I wait a few days or hold off completely on the next X puzzles to give other people a chance. Also, happy to give the puzzles a test run to give you feedback before releasing to the public if you want - but absolutely no hard feelings if you'd rather go solo. I'm having fun either way.

Per usual, I overthink everything, thanks for sticking with me and reading my thoughts lol 😬👍