Forget ACPT. Forget Lollapuzzoola. Forget escape rooms and scavenger hunts and puzzle cruises and D&D in a castle. Our newest offering leaves all of them in the dust.
The final season of HBO’s hit fantasy series Game of Thrones is fast approaching — the first episode of the 8th season airs April 14th — and HBO has gone all out to promote the end of the epic saga of the Starks, the Lannisters, Daenerys Targaryen, and the numerous other families and factions vying for the Iron Throne.
As news of this incredible scavenger hunt started to go viral earlier this week, four of the six thrones had already been located. Scattered across Europe were the first four thrones: Björkliden, Sweden; Puzzlewood, England; Atienza, Spain; and Beberibe, Brazil.
The Throne of Ice was yet to be discovered, and there were no hints yet as to the possible location of the sixth and final throne.
But as of yesterday, the Throne of Ice was found.
Tucked away in a small mountain town in the Canadian side of the Rocky Mountains, the Throne of Ice was discovered by Birgit Sharman and her husband Kevin in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia — the first throne found outside Europe.
HBO is taking the promotion pretty seriously, it seems. Two men wearing fur coats, presumably of the Stark clan, were waiting on the throne to be found and put a crown on Birgit’s head that she was allowed to keep and which she showed off via her Facebook page.
One throne remains to be found. But where? And what surprises await those who find it?
Its location is unknown for now, but one thing is for certain: fans won’t soon forget this amazing moment when the show brought a little bit of Westeros to life.
Update: The sixth throne was found!
Located in Fort Totten Park, NY, the Throne of the Crypt will be left in place until April 1st, so if you’re looking for a killer photo opportunity, you’ve got it.
The Game of Thrones Twitter page posted this photo about half an hour ago to indicate the sixth and final throne had been found.
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One of the curious aspects of being a modern Internet user is figuring out how to manage your passwords. Most sites, whether commercial or recreational, have log-in screens or other account info, and it’s up to you to remember passwords for these numerous accounts.
You could use the same password over and over for everything, but that’s not a terribly safe choice. You could keep a list where you write down your different passwords to each site in order to keep them all straight, which is also not safe. You could opt to use a password-management service to handle them for you, which is a bit unwieldy for most users.
And if you need to come up with a new password for each account, you might find yourself employing a puzzly technique like Mira Modi’s in order to conjure up a password.
Recently, Gizmodo writer Rhett Jones posed a password-centric brain teaser to his readers, asking why the seemingly safe-looking string “ji32k7au4a83” might not be a good choice for a password.
Can you puzzle out why?
I’ll give you a few moments to ponder it.
…
…
…
…
…
All set? Okay, here we go.
As it turns out, “ji32k7au4a83” is the Chinese equivalent of one of the worst choices for a password. Using the Zhuyin Fuhao system for transliterating Mandarin to English, “ji32k7au4a83” becomes “my password,” a top contender for terrible password ideas like those compiled below:
Yup, as it turns out, that random string of letters and numbers isn’t particularly random after all.
You’d be better off using a technique suggested by one of my fellow puzzlers. To generate her random passwords, she composes a sentence related to the website, then uses only the first letter of each word in that sentence as the base for the password.
Toss in a number or two, and voila, you’ve got something that appears to be gibberish, but is easily recalled and reassembled for your own use.
Pretty diabolical! Give it a shot and let us know how it works for you!
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The 42nd annual American Crossword Puzzle Tournament was this weekend, and puzzlers descended on the Stamford Marriott Hotel once again to put their puzzly skills to the test in what is lovingly known as “the Nerd Olympics.”
The tournament takes place over two days, with six puzzles to solve on Saturday, followed by one on Sunday. Then the top three finishers in the A, B, and C brackets solve the championship puzzle on whiteboards in front of the audience.
On Friday and Saturday night, there are often puzzle events, demonstrations, and panels by top puzzlers and figures in the puzzle world as well.
I made the journey down to Stamford myself Saturday morning, arriving with plenty of time to spare to prep our spot in the puzzle marketplace and say hello to friends and puzzly acquaintances. This year, I was joined at the Penny Dell Puzzles booth once again by my friend and partner-in-promotion Stacey Scarso.
The Penny Dell crew had a terrific setup as always, with a metric buttload of magazines to give away, including copies of The Crosswords Club and several flavors of Tournament Variety, Master’s Variety, and Dell Sunday Crosswords. They were also running a kickass promotion offering half-price on a year’s subscription to Crosswords Club, which is a great deal.
The Penny Dell Store also returned for the first time in a few years, as puzzle books (including a collection of Daily POP Crossword App puzzles!), tote bags, travel mugs, and coffee mugs were for sale. The Word Nerd mugs were a big hit!
PLUS we held a contest to win a bundle of PDP puzzle swag, including a mug, a tote bag, coffee fixin’s, and a bunch of puzzle magazines! All you had to do was solve a marvelous crossword variant puzzle cooked up by Eric Berlin.
And, yes, in their downtime between tournament puzzles, many competitors DO solve other puzzles.
At 9 AM, the tournament was two hours away, but the marketplace was up and running.
There were puzzle books galore from Will Shortz and Merl Reagle, ACPT shirts and cards from Elena Powell Abrahams, and a massive uber-crossword from T. William Campbell, which definitely caught the eye of some solvers:
As competitors readied themselves for the day’s solving, I had plenty of time to see friends of the blog like Crosswords Club editor Patti Varol, crossword gentleman Doug Peterson, constructor Joanne Sullivan, and Penny Press variety editor Keith Yarbrough!
Perhaps the best part of attending the tournament is getting to chat with so many members of the puzzle community in one place. There were 200 first-time attendees and enthusiastic rookies, mixing with current and former champions, and all sorts of puzzle enthusiasts of all ages.
There were long-time puzzle fans who have been competing at ACPT for years, if not decades, many of whom were decked out in puzzle shirts, puzzle scarves, puzzle ties, and other grid-heavy accoutrements.
One of the attendees even offered to buy the Crossword Puzzle Junkie shirt off my back! I assured him that that would work for him and literally no one else in attendance.
But I digress.
Many of the top constructors in the business were there, names like David Steinberg, Evan Birnholz, Joon Pahk, Erik Agard, Peter Gordon, and more, along with former champions and first-rate competitors like Dan Feyer, David Plotkin, Howard Barkin, Ellen Ripstein, and Stella Zawistowski.
Getting to connect faces and personalities with names I know from tournaments like the Indie 500 is a real treat, and so many of the people in the puzzle world are genuinely nice, funny individuals. Not only that, but I also got to meet several fellow trivia fiends from the Learned League community!
The two hours before showtime passed quickly, and soon, the marketplace emptied and the ballroom filled as competitors took their seats for Puzzle 1.
Attendance jumped again this year, which meant not only was the main ballroom absolutely jam-packed with competitors, but an overflow room was once again needed to accommodate the more-than-700 solvers in Stamford!
When Puzzle 1 arrived, most competitors found Kathy Wienberg’s puzzle to be quick and fair, on par with Monday NYT puzzles.
Although there was no sub-2-minute time like last year, the top solvers still blasted through this one.
Puzzle 2, constructed by prolific puzzler Joel Fagliano, surprised some solvers with a clever little trick at its core. This is consistent with the last few years, where Puzzle 2 has surprised the competitors. I think many solvers forget that, given how legendarily difficult Puzzle 5 is every year. It’s easy to forget other puzzles can offer quite a challenge along the way.
About this time, scores started trickling out for Puzzle 1, and many of the expected names were at the top: Feyer, Pahk, Plotkin, Zawistowski, Sanders, Kravis, Ryan… but two big names were missing.
Former 5-time champion (and perennial top contender) Tyler Hinman was not attending the tournament this year, and Erik Agard, last year’s champion, had a mistake in Puzzle 1, which would seriously hamper his efforts to repeat last year’s success.
Puzzle 3 was constructed by Patrick Berry, and served as a well-received, smooth-solving palate-cleanser before the lunch break.
[Even empty, all the dividers make the room feel packed…]
Solvers scattered to the four winds in order to grab a bite to eat before returning by 2:30 for Puzzle 4, while the tournament officials were still hard at work tabulating scores:
After 3 puzzles, Dan Feyer was on top of the rankings, followed closely by Pahk, and then a three-way tie among Kravis, Plotkin, and Zawistowski for third.
But it was time to kick off the second half of the day with Puzzle 4.
Last year’s fourth puzzle had a visual element that tripped up some of the competitors, and this year’s Puzzle 4 (by constructor Jeff Stillman) was also harder than expected. The fill featured more obscurities than solvers anticipated, and several competitors commented on it on Twitter:
Oh, and by the way, thanks to his puzzly skills and blistering speed, Erik Agard had worked his way back up to 7th place after completing Puzzle 4. Amazing.
Finally, it was time for Puzzle 5. This year, constructor Evan Birnholz (not Birnholtz, as it was misprinted on his name tag) did the honors, and according to competitors, it was as challenging as expected, really putting the craftiness and keen wits of the solvers to the test.
Even the officials noticed:
After the diabolical Puzzle 5, it was Dan Feyer, Joon Pahk, David Plotkin, Stella Zawistowski, and… Erik Agard.
Competitors closed out the day with Puzzle 6, constructed by Lynn Lempel (she also contributed Puzzle 6 last year), and declared it both fun and fair. The competitors dispersed to rest their brains (or solve more puzzles). We packed up the Penny/Dell table and headed for home.
[The standings after Puzzle 6. Erik has worked his way back to 4th. Was a comeback story in store for Day 2?]
And although I wasn’t present for Sunday’s tournament finale, I continued to get updates from friends and fellow puzzlers.
Puzzle 7, constructed by Mike Shenk, was what you might expect from a constructor of his caliber: elegant fill, little crosswordese, and great fun.
But Shenk’s name being announced for Puzzle 7 also meant a puzzly milestone for the Finals:
Yes, Robyn Weintraub’s tournament constructing debut would be the final hurdle for the competitors! Fantastic news!
Dan Feyer remained at the top of the leaderboard, having maintained a great solving pace, followed closely by Joon Pahk and David Plotkin.
But it was not meant to be, and the final three came down to Dan Feyer (7-time champ, looking for a record-breaking 8th title), Joon Pahk and David Plotkin (two familiar names in the top ten).
Dan Feyer crushed the A clues in under 7 minutes. Joon Pahk was a strong runner-up at 9:05, and David Plotkin placed third with a very respectable showing of 11:13.
As he had done all tournament, Dan solved with undeniable speed and precision, claiming his eighth tournament victory!
And it was a strong showing for many other familiar names! Doug Peterson placed 21st, David Steinberg placed 26th, Angela Halsted placed 94th, Vega Subramaniam cracked the top 100 with 98th, and Patti Varol placed 113th out of a field of 741 participants. (And even with one eye tied behind his back, Keith Yarbrough managed an impressive performance as well!)
There were also some wonderfully heartwarming stories to emerge from the tournament, like this multi-generational solving success story:
In the end, Jenna LaFleur (aka daughter) placed 33rd! Awesome job!
It’s always great fun to spend time with fellow puzzlers and wordplay enthusiasts, immersing myself in the puzzle community and enjoying all the charm and camaraderie that comes with it.
Of course, everyone should make sure to check their puzzle vaults when they get home:
We’ll see you next year!
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Puzzlers from all over are sharpening their pencils and their wits as they gear up for what is affectionately known as the Nerd Olympics, and we here at PuzzleNation wish all of the competitors the best of luck!
Here’s hoping Puzzle #5 isn’t as diabolical as it has been in previous years!
There is a topnotch lineup of constructors to challenge this year’s competitors. Not only do we have Patrick Berry and Mike Shenk — perennial contributors to the tournament — but there will also be puzzles from ACPT stalwarts like Lynn Lempel and Joel Fagliano, as well as tournament puzzle debuts for Evan Birnholz, Robyn Weintraub, Jeff Stillman, and Kathy Wienberg! I can’t wait to see what they’ve concocted for this year’s tournament!
Good luck to everyone competing! And hey, if you need a pencil sharpener — or you’d like some terrific puzzly merch, contests, and a few freebies — we’ll be hanging out with our pals at the Penny Dell Puzzles table again this year! Be sure to stop by!
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The Rubik’s Cube is an instantly recognizable icon of the puzzle industry. That simple pattern of colors on a 3×3 grid, the twisty turny puzzly challenge… it’s unmistakable.
Say hello to the Rubik Tilt, a $25 handheld Rubik-style twisty puzzle that mixes button pressing with rotating, turning, and tilting the device itself in order to manipulate a virtual Rubik’s Cube on its game screen.
The buttons on the back of the controller allow you to select which row or column of the Cube is being shifted by your real world maneuvering.
Now, you may very well be saying, “So what? What does the Rubik Tilt do that you can’t get from playing with an actual Rubik’s Cube?” And that is a very fair question.
And the designers at Super Impulse did think of that; yes, the Rubik Tilt does have one trick up its sleeve that the original Cube does not.
Yes, when the game detects a lapse in solving — such as when you’re stumped about how to proceed next — it offers hints on which rows and columns of the puzzle to focus on. Although the puzzle won’t go as far as walking you through solving a Cube, it does provide a little pushing and prodding to keep you going.
When you factor in that the game also keeps track of your solving time, you have a Rubik’s-solving experience that not only encourages you, but actually teaches you to be better at solving this classic, diabolical brain teaser.
And, like the best puzzles, it rewards determination, rather than doubling down on frustration.
It’s certainly a different take on the Cube we all know, but it remains a worthwhile experiment, a proud new entry in the grand tradition of puzzles that teach us to be better solvers.
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