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Letters In Boxes #23
I tell ya what, those pilgrims had it easy. Back when they first celebrated Thanksgiving, they might've put up with some hardships, like, you know, death, but we've got it pretty bad... It's a meal made for one day of the year, but it lasts for two weeks afterward... I blame plastic storage containers. The pilgrims had it easy, they never had to deal with plastic tubs taunting them with old turkey when all they really wanted was to order a pizza.
Which brings us to this week's Letters In Boxes challenge, a celebration of the neverending leftovers. All of the puzzles in this week's series, believe it or not, were actually extra puzzles made in weeks past, but weren't used, usually because they didn't fit that week's theme. Some of the puzzles featured here today were among the first LIB puzzles ever written!
Here's how to play: Below you'll see the first puzzle in the series. Click on it to open it up in a new window. Once you think you've solved it, move up to your browser's address bar, and substitute your answer for the filename (in this case, "novtwentythree"), making sure you stay in the same directory and keep the same filename extension. All answers use only lowercase letters and no spaces. If you've found the correct answer, you can get ready to gobble up another challenge! If you're wrong, it's pumpkin pie in your face, but you can always back up and try again.
This batch of puzzles contains four puzzles to solve. On the fourth puzzle, you'll find the email address for sending your final answer. We'll hand out a prize to the first correct entry we receive, plus one additional randomly-selected correct entry. Please include your Casual Gameplay account display name with your entry. You must be at least 13 years of age to enter. Only one submission per participant, please. Offer void where prohibited. Your deadline for submitting your answers is Monday, November 28th at 11:59 PM (GMT-5:00). These leftovers won't last long, so hurry!
Update: Congratulations to the following winners! :D
Both winners were given a choice of prizes. Congratulations and thanks for playing with us! Look for another Letters in Boxes again soon!
- H2G ...First!
- ray9na
Cracked one, on to number two.
Cracked two, on to three.
cracked three, on to four.
Cracked four.
Great, now I failed.
Sorry about that.
Oh well, there's still the random pick.
I might be wrong. The answer XKVBSTXY did seem a bit strange. OK, I lie, that isn't the answer, I got but I still could be wrong.
jamedkan - you may well be right about the random pick as it looks like only you and me have had a go. Normally I'd expect to see much more interest. Wonder if it's due to Thanksgiving ?
Anyway, could yougive e a hint on no.1? I mean, its still 1.
I think we are all just agog over your lettersinboxes solving skills...
I've spent a while on #1 and got nowhere.
A new challenger arrives!
Mdb, do you know at least anything?
No 1 Hint
Look carefully at the puzzle, particularly the borders. All chains lead to the middle. Then follow the clue.
Hey, thanks. I'll have to see what it means first
though. I guess I have to go now. Maybe.
yay! finally got #1 lol!
I didn't really like this puzzle coz the chains don't seem to follow a particular order, so it turns out I was doing the right thing all along, cept that I wasn't seeing the answer lol!
start with the chain that starts with T
My #1 failures so far:
I've spotted it has four spiral arms. Th clue "Out to In" suggests starting at the ends of the arms and working towards the middle.
Each arm by itself doesn't read anything useful from end to the middle.
Reading the 4 letters at the tips of each arm, then the next 4 and then the next etc spiralling inwards doesn't work in either a clockwise or anti clockwise direction though a few words are made in the clockwise direction.
I'm missing something obvious I know...
hm... still trying #2... I've noticed that:
some words that appear at the bottom of the puzzle appear in the grid, so I tried cancelling them out... but it doesn't seem to cancel out perfectly (and I can't seem to form a word with the letters left either lol)
No 1 - Another Hint
Picking letters of the arms isn't sequential (i.e. not 1,2,3,4,1,2,3,4 ...). The only rule seems to be always to pick a letter off the end of any of the arms. You can even pick of the same arm twice if need be.
oooh.. I got it to read
"next clue is..." but then it became a jumble of random letters... so I guess I'm doing something wrong still? :(
oops :$ I feel like I'm spamming, sorry for posting so many posts in succession :$
But I've got the answer for #2 now... cept that I only got it by changing some letters of the grid... is the grid correct? :$ (or maybe I'm just lucky and got the 'right' answer with the 'wrong' method XD)
I believe there is an error in Puzzle 2, although it's still possible to solve it with an intuitive guess.
Should I tell what I think the error is ?
I solved 1, 2 and 3 so far and I didn't like them.
In number one
You think you need either more or less than what you actually need. also it is unorganized as someone already noted
In number two
There seem to be some mistakes in the puzzle. Even with the
new rules for the game
, and one word seems to be missing
In number three (big spoiler maybe)
Why do I need the right side grid?
o.O Got #3!.... but hm...
part of the picture was like. totally un-used for me?
and @GlixD: I'm glad it's not just me that thinks #2 is 'off' :)
Number 2 Correction
The 3rd line of the grid should read
D A A L R Y X O
Number 2 Correction
The 3rd line of the grid should read
D A A L R Y X O
wheee all done! :) #4 was kinda cute, I had fun doing it XD ... and my answer was
an actual word though (in reference to what GlixD said above about "XKVBSTXY" rofl)
#2: I think there should be another correction, besides what GlixD posted?
The 2nd last letter of the 4th row should be a 'Y or L', not just a 'Y'? coz I had to use that box twice...
(I think this is my first LiB that I got mostly by myself, cept for GlixD's hint for the first puzzle (which convinced me that I was on the right track after all :D)... usually by the time I see the week's LiB the comments thread is really long and so I always cave in and look at spoilers/hints haha! *feels happy*)
A "fixed" version of puzzle 2 has been posted. ;)
Nice "fix" on #2, Steve.
Was the puzzle completely un-fixable, or did you just decide to give us a freebie? Or both? Also, I'm curious to see what the original puzzle looked like. Can you give us a link?
For those making the same mistakes on #1 as I did:
Don't use the same chain four times in a row. If you're doing that, only use it twice, then do a one-eighty.
Having trouble with #3. I've tried
replacing the letters in the left grid with those in the right one, with any number of various rotations and flips, but no luck.
Help, please?
And, by the way, which LIBs were these originally designed for?
I beat number 1 on an educated guess, saw the "fix" on 2, and now I am stuck on 3, any help?
Number 3
Follow the correct path to find the "next clue". If you can't find the beginning, you might be able to find the end.
I didn't need the right side grid, either - but consider that the grids have 25 spaces. If you fill the blanks in the right grid with the missing letters, it will help you find the path.
25 letters - so leave off the last one.
Number 3
Check out the previous post by donhuando about Number 3.
It's a continuous chain using all the letters in the grid. Look for words you recognise and work from there
@bubblecamera: The second puzzle could probably be recycled (in concept), but there was no way to quickly fix the puzzle without rewriting the entire thing. Since I'm away for the weekend, I can't repost the original version since I simply overwrote the old version on the server. If I remember, I'll tack on the original puzzle with the solutions.
That infamous second puzzle was probably written around the time of LIB 4 or 5. The first puzzle was written not more than a couple weeks ago. Puzzles 3 and 4 were both part of the very first LIB ever written, though they were set aside because we felt some parts of the series were a bit too difficult (you should see this one other puzzle from the series... it might drive people to insanity!). There are a couple other puzzles that I didn't use this week, perhaps they might pop up again in a later edition.
Grar #4
I set it up correctly in that everything fits nicely, but I can't make heads or tails out of what that gives me. So either I did something wrong, or there's more to it than meets the eye.
Does #4 have to do with
geography?
Otherwise, I'm having trouble coming up with a word :(.
Did anyone solve 4? I mean, not the strange
jumble of letters.
For 4, I got something to do with
level of flavor?
Anybody got something similar?
@DAM, sounds like you're on the right track.
For me, #4 was really an exercise in
trial and error. Make all the clues for across and down fit together seamlessly, and you'll have the answer.
Oh, I got the pieces to fit no problem. I didn't even really need the two letter clues, but they confirmed everything was in the right place. I'm just not sure if there's a set order to the circles, or if we're just supposed to unscramble them. --BeagleBag (not sure why the last post said DAM)
[Your comment appears 2 above DAM's. -Jay]
Im still stuck at no.1 though...
Would someone help?
My thoughts on #1:
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I can't make ANY sense of this whatsoever!! D:
P.O.P. goes the weasel once again, and now I feel like a dunce. XP On to #2.
And done!
Number 1
If you look carefully there are 4 chains spiralling into the middle, all ending in the central T. It's then a case of taking a letter (or sometimes 2) of the end of the chains and making up a sentence, slowly working inwards to the centre. Jump between the end of the chains as required, so remember there is no pattern as to which chain to take a letter from next.
Number 2
I haven't looked at the corrected version of number 2 but it's essentially a word search with a slight twist that should be fairly obvious. Once done look what's left.
Number 3
It's already been mentioned in the posts that the right hand grid is a red herring (or at least I could find no use for it). The left hand grid is a chain of letters that go to make a sentence. There are a couple of words that shouldn't be too hard to find and work from there. The solution might not be blindingly obvious but in the words of Sherlock Holmes "...when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth".
Number 4
I used Visio to make up all the pieces and draw the grid. From then it was a case of trial and error. Once you have a couple of the longer words in place then all the rest will fall in to place quickly. Once I'd done the hard bit in Visio it took about 5 minutes to solve. Look at the letters in the circles and think about rearranging them. If you're no good at doing it manually then use an anagram solver - only 1 word pops out. And once you are shocked at solving it go and have a nice cup of tea to steady your nerves.
D'oh #4
I had it. I seriously did everything right and proper and correct. I can't believe I didn't think to
nag that darn ram!
I blame feeling ill. :-P
Question about #1:
Am I supposed to be spelling out the exact answer, or am I spelling out something like "your answer is..."?
Nerdypants you are looking for something like :-
"blah is the answer you seek"
or words to that effect
Thanks, GlixD.
I'm still really confused, though. :(
About #3:
The right grid DOES have a use, although the puzzle can be solved without it. The right grid consists of one long consecutive chain. If you figure out how to fill out that, you will know how to get the answer from the left grid.
Still stuck on #1. Feeling stupider by the minute.
I know I'm supposed to be finding a phrase, but does the phrase go like "[word] is your answer" or "your answer is [word]"? In other words, is the answer the first word I'm spelling out?
Gah, this would be so much simpler if I had some sort of order to go in.
Nevermind! I got it!
The "How To Play" section here starts by instructing to click on the puzzle here to open the game up in a new window, and then it skips instructions of HOW to play and goes right to telling you what to do when you think you have solved it.
@Lomondra:
This isn't a game per se so much as a puzzle. You'll notice that the link in question is a simple .gif image.
Additionally, this is a weekly contest. Part of the whole idea of this is to figure out how to solve it. Hence all the cryptic hints in spoiler tags.
It might help to look at the previous contests, their comments and solutions. That might give you a better idea as to what this is all about and the techniques involved in solving it.
https://jayisgames.com/tag/lettersinboxes
Time for more dessert! Here are this week's answers:
Puzzle 1
Puzzle 1 Answer
For this first puzzle, you needed to work your way from the outside of the spiral toward the center, one letter at a time. There was no particular order to the branches, aside from the fact that each one letter is taken from each branch before that branch can be used again. One way to solve this puzzle was to take each cluster of four letters (at the same distance from the center) and unscramble them to form logical words. When finished, the message reads TOUCHDOWN IS THE SOLUTION YOU WANT.
Puzzle 2
Puzzle 2
In theory, this puzzle would be solved by searching for the words in the sentence in order, but completely removing the words as they're found, and jumping over the gaps left by used letters. The red box is where you will find this puzzle went wrong, as it must contain two letters for the puzzle to work as intended.
Puzzle 3
Puzzle 3 Answer
For the third puzzle, the box on the right can be filled in with the letters A-Y moving through adjacent squares in only one way. When that same path is applied to the box on the left, you find the message NEXT CLUE AT BOLD LAMPS DOT GIF.
Puzzle 4
Puzzle 4 Answer
This final puzzle was a fairly standard fill-in puzzle, using mostly gibberish words. Did you try to anagram the eight letters used to make the words to find an answer? Nope, you had to actually solve the puzzle and use the circled letters. When rearranged, they spell SWEETEST, your final answer.
Winners will be announced soon!
@ray9na
ok, take out the word "game" in what I previously asked and substitute the word "puzzle", but the "HOW TO PLAY" section still gives NO information on HOW TO PLAY, all that is stated is to open it up in a different window, and then it jumps to when you think you've solved it? Solved what? Is there something seriously able to solve just by opening it up in another window?
@Lomondra... but each week's puzzles (and indeed, each puzzle) is different, there's no 'standard' way of solving it... and that's why they're 'puzzles' :) Part of the fun is to try out various ways/think out of the box/basically figure out how to make sense of each word puzzle :)
We do know (as seen from the instructions) that each puzzle is meant to give us a clue as to the link/url of the next puzzle in each series, but we're not meant to know exactly 'how' to get to the answer (since then that would more-or-less defeat the purpose of puzzle-solving) XD
But if you're stuck/need help, usually I find that many other users post really helpful tips/hints in the spoilers in the comments thread, so you can always check those for additional help :)
Update