New York Times Crosswords for the DS

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Tybee

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In reading a news item on IGN today about Majesco's latest earnings report, I was surprised to see Majesco CEO mention a crossword game for the DS that I have not seen discussed anywhere else:

[quote name='IGN']Regarding 2007, Sutton responded, "In 2007, the core of our line-up will include a variety of titles for the handheld markets, with an emphasis on products for the increasingly popular Nintendo DS system. We currently have games in development for the DS based on popular licenses that we believe will appeal to the mass market audience. Specific titles include: New York Times Crosswords, Nancy Drew, and Cake Mania.[/quote]

Does anyone know anything about this game? Just last weekend my wife and I were watching the documentary "Wordplay," which centers around Will Shortz the NY Times crossword, and I was lamenting that there are no crossword titles for the DS. There are seemingly dozens of sudoku games, yet no crosswords, which confounds me because the system is so obviously suited to them. And NY Times crosswords are the Holy Grail. I would kill for this game.
 
Man, if that comes out, I might have to get my grandpa a DS for Christmas. He's started doing sudoku recently, but his love is crosswords.

Unfortunately he goes through a year's worth of puzzles in a couple months, so I'll have to see how many puzzles are included.

Wordplay was a fascinating movie, by the way.
 
It's not like these are USA Today offerings for the drool cup crowd...don't you pretty much have to be Ken Jennings on a Red Bull binge to ever complete one from the Times?
 
[quote name='jollydwarf']It's not like these are USA Today offerings for the drool cup crowd...don't you pretty much have to be Ken Jennings on a Red Bull binge to ever complete one from the Times?[/QUOTE]

The only thing harder is Harper's puzzle (I think it's just called "puzzle," actually).

This is *completely* drool-worthy. Coming from Majesco, no less, so there's a chance it releases at $20.
 
[quote name='jollydwarf']It's not like these are USA Today offerings for the drool cup crowd...don't you pretty much have to be Ken Jennings on a Red Bull binge to ever complete one from the Times?[/quote]My mom got my grandpa one of those books of NYT crossword puzzles for Christmas a year ago, he finished it in May, I believe. I, on the other hand, would probably take three Christmases to do so.
 
I'm pretty sure I've never completed a crossword, ever.

Ok, maybe that one in gradeschool that had a wordbox to chose from. ;)
 
[quote name='daroga']I'm pretty sure I've never completed a crossword, ever.

Ok, maybe that one in gradeschool that had a wordbox to chose from. ;)[/quote]

I'm so glad I'm not the only one!!! :lol:

I would love to see a compilation of other sorts of word games, though... I do love word searches and logic problems, and the DS would be perfect for both :bouncy:

And Nancy Drew... as a female, I have to give the obligatory "hurrah!"... thanks for mentioning that in your post, op ;)

I wonder when these things will come out? I thought Cake Mania was coming out in the next few months... so does that mean that these other games are, as well? or that Cake Mania has been delayed? :( Or... neither??
 
[quote name='jollydwarf']It's not like these are USA Today offerings for the drool cup crowd...don't you pretty much have to be Ken Jennings on a Red Bull binge to ever complete one from the Times?[/QUOTE]

For the weekends yes, the Times is pretty insane, but up to Thursday shouldn't be too difficult for anyone with a few years of college under their belt. Unless you're not...wordy

I've never seen Harper's puzzle, but I've heard things. Maybe they have a sample online?
 
[quote name='jollydwarf']It's not like these are USA Today offerings for the drool cup crowd...don't you pretty much have to be Ken Jennings on a Red Bull binge to ever complete one from the Times?[/QUOTE]

They increase in difficulty over the course of each week, starting with USA Today level on Monday and progressing to clusterfuck on Friday and Saturday and nigh impossible on Sunday.

Go rent the movie Wordplay http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0492506/

It's a pretty good movie about crossword puzzles, specifically the NY Times version. Very interesting, considering the topic.
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Agreed. And they scored interviews with lots of great celebrity Times crossword fans, including Jon Stewart, Bill Clinton, and the Indigo Girls.

There's an art to them, and many have more going on than you think (in the supplementary material included with the Wordplay DVD, it provides five classic examples, including one that, once answered, becomes a maze, one that uses word tricks to evoke the Empire State Building, etc.)

Also, you can get the Sunday Puzzle, the 10-minute program Will Shortz does for NPR each week, as a free podcast here:

http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast/podcast_detail.php?siteId=4819411

It's really clever and a lot of fun.
 
Aha! Guess I was just a day early. ;)

http://kotaku.com/gaming/the-new-york-times-crosswords/nyt-crossword-coming-to-ds-232889.php

[quote name='Kotaku']Majesco announced today that The New York Times Crosswords, a game that will feature, wait for it, the New York Times Crosswords. Clever title, huh?

The game, which ships this spring, will feature more than 1,000 crossword puzzles and the ability to handwrite in answers with the stylus. It will also include several modes such as Puzzle Me Quick, Puzzle Week and Challenge Mode. Finally, the game will have some coop and competitive two-player modes.

Unfortunately, it doesn't look like it will support any sort of ability to update with new puzzles. That would kick ass. Imagine a NYT Crossword game that actually updated with the current, in-paper, puzzles. Oh, well. We all know that Nintendo and online just don't like to mix. Brian Crecente

EDISON, N.J., Jan. 31 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Crossword puzzle aficionados will soon have a new outlet as Majesco Entertainment Company (Nasdaq: COOL - News), an innovative provider of digital entertainment products and content, today announced The New York Times Crosswords for the Nintendo DS(TM). Developed by Budcat Creations, The New York Times Crosswords will challenge even the most savvy wordplay enthusiasts when it ships this spring.

"The challenging fun of The New York Times crossword puzzles combined with the stylus-based functionality of the Nintendo DS is a perfect pairing from our perspective," said Ken Gold, vice president of Marketing, Majesco. "Handwriting recognition lends authenticity to gameplay while wireless multiplayer offers social players a means to enjoy the game with other fans on the go. The New York Times Crosswords really is the ultimate game for passionate crossword puzzle lovers."

The New York Times Crosswords features more than 1,000 real crossword puzzles and the unique ability to write in answers with the stylus or use a Touch Screen keyboard to enter letters. Various modes of play include Puzzle Me Quick for a fast word fix; Puzzle Week for extended play with progressive difficulty; or Challenge mode with adjustable time and difficulty settings. In addition, the game includes both cooperative and competitive 2-player play so puzzle fanatics can work together or face off in wireless challenges.

For more information about Majesco's exciting line of products please visit www.majescoentertainment.com.[/quote]

The described modes sound very cool, and you can't argue with 1,000 puzzles. I like how they'll have progressive difficulty modeled after the way the puzzles get harder over the course of a week. Also very thankful for text entry using the stylus. That really gave Brain Age's version of Sudoku the leg up on other versions, so it's nice to see them including it here (assuming the character recognition is decent). Competitive/cooperative play could be cool. Online play/updating would have been nice, but not necessary.
 
Just a few months ago, I was thinking that there are two games the DS is really missing that would be perfect for it: a crossword game and a picross game. Picross DS just came out in Japan, and now we're getting a crossword game; all we need now is for Picross DS to come out here in the States (of course, given that the purpose of the game is to draw pictures using numbers, I imagine the game is not text-heavy and therefore import-friendly, so if it doesn't come out here, I'll just import it).
 
Anyone see this today? eb/gs had today, bb has next week, i couldnt find it in stores nor find anyone that knew when it was dropping.
 
I'm interested in getting this, but I just can't see spending $30 on it. If it drops to $20, I'll probably pick it up in a second, but $30 is a little too steep. I still want to read some reviews as well, to see how the interface is like.
 
man i love crosswords i remember we had a hundred word one in my english class senior year for the final and we got to work in groups. It involved all the vocab words in the semester and long story short we all passed because my friend went on the internet with his psp and got the answers.
 
I've got a $5 BB gift cert. burning a whole in my pocket. May use it toward this when it shows up there.

Any reviews yet?
 
Looks like most places have the 29th for the release date now. Eventhough majesco says it shipped today. What is with games these days missing every date by at least a day.
 
[quote name='Tybee']I've got a $5 BB gift cert. burning a whole in my pocket. May use it toward this when it shows up there.[/QUOTE]

I've got some BB $5 GGC coupons and this game appeals to me. Nothing's up on gamerankings yet, which shouldn't be surprising. It's not the kind of game that the IGNs of the world will get a traffic bump for hyping. :)
 
EB/GS says they will ship this but the store locater comes up blank. Im gonna make another sweep while hitting some memday sales. I was hoping to play this on the extra weekend.
 
Im waiting for the slidecage review of it before i get it. ;P
It's next on my gamefly list and I cant wait since I love crosswords. I have to admit I've never done a nytimes one though, and their reputation is a bit intimidating. At least I can be gauranteed a challenge and learning experience.
 
IGN's review

Seems pretty good from what I can tell. I definitely may wind up picking it up sometime soon, though I'm still trying to get it for a little cheaper than full price.
 
Yea the $30 price hurts. The difficulty isnt watered down from normal NYT. My only complaint is you can only save one ongoing puzzle of each type at a time. Im a person who works on a few at a time usually. Havent tried the multi but I will soon.
 
I picked it up yesterday and my wife and I love it. I am really surprised at the amount of production that went into this title (when you you touch the screen to select a profile or choose a mode you are greeted with a piano sound). The writing recognition is well done and the amount of puzzles is staggering (three years worth!).
 
I tried playing this for about half an hour today. About 75% of the clues don't help me; and I don't want to cheat with the 'hint' function. Man, this game makes me feel dumm.
 
Im waiting for the slidecage review of it before i get it. ;P
It's next on my gamefly list and I cant wait since I love crosswords. I have to admit I've never done a nytimes one though, and their reputation is a bit intimidating. At least I can be gauranteed a challenge and learning experience.
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Most people do Sunday crosswords, and in the NY Times structure, Sunday is the hardest one. Monday is easiest, and each day of the week gets progressively harder. That being said, I don't think I've ever finished 100% of a Monday puzzle on my own. I think I got around 90% once.
 
I did end up picking this up on Monday, and I have to say I am extremely pleased. I enjoy crosswords, but online crosswords were always kind of a pain for me because I didn't want to be chained in front of a computer screen. And I don't subscribe to a newspaper (I read the Times online). So the convenience and accessiblity of this title was a great boon for me.

The gameplay itself is very intuitive and the handwriting recognition is far better than I was expecting. At this point, the only letter of mine it regularly has trouble recognizing is my upper-case 'G', but that's easily remedied by using lower-case, which it gets every time. I do find it changes the way I do the crosswords a bit, as with the print versions I usually attempt all the across clues and then all of the down clues in a somewhat orderly fashion. Here, it's more convenient to just jump around at random, as the top screen gives you the clue for whatever space you last tapped. Just tap the same space again to switch between horizontal and vertical. And as you're entering text, it will automatically skip spaces already filled with letters. If you start filling in a word in the middle and go to the end, it automatically goes back to the beginning so you can fill in the rest. The hint system is nicely implemented, and unlike some reviews I read, I've never had occasion to "accidentally" use a hint. It only gives me a gimme letter when I deliberately ask for it.

As for the difficulty, yeah, it can be tough. For my very first selection, I started with a "quick game" and it randomly selected a Sunday puzzle for me, which gave me pause. I've managed to get about half the clues without help, which surprised me. I'm very fond of the Week Play mode, which lets you start with a Monday puzzle and progress through Sunday. I finished the Monday puzzle in minutes. Tuesday for some reason was very tough. But Wednesday was a piece of cake. You can play these one day at a time (and save your progress at any point) or run through the whole week in one sitting if you're a masochist. Puzzles are timed and scored based on how quickly you finish, any misses (which it then gives you a chance to correct), and I think the number of times you have to make corrections as you go along.

Really a teriffic little program. With 1,000 puzzles in the offing, I can see playing this for a long, long time.
 
I picked this up a week or so ago and I am impressed. I'm used to using a Palm Pilot so I wish it would support Graffiti, but it doesn't seem to recognize some of the strokes. When you ask for a hint on a letter you already have correct, I noticed it doesn't mark the letter. Are you still penalized for it? I also noticed you can't go back and improve your score on puzzles. Once you finish it, the grade stays unless you make a new profile.
 
[quote name='radjago']When you ask for a hint on a letter you already have correct, I noticed it doesn't mark the letter. Are you still penalized for it?[/quote]

I think if you have the letter correct, it's a gimme and you're not penalized for the confirmation. But don't quote me on this.
 
I purchased this for my dad on father's day... its a lot of fun knocking the crosswords out with a group of people. Anyone get an A on a puzzle yet? How long do you have to complete it in?

-Dr. Ugly
 
[quote name='PagingDrUgly']I purchased this for my dad on father's day... its a lot of fun knocking the crosswords out with a group of people. Anyone get an A on a puzzle yet? How long do you have to complete it in?

-Dr. Ugly[/quote]

I regularly get A+ on the Monday puzzles. Finishing them around 12-13 minutes or less with no hints pretty much always nets an A.
 
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