I find it satisfying to do a word puzzle (or three) every day. Wordle is great, but it’s not really exciting anymore. Crosswords are fun if you have the time (I love the NYT Thursday puzzle) but I don’t always bother. My sweet spot, lately, is games like Minute cryptic And password-which are entry points into the incredibly strange world of British “cryptic” crossword clues.
What is a cryptic puzzle?
Cryptics are a type of word puzzle unlike any other. There are full crosswords out there, but the daily puzzles I write about are fair One key per day, so you can focus on exactly what’s going on in that one key.
Cryptics look like regular crossword clues – a short text with a word or phrase as the answer – but the way you come up with the answer is by reinterpreting the clues as instructions for a wordplay. You may realize that you are being asked to anagram a word, insert another word inside it, flip a word backwards, or do one of a variety of other diabolical tricks.
For example, a recent Minute Cryptic sign reads “Learn 1970s-style dance music! $5 off per beginner!” To solve it (which gave me a few clues) I needed to do the following:
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Ignore the word “learning” for now, as that would be the definition of the word I’m trying to find
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Translate “1970s-style dance music” to DISCO
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Translate “$5” to another way of writing the number five — the Roman numeral V
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take off This beginner The word “per,” leaving me with ER
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Put those bits together to form the word DISCOVER, which is a synonym for “learn.”
If you shout “Are you kidding me?” When you get a reply on your phone, you’ve done it right. My second favorite was “Schrödinger’s dead pet box contains about half a skeleton.” To make a “box for the dead”, you put the letters SKE (about half of the “skeleton”) inside the CAT. Then you get the CASKET. get?
I’ve always liked regular, nice, American crosswords—where the clue is a definition and that’s all—and I thought the cryptic type was basically impossible. But friendly puzzles like Minute Cryptic and Passwords help you learn little tricks of the trade, and after playing them daily for a while, I can now often answer cryptic clues without hints.
How to learn to play daily secret puzzles
While my favorite is Minute Cryptic, I’m going to show you the password first, because it’s more specific about teaching you the manipulations you can see in a cryptic key. When you first visit parseword.comYou will get a very complete tutorial.
Instead of just giving you a box to type in an answer, Password lets you click on each word in the clue. When you click, you will get an option to replace the word with a substitute. If you click on two words, you will get options for different ways to combine them. The interface lets you click around to explore all the possibilities, which can be a great way to get stuck when you’d otherwise just stare at the screen wondering what you’re supposed to do.
What do you think so far?
Credit: Passwords
The minute takes a different approach, based on cryptic clues. You can decide if you want the game to reveal indicator (words that tell you to perform operations like “off” and “beginner” in my Discover example), or fodder (the words you use for parts) or indicate which word is the definition. If you’re still stumped, you can ask the game to reveal one letter at a time until you finally get it. There’s no way to fail Minute Cryptic—you’re just told that you used more or fewer clues than the average player.
On the left, what you see first when you solve the puzzle; On the right, hints and video explanations
Credit: Minute Cryptic
Both games are beginner friendly – no judgment if you need hints, but no hints if you choose not to. Passwords can be more structured with its “learn mode” and automatic suggestions. I love Minute Cryptic’s hints, and I love that it recently added a “scribble space” where you can select and rearrange letters – perfect if you know you need to anagram something. (Before that feature was introduced, I used Screengram As my non-cheating anagram tool. (You enter your letters and press “Shuffle” until inspiration strikes.)
After a few days with Minute Cryptic, I began to understand how the clues were made. After a few weeks, I was usually solving them “under par”. A few months later, I paid for a subscription that gives you unlimited mini crosswords to do, where every clue is available.
The second step in your learning journey, if you feel confident, is trying it out Guardians Quick Cryptic. Not only is it shorter than a regular cryptic crossword, there is also an explanation of the types of clues used in the day’s puzzle. for example, Puzzle #103 There are anagrams, hidden words, soundlikes, and acrostics, but no other clue types. You’ll get practice finding and solving those four types, but you’re on your own to solve them.
