Author Archives: gmdirect

5 Questions with Rena Nathanson of Bananagrams

Posted on by
2

Welcome to another edition of PuzzleNation Blog’s interview feature, 5 Questions!

We’re reaching out to puzzle constructors, video game writers and designers, board game creators, writers, filmmakers, musicians, and puzzle enthusiasts from all walks of life, talking to people who make puzzles and people who enjoy them in the hopes of exploring the puzzle community as a whole.

And I’m overjoyed to have Rena Nathanson as our latest 5 Questions interviewee!

Rena Nathanson is the CEO (aka the Top Banana) of Bananagrams, a puzzle company built around family-friendly dice and tile games with anagram, pattern matching, and word building elements.

Bananagrams and its fellow puzzle games have won numerous awards and accolades from family groups, and the brand is in good hands with Rena at the helm, continuing to add new products to the Bananagrams puzzle family in the spirit and tradition of Bananagrams patriarch Abe Nathanson.

Rena was gracious enough to take some time out to talk to us, so without further ado, let’s get to the interview!

5 Questions for Rena Nathanson

1.) Bananagrams is a game designed by a family for families. Can you tell us a little bit about how Bananagrams came to be, and how the family dynamic contributes to the company as it stands today?

First and foremost, Bananagrams is a labor of love. As a family we loved playing games, especially word games, but we wanted something fast-paced that the whole family of varying ages could play together. At first we intended to create something just for us, but we showed it to a few friends and family, and everyone said, “You must share this with the world!”

My Dad (who was 75 at the time), myself, and my two kids, Aaron (then age 7) and Ava (then age 11) created the game. My mother, who was in theater and set design, created the pouch… we literally sewed the first few by hand.  My Dad came up with the name, exclaiming: “This anagram game is driving me bananas!,” hence “Bananagrams.”  We created Bananagrams as a family, for families (and friends!) to play together.

[The distinctive Bananagrams pouch, beside a game in progress]

2.) In addition to several English versions, you also have Bananagrams sets designed for other languages. How do you choose which languages get their own edition of Bananagrams, and are there any new editions forthcoming?

Bananagrams is currently available in French, Spanish, Italian, German, Norwegian and Hebrew. Swedish and Icelandic are in production. Our criteria for producing a foreign language edition is: do people want it!? If there is sufficient demand, we are happy to produce it.

3.) You’ve got several variations on the letter-tile puzzle, including Appletters, PairsinPears, and Zip-It. Were these all created in-house, or were they pitched to you? How do you know when a game is right for the Bananagrams family?

We created all our games in-house. We developed Appletters and PairsinPears in response to fans looking for a Bananagrams-like game for a younger audience. As for Zip-It, our fans requested something that would capture the magic of Bananagrams, but that could be played in a more compact space.

All our games “travel well,” but Zip-It is the ultimate travel game. It takes up a lot less real estate than Bananagrams, so you can play it on a plane or airplane tray, and the scoring mechanism is on the pouch itself via zippers and numbers.

[A look at the extended Bananagrams puzzle family.]

4.) What’s next for Rena Nathanson and Bananagrams?

My goal is that every school and every household on earth has a set of Bananagrams. Global Domination! Nothing too lofty or anything!  Ha!

But seriously… my father had many aspirations for Bananagrams, and there are many things I would like to see to fruition in honor of him. There is still a long way to go in building and strengthening his legacy.

5.) If you could give the readers, writers, aspiring game designers, and puzzle fans in the audience one piece of advice, what would it be?

If you have an idea, be passionate about it, don’t take no for an answer and be prepared for some very hard work! Also, know when to ask for help. None of us knows everything, and I wouldn’t be where I am today without all the support and help and advice from various people in all aspects of the industry, which I continue to receive gratefully to this day!

Many thanks to Rena for her time, as well as Bananagrams PR wizards Lesley Singleton and Judee Cohen for their time and assistance. Be sure to keep up on all things Bananagrams by checking out their website and following them on Twitter (@Bananagrams). I can’t wait to see what they come up with next!

Thanks for visiting the PuzzleNation blog today! You can like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, cruise our boards on Pinterest, check out our Tumblr, download our puzzle apps and iBooks, play our games at PuzzleNation.com, or contact us here at the blog!

Puzzles and Brain Health

Posted on by
3

There is a lot of talk nowadays about brain boosting and other attempts to combat the effects of aging on the brain. There are numerous websites and products boasting that they can help keep your wits sharp, your memory keen, and the threat of Alzheimer’s at bay.

From visual acuity and perception to coordination, critical thinking to spatial reasoning, from observational skill to improved memory, there are a lot of promises being made about brain health.

Unfortunately, there’s a wealth of conflicting and inconsistent data out there. (This article by The New York Times points out some of the inconsistencies in brain health reporting when it comes to puzzles.)

From a recent NPR article:

Molly Wagster, chief of the behavioral and systems neuroscience branch at the National Institute on Aging, studies how puzzles can benefit brains. “What we know is that it probably makes us better at puzzle solving, but it may not necessarily make us better at other types of cognitive activities,” Wagster explains.

However, in general, experts agree that puzzle solving is good for us. But what puzzles do the most good, and when should you start solving?

I’ve done my best to comb through the available data — both through reports from news sources and scientific papers themselves — and there’s one thing that they all seem to agree on…

Start puzzling when you’re young.

A study by the University of Chicago said that children who play with jigsaws and other shape-based puzzles at a young age tend to develop better spatial and math-related skills.

And there are other studies that support the idea that a fundamental base of puzzling at a young age contributes to better brain health later in life.

A study at Berkeley published in the Archives of Neurology (and covered by CBS News) found a correlation between crossword puzzle solving (and other challenging mind games) and a decreased likelihood to develop a particular marker for Alzheimer’s disease.

This study also said that when you engage in these activities is a factor. Like the University of Chicago study, the Berkeley study states that adults who engaged in crosswords and similarly brain-stimulating activities in their early and middle years had the lowest amount of these markers.

There is plenty of data to suggest that crosswords and other associative puzzles can have unexpected brain health benefits.

My friend Jake had major brain surgery years ago, and part of his post-surgery recovery consisted of solving crosswords. It was considered excellent speech/occupational therapy, and he sought out more crosswords post-recovery.

(This article from The New York Times discusses in detail another example of the curious relationship between crosswords, memory, and post-surgery treatment.)

But what about those who’ve come to puzzles later in life? Are all the promises made by those websites and brain-boosting products possible?

It depends on the puzzle. There are plenty of puzzles that are great at exercising various brain functions and observational skill, but there’s precious little scientific data to back up whether these games and puzzles actually help with memory retention or other faculties challenged by age.

But a recent article by Dr. Rob Winningham suggests that certain types of puzzle solving are more beneficial than others.

Crossword puzzles involve getting a cue and then attempting to retrieve previously learned information, which is something that people with age related cognitive impairment and even early to mid stage dementia can do fairly well.

Age related changes in cognition and earlier stages of dementia are primarily associated with impairments in the ability to concentrate, pay attention, and make new memories; crossword puzzles don’t really exercise those abilities, but Sudoku puzzles do.

According to Dr. Winningham, the heavy demand Sudoku puzzles place on concentration and active attention-keeping — especially when solved with distractions like television or conversation in the mix — exercise those parts of the brain associated with the formation of new memories, encouraging better memory retention and other mental faculties so many solvers of all ages want to keep in top condition.

While there’s still more research to be done to narrow down exactly what puzzles are best for your brain in the long term, there’s no denying that puzzle solving is always a healthy decision.

Thanks for visiting the PuzzleNation blog today! You can like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, cruise our boards on Pinterest, check out our Tumblr, download our puzzle apps and iBooks, play our games at PuzzleNation.com, or contact us here at the blog!

PuzzleNation How-to: Sudoku!

Posted on by
Reply

Sudoku is one of the most popular paper puzzles in the history of puzzling, perhaps the only puzzle to rival crosswords in the hearts of solvers worldwide.

That being said, I frequently encounter people who have either never tried to solve Sudoku puzzles or had a dismal first showing that dissuaded them from trying again. And today, I’d like to reach out to the Sudoku disenfranchised out there with a PuzzleNation How-To.

How to solve Sudoku, to be specific!

[Brief historical tidbit: The Sudoku puzzle as we know it was created in 1979 for Dell Magazines by puzzler Howard Garns (though it was introduced under the name Number Place). Before its rebranding in the modern era, it was also known as To the Nines.]

The rules of Sudoku seem simple enough. It’s the solver’s job to place the numbers 1 through 9 in every row, column, and 3×3 square in a 9×9 grid.

[Additional brief historical tidbit: Each row and column add up to 45, making every Sudoku puzzle a variation on the classic Magic Square puzzle concept. Only Extreme Sudoku puzzles — puzzles where the numbers 1 through 9 also appear along the diagonals — qualify as true Magic Squares, grids where the sum of every row, column, and diagonal all add up to the same number. Magic Squares have been around for more than 2000 years, giving Sudoku an impressive puzzly pedigree.]

Sudoku puzzles come in all sorts of sizes and difficulty rankings — most of which are dependent on where numbers are set, how many are set, and what numbers are set — and the placement of set numbers often adheres to the same diagonal symmetry as black squares in crosswords.

Let’s look at a sample puzzle, shall we?

The best way to start a Sudoku puzzle is to scan for numbers that appear most frequently, since they’ll offer more hints pointing toward where to place other numbers.

For instance, we’ve got a 7 in the top left-hand 3×3 grid (on the top row) and a 7 in the top center grid (in the middle row), so let’s try placing a 7 in the top right-hand grid.

Since a number can only appear once in each row, column, and 3×3 grid, we can draw imaginary lines crossing out the open spaces in the top row, the middle row, and the rightmost column, leaving only one space remaining where the 7 could possibly go.

Let’s continue with 7s and see if we can place a 7 in the middle left-hand grid.

Between the 7s in the top row, the middle row, and the second column from the left, there’s only one open space for that 7.

With this new 7 in place, we can also determine the 7 in the bottom left-hand grid.

Our new 7 eliminates any spots in the leftmost column, and the given 7s in the second column and the middle row eliminate all possibilities but one.

With this new information, we can place the last 7 in the bottom right-hand grid.

Focusing on one number can deliver a lot of new information early on.

Now, after filling in a few more numbers, we can move into more of the deduction aspects of Sudoku solving.

Look at the middle grid on the left-hand side. There are only two numbers missing from this 3×3 square, the 5 and the 8. While we don’t have enough information to place them, this box can help us place numbers in the top and bottom left-hand squares.

The second column has four numbers missing — the 1, the 2, the 5, and the 8 — and we know the 5 and the 8 will be in that middle grid.

This means that there are only two options for the 1 and the 2, the top left-hand space and the bottom left-hand space.

And since there’s already a 1 in the top left-hand square and a 2 in the bottom left-hand square, it’s easy to place our numbers.

That sort of deduction can be extremely helpful when it comes to harder Sudoku puzzles. Here’s another example, a little farther into our solve.

In this case, we’re going to try to place a 3 in the center 3×3 square. We know from the placement of other 3s in the grid that the 3 cannot be in the bottom row or the middle row.

Unfortunately, we don’t know which of the open boxes in the top row will hold our 3.

But, thanks to this information, we can place the 3 in the middle grid on the right-hand side. Here’s the grid with the 3s we know for certain.

Since we know the center square’s 3 will occupy one of two places in that top row, we can also eliminate that row from the possibilities for the middle grid on the right-hand side.

We can now place the 3 in the remaining square, and move forward with our solve.

From this point onward, you’ll be able to fill the entire grid with ease, adding the first of many vanquished Sudoku puzzles to your solving experience.

I hope you found this PuzzleNation How-to helpful. All of the graphics came from our Classic Sudoku app, now available for the iPad!

(Although the black lines were for illustrative purposes only, you can place possible numbers in blue just as I did with our Candidates feature.)

Thanks for visiting the PuzzleNation blog today! You can like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, cruise our boards on Pinterest, check out our Tumblr, download our puzzle apps and iBooks, play our games at PuzzleNation.com, or contact us here at the blog!

Classic Sudoku is here!

Posted on by
Reply

A few weeks ago when we announced the Penny/Dell Jumbo Crosswords App, we also teased that a certain number-based puzzle would be getting the PuzzleNation App treatment very soon.

Today, I’m proud to announce that Classic Sudoku has just launched for the iPad!

With four levels of difficulty (easy, medium, hard, and expert), a touch-to-scroll feature for entering numbers, and a timed option for competitive scoring, Classic Sudoku is ready for solvers of all skill levels.

Plus, with our Candidates feature, you can list possible solutions in a box without jeopardizing your score or your time!

Classic Sudoku joins the terrific lineup of Crossword apps and Classic Word Search iBooks from PuzzleNation and Penny/Dell Puzzles, and we’re so excited to add another world-class puzzle to our mobile library.

Thanks for visiting the PuzzleNation Blog today. Stop in again soon for the latest puzzle news, app announcements, and all sorts of puzzly goodness!

5 Questions with Andrew Hackard of Munchkin

Posted on by
3

Welcome to another edition of PuzzleNation Blog’s interview feature, 5 Questions!

We’re reaching out to puzzle constructors, video game writers and designers, board game creators, writers, filmmakers, musicians, and puzzle enthusiasts from all walks of life, talking to people who make puzzles and people who enjoy them in the hopes of exploring the puzzle community as a whole.

And I’m overjoyed to have Andrew Hackard as our latest 5 Questions interviewee!

(Andrew oversees a session of Munchkin for a younger group of puzzlers at Gen Con. Intended for adults, Munchkin can also be a great intro to both card games and roleplaying for younger gamers.)

Munchkin is a hilarious send-up of the classic roleplaying scenario: the dungeon romp. Encouraging players to team up to battle monsters (and betray each other as often as possible for the sake of treasure), it’s a marvelous mix of puzzly strategy and luck. With numerous expansions covering everything from pop culture to the apocalypse, Munchkin has become one of the standard-bearers for the modern board game and card game industries.

And when it comes to all things Munchkin, Andrew Hackard is your go-to guy. As the Munchkin Czar for Steve Jackson Games, he oversees the brand as a whole — at this point, he’s practically synonymous with Munchkin — and helps to offer a unified vision of the franchise while guiding it into new, unexpected territory.

Andrew was gracious enough to take some time out to talk to us, so without further ado, let’s get to the interview!

5 Questions for Andrew Hackard

1.) Everyone hopes for a great job title, something that’ll look sharp and impressive on a business card. Your title is Munchkin Czar. Can you tell us what that entails? Also, why “czar” and not something like “wrangler” or “overlord” or “almighty omnipotent entity and big cheese”?

It’s a little daunting to realize that out of seven billion people, I am the only one to have this job title. (If that’s not true, please don’t tell me.) It certainly does get me into some interesting conversations when I hand out my business card!

When Steve and Phil rehired me, back in 2009, Steve’s first thought for a title was “Brand Manager” — in fact, I have some cards with that title that I give to people who regularly wear neckties and sport coats. But Steve quickly decided that he didn’t know what a Brand Manager did, and he knew what he wanted ME to do — oversee all the day-to-day mundane operations of the Munchkin line, so that his time was freed up to write games rather than tracking sales figures and planning reprints and fussing with spreadsheets. For whatever reason, “Czar” was the title we came up with. It has the advantage of being both impressive and vague!

Over the past five years (!!!), my job has evolved considerably, and now I’m doing quite a bit of Munchkin design work myself, enough that we’ve started talking about maybe hiring *me* a Brand Manager to track sales figures and fuss with spreadsheets!

(Just a few of the Munchkin game sets and expansions that have been released.)

2.) How do you decide what the next theme or expansion will be for Munchkin? Are there any favorite cards or additions that really sold you on a given idea? Is there anything that, as a board/card game fan yourself, you loved bringing to the Munchkin universe?

We’ve published six new base Munchkin games since I started, and every one of them was different. (The next one, Munchkin Adventure Time, will be the most different of all, because we *aren’t* publishing it; our pals at USAopoly are doing the heavy lifting of design and development, and they’re knocking it out of the park!) Munchkin Zombies came about because we were trying to figure out what we hadn’t done yet, and all of us simultaneously said, “ZOMBIES!”

Munchkin Apocalypse grew out of a desire to commemorate (i.e., mock) the 2012 hysteria. Munchkin Legends was a set lots of our fans had suggested, and it worked well as a new fantasy set when we needed one. Our licensed sets (Axe Cop, Conan, Pathfinder) have all been targets of opportunity, and every one has been both a challenge and a blast to work on — all for different reasons.

So far, I think the most fun I’ve had designing a Munchkin set was Munchkin Apocalypse, because the Seal mechanic was completely new and a real design challenge. The first version we tried was way too hard — playtesters almost universally said it felt like they were fighting the game, not the monsters (and not the other players).

After a couple of disheartening playtest sessions, we went back and completely retooled the set, and ultimately came up with a game that I’m extremely proud of. I would be remiss not to give John Kovalic a shout-out for his outstanding art on Apocalypse, and of course on so many other Munchkin sets over the years. (Look at the Pathfinder cover!)

(The Pathfinder cover, along with the Munchkin version. Look at it!)

3.) You’ve also had a hand in guiding GURPS — short for Generic Universal RolePlaying System — as well as developing the most recent addition of Ogre. All of these projects involve longstanding legacies and expansive rule sets that must be quite a puzzle to work with. How do you mix and match the needs of the player with the high expectations involved?

To correct a minor misconception, my involvement with Ogre was more as a Kickstarter consultant than an Ogre developer — and there are times I wish I’d been a much louder consultant. (But wow, it’s an amazing achievement in game design and production!) Other than that, all I did for Ogre was keep the Munchkin train on the tracks so we could afford to print the sucker.

With GURPS, I was fantastically lucky to work with the best RPG line editor in the business, Sean “Dr. Kromm” Punch. Kromm took care of all the rules issues and made sure that the manuscripts were consistent with the rules that had gone before. That freed me up to worry about issues of text quality, book production, and of course scheduling.

I’m really proud of the work that Kromm and his team did on GURPS, especially on the Fourth Edition launch — editing the entire Basic Set was six months of hard work, but having him there to consult made it go so much easier.

It’s no exaggeration to say that my work on GURPS Fourth Edition was invaluable when I undertook to revise the rules and cards over the entire Munchkin line in late 2009 and 2010. We had decided to upgrade the visuals on the core Munchkin game, to use full-color art instead of the shades of brown that it used to be, and as long as we were going to be changing the set that much, we decided we could afford to sand down a few other rough spots.

It turned out to be quite a bit more of an undertaking that we had originally planned, but the result was a more consistent set of rules (on six pages instead of four, so old, tired eyes like mine could read them!), and the removal of a few design choices that were fine as one-off jokes in 2001 when Munchkin was a stand-alone game, but had started to become VERY frequently asked questions in 2009 when there were nine Munchkin core games and a dozen expansion sets. We thought about calling this a new edition, but it really wasn’t — it was just a refinishing job on the existing game. Ultimately, we compromised and updated the rule version number to 1.5 (with a tip of the hat to D&D in the process).

A lot of the updates we made in ’09 have helped shape the new sets — I think Steve and I both have a clearer understanding of the “Munchkin engine” than we did before that process started. The sets starting with Munchkin Zombies have been a lot more internally consistent, I think, because now we know when a rule doesn’t “feel like Munchkin.” Which is not to say that the earlier sets were bad — far from it! — just that the work of looking at every single card taught us a lot about the game. I certainly hope Steve would agree!

4.) What’s next for Andrew Hackard?

At the time of writing this, we’ve just sent Munchkin Apocalypse 2 to print (it’ll be out in the spring of 2014) and I’ve finished writing a couple of expansion sets for later next year. We have several booster packs planned for 2014, and a few surprises, too! Our biggest news, though, is that Steve, Phil, Ross Jepson (our Director of Sales), and I sat down for an all-day meeting in Dallas during BoardGameGeek Con, and we not only planned out the entire 2014-2015 schedule, we even started putting some things on the board for 2016!

I wish I could tell you about all the Munchkiny goodness coming down the pike, but I have been sworn to secrecy. Suffice it to say that I think our fans will be very pleased indeed, both with the new games coming out and the new support for some classics that haven’t seen a lot of love lately. As long as we don’t start competing with ourselves, we’ll be fine.

I’m also working on a couple of *new* goodies in the Munchkin sphere, one planned for late 2014 and one for 2015, and I’m really looking forward to being able to talk more about them as their release time draws closer. Right before our holiday break, I got the go-ahead to dust off something *non*-Munchkin that I’d been working on awhile back, so I’ll get a chance to stretch my skills in a whole new direction as well.

I expect 2014 to be an amazing year for me, personally, as well as for fans of Munchkin and of Steve Jackson Games in general.

5.) If you could give the readers, writers, aspiring game designers, and puzzle fans in the audience one piece of advice, what would it be?

Wil Wheaton talks about being an advocate for what you love, not a detractor for what you hate, and I think that’s very important. Gaming is a huge field and getting bigger all the time, and life’s too short to get into arguments about taste.

Have fun playing what you like, be a positive spokesman when someone expresses interest in what you’re playing, and try new games when you get the chance, because you never know when you’ll find your next favorite game — or when you’ll teach someone THEIR favorite new game.

For the aspiring designers out there, my best advice is simple: play games. Play LOTS of games. Take notes on the rules you like and the rules you don’t, and think really hard about why those rules were designed the way they were. (Don’t be surprised when the answer is, “It seemed like a good idea at the time.” That’s how Munchkin started!) If you’ve never studied technical writing, consider taking an introductory class at your local community college, because rule writing IS technical writing. If you confuse the players, they won’t play your game.

Go to conventions, if you can afford it; you’ll never get a better chance to show your game prototype to people who are eager to see the next hot new thing, and you may get a chance to meet and schmooze your favorite game designers, if you’re polite and well-groomed and willing to buy the first round.

(Seriously, the game industry is more welcoming than many others — we all started out as gamers ourselves, after all, and the list of fan-to-pro success stories is half a century long and growing every year.)

Ultimately, that’s what it’s all about — having a good time with your friends. Keep that in mind, and you’ll be far ahead of the game.

Many thanks to Andrew for his time. Check out all things Munchkin on the Steve Jackson Games website, and be sure to follow Andrew on Twitter (@redpenofdoom)! As a fan, I cannot wait to see what he and the Munchkin team come up with next.

Thanks for visiting the PuzzleNation blog today! You can like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, cruise our boards on Pinterest, check out our Tumblr, download our puzzle apps and iBooks, play our games at PuzzleNation.com, or contact us here at the blog!

American Crossword Puzzle Tournament Round-Up!

Posted on by
9

This past weekend was the 37th annual American Crossword Puzzle Tournament. Puzzlers descended upon Brooklyn, NY, for what more than one Twitter user affectionately referred to as “The Nerd Olympics.”

I’ve spoken to several participants — all veterans of the tournament who often enjoy the socializing as much as the actual puzzles — and much fun was had by all.

The tournament flowed smoothly, despite Daylight Saving Time stealing an hour’s sleep from competitors on Sunday. Topnotch solvers emerged early with blistering times, and other solvers challenged themselves to reach new personal bests and performances to be proud of.

In previous years, the biggest hurdle for most solvers has been Puzzle #5. It’s routinely the toughest, and this year’s puzzle proved to be no exception. Only a few dozen solvers completed the puzzle in the half hour allotted.

Here are two of my favorite tweets that captured the impression left by Puzzle #5:

I asked Penny/Dell variety editor and friend of the blog Keith Yarbrough about Puzzle #5. As a multiple-time attendee of the ACPT, one who has placed in the top 20% on more than one occasion, he had some valuable insight into the infamous puzzle:

If they didn’t have puzzle 5, the top solvers would all be bunched up with roughly the same scores, and it would be a mess trying to figure out the top three for the finals.  Puzzle 5 separates those people a bit and is the price we mortals have to pay for it.

(For the constructor’s thoughts on the puzzle, check out Brendan Emmett Quigley’s blog post here.)

On Sunday, after the ceremonial final solve in front of an audience — click here to check it out on YouTube! — the winners were crowned, and to no great surprise, Dan Feyer scored his fifth consecutive ACPT title, tying Tyler Hinman’s formidable streak. The top solvers were a who’s who of ACPT puzzlers, including Joon Pahk, Anne Erdmann, and Jon Delfin — and a thoroughly impressive 43 solvers managed to solve all 7 puzzles without any errors!

And friends of the blog had a terrific showing this year! Crossword gentleman Doug Peterson placed 14th, Los Angeles Times crossword editor Rich Norris placed 71, constructor David Steinberg (of the Pre-Shortzian Puzzle Project) placed 136, Uptown Puzzle Club editor Patti Varol placed 145, and editor Keith Yarbrough placed 212. (When you consider the nearly 600 entrants, those numbers are stunning.)

For a more complete rundown of the tournament, I highly recommend you check out the Twitter feed of The Puzzle Brothers. They virtually live-tweeted the tournament — their coverage of the final puzzle is terrific — and it’s a really fun read overall.

Thanks for visiting the PuzzleNation blog today! You can like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, cruise our boards on Pinterest, check out our Tumblr, download our puzzle apps and iBooks, play our games at PuzzleNation.com, or contact us here at the blog!