Téa Mobster
TED Games, logic puzzles, and a new Puzzler
September Puzzler
Every month I offer a new bite-sized puzzle. Here's the latest one:
Take the name of a caffeinated drink. Remove a letter, then add a letter, and you’ll get the last name of an actor whose first name is also a caffeinated drink. Who is this?
Submit your answer here 🗳Puzzling in Chicago newsletter
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TED Games
Your old friend TED is getting into games. Right now they're beta testing a game called The Purring Test, where you have to guess a word or concept based on a small collection of AI-generated art and poetry, as processed through the mind of a cat.
It's in beta, so they're collecting feedback about the experience at the end. This is the work of a small team led by Alex Rosenthal, who you may remember as the guy behind this delightful TED talk about puzzle hunts from five years ago.
2024 Galactic Puzzle Hunt
Every year the Galactic Puzzle Hunt does something notable in how they break the standard conventions of online hunts. But one thing that stays the same are the devilishly difficult puzzles that make up the core of the hunt. For this year's hunt, which my team just completed, instead of their typical small set of very complex puzzles, Galactic went for a very large quantity of very approachable puzzles. Some take just a minute or two to solve. I recommend you give it a shot if you're in the mood for some light puzzles — and a lot of them.
Also the story is adorable and the web interface is a joy to use.
Puzzle Boat 11
Speaking of ludicrously capacious puzzle collections, Foggy Brume's annual puzzle extravaganza is launching in one month. I've been a regular Boater since PB 4, and I've always found the price ($100 per team) to be a tremendous steal. The puzzle count changes from year to year, but even on the low end, we're talking 75 or so expertly crafted word and logic puzzles. This year's hunt is titled "A Puzzlementary", and combined with the "11" and the font choice, it appears we're in for some metal püzzles.
Wyfio and other online riddles
I spend most of my puzzle-solving time with puzzles that have very clear parameters, where even if there are minimal instructions, it's at least clear what kind of answer I'm looking for, and how to submit it. (This is a core ethos to the kinds of puzzles and games I build, as well.) Further along on the enigmatic spectrum are puzzles that obfuscate the bounds of the puzzle and the puzzle experience as much as possible. There's a whole subculture surrounding these "online riddles," as their fans call them. I was recently told about a site called wyfio, which seems to have a expansive collection of these puzzles, 85 at last count, all made by a small team:
They have a blog post that explains how it works, which I recommend you start with. If you find that you dig this kind of thing, there's also a huge archive of these kinds of puzzles over at enigmatics.org.
Rat Run logic puzzles
I recently spent a week binging on this set of 10 Sudoku variants by Marty Sears:
As much as I like logic puzzles, especially variety logic puzzles, I was hesitant about this, since it was built around Sudoku, my least favorite thing. But I was quickly won over. Each puzzle adds a few more constraints and rules to the base Sudoku ruleset, making the entire solve an extremely satisfying experience. The story of these puzzles is a rat running through a maze, and it really is an apt metaphor, as you are continually figuring out how the various rules intersect in order to bring clarity to otherwise ambiguous choices.
It reminded me of my time solving Baba Is You, which also featured new rules on every level and the satisfaction of finding new loopholes and interpretations that would allow you to bring the solution of a seemingly unsolvable setup into focus. Rat Run has that same feeling.
Solution to the August Puzzler
Think of a hyphenated phrase that means “fine”. Take the second half, change just the middle of it to its opposite, and you’ll get a word that also means “fine”. What words are these?