ACROSS LITE PUZZLE: [ IMPROPER PUZZLE]
PROGRAM: [Across Lite]
PROGRAM: [Java]
PRINTOUT PUZZLE: [ IMPROPER PUZZLE]
PROGRAM: [Adobe Acrobat]
So this one originally ran alongside an article about yours truly in the Improper Boston. That’s a local magazine that for some inexplicable reason doesn’t put it’s content on-line. It’s not like they’re gonna lose money putting it on the web, they just give the magazine away for free anyway. I don’t get it? Don’t they want people to read their articles? I have an international audience who’d want to read this! Anyway, since most of you haven’t seen the issue, this puzle might as well be new.
They asked me to write them an easy puzzle to go along with the article. Initially I think I got the difficulty right as a couple friends who aren’t puzzle people were able to finish it. The Improper originally wanted something about Boston, which I thought would be too boring. That’s why I’m emphasized the other word in their title.
I don’t want anybody upset because this one’s an easy puzzle. If you’re in that category, I want you to do what a couple of my “extended family members” (that’d be puzzle people) do. The rely on extreme handicaps, with the de facto one is using the Down clues only. Their logic is if the puzzle is really truly easy (and fairly clued) you should be able to get the whole thing by using just the Downs and you can confirm your answers from the crossings.
I’ve solved exactly three this way, and well, I just hated it. After all the years of blowing through easy puzzles with a whirlwind abandon, I got frustrated because Downs-only solving slo-o-o-o-owed me down. Hardcore. In a way, it was not unlike constructing a puzzzle. I found myself thinking things like: “if say ORATE goes across, MR. BIG fits going down.” I mean, I make so many damn puzzles, forgive me for wanting to do them for entertainment!
My buddy Trip tells me every now and then he solves the Saturday puzzles (aka “the bitch mothers”) Downs-only. I … er, um … Wow. I got nothing. I know Trip’s been at the top of competitive solving for like ever. But, man. I repeat: wow! Granted, he can’t fly through a Saturday this way, but jeesh, that seems like showing off to me.
Oh, by the way: for those who gave some loot to help pay for the site, thanks mucho! For those who have no idea what I’m talking about, I’m hitting folk up for some small scratch to help pay for this month’s puzzles. So if you can, go to the tip jar and give $5, $10, or $20 if you got it to help cover this month’s puzzles and to keep the BEQ strong and independent. And again, everybody who donates will be in the running for a free copy of “Diagramless Crosswords”. I’ll announce the winner on Monday.
Share the puzzle. Themeless Friday coming up next. (You thought I wasn’t going to post one, eh?)
By a country mile, the easiest beq ever. I can’t do NYT Mondays that fast. Wow. More enjoyable than most NYT Mondays, though. You should do more easys (esp. if you want to garner WorldWideFame — tons and tons and tons of people are actually looking for and prefer easy puzzles). I mean, don’t stop the hard stuff, but artful easy puzzles — that’s an underserved market.
Yeah, I blew through this in less than half my usual time, and the last thirty seconds was just me being an idiot and transposing the across and down clues for EARNER and IND.
what a nasty puzzle! seriously, nice easy puzzle.
I’m with Rex, while it took me about the same time as a Mon NYT to solve this was much more fun then they are. That means that this is a really great puzzle with a squeaky clean grid since there was no where to really slow you down. Heck, even the Roman numeral clue was gettable for once.
I wonder which puzzle people liked better this breezy one or the monster that was Monday’s. To me, it seems like harder puzzles get more street cred b/c you are slowing down speed solvers, have different entries, whatever but an easy puzzle seems much harder to construct since you can’t cop out with a more obscure entry. I really liked this one better because of how clean the grid was without compromising the BEQness (you better get on a trademark for that) of the grid. I wonder what people think and what you think. It’s not fair that the easy stuff isn’t seen as legit as the nasty stuff.
only holdup in doing this downs-only was thinking that CV_ was going to be CVS, especially for a boston-based market. still, the fact that the rest of this went so incredibly fast is a testament to its smoothness. and the theme is great.
forgot to rate this, but it’s a *****.
Your easiest puzzle ever! I solved it Downs only and the Across crossings were all so plausible. The only iffy spot was being only 90% sure about NOBU, with that partial TO BAT crossing not icing it.
I shouldn’t have squandered my one chance to break four minutes on a BEQ puzzle by doing downs-only, but I couldn’t resist the challenge. And now you’ve got the honor of being the only constructor I’ve ever solved a puzzle downs-only for.
Of course, I’ll never do it again–looks like I missed about 50% of the good clues.
Trip challenges me to duplicate his Downs-only feat on Friday or Saturday when he manages to do it. I usually make some progress, but it seems like there’s always a section with one or two no-hopers that force me to look to the Across.
I tried doing this on last Friday’s Patrick Berry, and I had a realization after some but not a great amount of progress: “wait, this sucks.” I just wasn’t having any fun with it. I enjoy really tough puzzles, but it somehow is more frustrating than entertaining when you know you don’t have all the information.
I feel the same way. I want a puzzle that requires me to use every trick in the book (short of Google). If I have to handicap myself to make it interesting, it’s just not fun.
Nothing wrong with a gimmee every now and again.
I’m with you on that. I used to do the down-only thing with the Boston Globe puzzle. Then I graduated to doing ’em in my head, which is a little strange but possible. Sort of hard to remember your crosses after a while, at least for me. But doable. But finally I just stopped doing ’em b/c they just weren’t fun any more.
As for the Saturday NYT, nope, no way I could do it downs only. But back in the day of paper newspapers I used to always do ’em in pen–does that count?
As usual, I went ahead and did the puzzle without reading your blog post first. Maybe I would have tried it doing only the downs, but it looks like a near consensus that that sucks. (I have had some fun doing easier — or even more difficult — puzzles as diagramlesses, though.)
Anyway, 4:12. By far my quickest BEQ time. (And by “by far” I mean, like, ten minutes.)
Having not read the backstory, I was left so dumbfounded as to how this puzzle could have come from BEQ that I checked AcrossLite’s author and copyright fields in the possible event that I was misremembering which site I’d downloaded it from.
Dejectedly, and without even noticing that it had a theme, I gave it 2 stars.
Then I read the blog entry and looked at the grid again. Ah, man. I wish I’d given it at least 3 stars if only because it really is a feat to create a clean easy puzzle without using the more obscure crosswordese to bail you out in various spots.
Well done, again.
OK, after reading the blog/comment thread, now I feel like an ass for rating this ***. This is clearly a five-star easy puzzle.
My inclination, though, is to rate based on my solving experience. “Too easy” detracts from that for me (as does “too hard” — the perfect puzzle is tough but fair). This puzzle barely put up a fight — I guess that’s gonna happen sometimes when BEQ is creating a puzzle for a more general audience than the loyal puzzleheads. More power to you for showing off your versatility, Brendan.
That was a nice changeup, and a fun little theme.
BEQ, BEQ you really painted yourself in a corner now. On your prior “Easy” puzzles, you stated with befuddlement why we considered them Medium or even Hard. You told us that this was as easy as you can make them and voila you create a true Monday puzzle. I felt like a Viking storming the beaches on this one nothing stood in my way but don’t worry I won’t hold this one against you.
I used to try solving the weekend puzzles downs-only. I only finished a grid once, but I found the exercise more interesting than speed solving. I should fiddle around with the Across Lite display options and see if there is a good way to solve downs-only on the computer.
Eh, different strokes. I rarely solve standard crosswords at all (mostly if I decide to do training for the tournament), just because of the whole busman’s holiday thing. For me, doing hard puzzles downs-only is more interesting because it adds some interesting logic and trial-and-error possibilities into the more usual straightforward solving approaches, but I can also see why it’s never really taken off. (And there are plenty of puzzles where I start downs-only, then say “ah, the hell with it” and then grab the Acrosses and just rip through the rest.)