Sep 30, 2007 Hypercross Puzzle

I suspect lots of hatred on this one. We'll see. :-)

[1] i think you'll be getting it, it does look fun though.
it can't be as annoying as the one puzzle that i want to make.

Now if i can figure out how to piece these words with these words with this syllable...

Well, ten minutes and still not getting any aha's...

I get it, but I don't.
and I'm not even sure if one of my stressful words is actually a word.

I see what's common with all the clues, but no idea yet what to do next. Intriguing...I'm confused and I like it. :)

We had to guess on a few of them, but finally got them all. Pretty tough, and not really that fun. Nice concept, but the clues and answers weren't very recognizable, and some were a real stretch.

Not a good sign if the puzzle maker suspects hatred. I thought I knew what to do here, but so far I seem a little off.

So far, it's reminding me of many puzzles like that 'easy' one with the tomato.

argh! There are two we can't get; second across and bottom across.

I think I'm having the reaction Murdoctor did in [7]--I'm piecing things together slowly, but the clues look a little obscure (a chart of meat in Russian? a homebrewing newsletter? a...clawprint or something?). And the ones I have seem shaky. I'll probably give up in the next few minutes.

Can we make the clues any smaller or harder to read when there is actually text to be seen??? Geez! >:(

I have guesses for about half of them, but they don't seem to fit together and I'm not sure which (if any) I have right. I'm also at a loss for the ones mentioned in [11] and who are those two guys?

I'm not up to the point of actual hatred yet, but some of these are so ambiguous that without some kind of theme to tie them together and give you some idea whether you're on the right track, it's very frustrating.

[13] If you mean the two guys in an across clue, the first one was the star of Knight Rider, and the important thing about the other one is what he's doing with his hat, not who he is.

Any help on the newsletter/footprint, the Russian, or the football diagram?

Any salt on the claw one? I've identified the first picture, but need help on the second.

[15] If you squint at some tiny words in the newsletter, you can see where the title came from. The Russian chart is a type of meat that's pretty horrible, and the football diagram is a general concept rather than a specific formation.

[16] I suspect the clawprint is demonstrating a quality, rather than something about the claw itself.

[15], the newsletter's title is a synonym of "drink", and the Russian stuff is also called "variety meats".

[16] I think it's a handprint, not a clawprint.

I have something wrong, but I can't figure out what. Is anyone willing to check my list?

[19] Well, yes, but clawprints are cooler.

[20] I'm in the same boat; I've got answers for all, but I'm thoroughly unsure about at least half of them. I think I'm going to bed for tonight. Maybe it'll look different tomorrow.

(incidentally, I don't think this is a bad puzzle, it's just complicated in different ways than the typical Hypercrosses; and if I'm right about any of my answers, then there are a number of rather extreme stretches to get the right pronunciation out of the clues!)

I know the technique, have some of the answers, but boy, some very hard to figure out words there...its a stretch to say the clue sounds anything like the answer for some of these.

That was extremely difficult but obviously not impossible. I had to keep playing around with the possibilities I had until I got the words that fit together correctly. Some of these were very obscure words that I'd never even heard before. Took lots of Google searching (which I hate) but I did learn a few new words.

Yeah I've got nothing.

Done... 4 completions.

I'll salt some of them at BGG.

I guess I'm #5.

Well it's solved but those 2 points weren't really worth the uncertainty and frustration induced by it. Nearly an hour and only 5 solves at present, do the math!

It's usually not so easy to tell on the Hypercross, but...

SIXTH!!

One more look before going to bed got it for me. I have no idea what the newsletter/handprint one was (I know the newsletter title, but no clue on the handprint picture), but fortunately it was easily found from a list of crossword solver suggestions. I also had to guess on the one with the house part and the Heath bar (got the Heath part, no clue what the first one is supposed to be). And the one with the Russian meat chart is such a stretch of pronunciation that it's nearly impossible.

All in all, very tough puzzle, but somewhat rewarding to have completed it. It would've been more fun without the unintentionally difficult elements, but I still liked it. More fun than plants, baseball mascots, or Magic cards. :)

This is annoying. We have a mistake somewhere and we don't know where...

this would be much better and much easier if the answers themselves had something to do with eachother, rather than the clues...

I didn't get the handprint picture either, but I think you're just supposed to focus on the material, not the hand itself (but I may be completely off base).

[31] Consider us in the same boat. We have answers, but no idea where we went wrong.

Probably 7th. But I don't feel good about some of those answers.

[1] AwpH

1) My first hatred comes from the small print and small images...
Please, Please, Please take advantage of the maximum allowed image size...

2) If you expect lots of hatred of a puzzle, why submit it in the first place???

What the heck is the russian meat?

[36], it's a 5-letter word starting with the relevant 3 letters.

OK, I think I'm now only stuck on the Coffin and Coffee one. Or is that not coffee?

UNSALTED

Having looked at answers over on BGG, I'm glad I didn't spend any real time on this. There's really a whole lot of very broken phonetics here.

UNSALTED

Blech!

not my favorite, sorry. I am sure it took a lot of time to put together.

[35] I think the problem with the images was the opposite- they were too large, and got compressed when I uploaded them into near-illegibility.

I almost deleted this one twice after submitting it, because I really wasn't sure I wanted to frustrate people. But I didn't before it was published, and it's too late now, thus my comment.

Apologies to everyone who was frustrated with this one- I got too caught up in what I found to be an interesting twist on the usual hypercross clue/solution idea, and clearly ended up forcing several of them a little too hard for comfort.

I'll aim for more "fun" and less "difficult" in the future- my next one (assuming eventual publication) should get much more love than this one, deservingly.

Got it with no salt. But I think a couple were just guesses. Pronunciation was forced in several of the answers, but nothing seemed unfair.

That meat is awful

[44] For my hypercross submissions, I've been using 300x300 images, and that appears to fit very nicely. I've seen some that have been up to 400 pixels wide, though. After some experimentation, I've found that 400x300 is the maximum, so if you design your hypercross clue images to that size, you won't risk any resizing issues.

Hmm... I didn't think this one was that bad. I guessed at the russian meat one. It *is* a bit of an odd word, to be sure.

[48] ... but it's the only word associated with meat that fit the theme.

With that said, though, even with a list of the correct words it took me a long time to backsolve this puzzle.

Not a particularly well executed puzzle. Too many of the clues were either unidentifiable or a stretch in pronounciation.
Better luck next time.

I prefer the puzzles with a bit of difficulty. But the problem here is that the difficulty comes from the awkward fit of the syllables. There is no elegance or fun to be found in this puzzle.

That said, I appreciate the effort that must have gone into this. And I think it was a terrific idea; just not executed properly.

I can't believe I solved...too many ambiguous places to go wrong...sheesh