Mikalye's Crossword Event - Ends 26 May

I have been playing lately with crossword puzzles, and I have been looking at what makes them hard.

As far as I can work out, there are multiple possibilities.

a) They can be hard, because of tricks in the architecture of the puzzle (words running into blank spaces, words running off the edge, puzzles with two or more letters in one or more boxes. Words with no letters in one or more boxes)

b) They can be hard because the vocabulary used is obscure. For example you might have temporarily forgotten that the Morin Khuur is a two stringed instrument which is the national instrument of Mongolia, or more likely you never knew that. Including obscure words is a easy way to make what could be a fun puzzle impossible. There are now some words, which because of their usefulness in constructing puzzles, have become "crosswordese", Words like ESNE (a laborer or man of the lower classes among the Anglo-Saxons, often a slave) gets used a lot. So much that the New York Times crossword once clued it as "Slave to Crosswords?" So do words like OLEO (margarine, or a mixture of butter and margarine), APSE (a semicircular church recess), ETUI (a small purse often used to hold sewing supplies), ASTA (film dog of the 1930's), ELSA (Princess in Disney's Frozen - could also be ANNA),. and many others show up a lot more often in crosswords than they do in English conversation.

c) They can have a lot of Punny clues. A question mark after a clue is often used to signal a pun. So if I had to clue the word FISH, for example, I could clue it as "Perch or sucker", "Aquatic animal", "Aquarium denizen", or I could make it a lot more obscure perhaps cluing it as "Bass, for one" which could refer to a musical instrument or an animal, or "Porgy and Bass" or "Net gain?" or even "Catch a few rays?"
Here a simple word, can turn into a difficult-to-solve clue because of the pun. Similarly ASH, could be clued as a shade tree, or as the residue of a fire, or as a cigarette remnant. Each of these definitions could be turned into a pun, for example for the cigarette definition I could clue it as "It could be dropped from a camel?" given that Camel is a brand of cigarettes. I should note that with the single exception of the puzzle Traveling Around (which turns on them), I have mostly tried to avoid using punny clues.

Anyhow, I thought I would play with different ways of producing crosswords. For a crossword to be considered classic, it should be symmetrical (often with rotational symmetry), it should have no words less than 3 letters, and every letter should appear in exactly 2 words. Most of my puzzles meet these rules, but not always.

Each of these crosswords have been written so that from the completed grid a single word or short phrase can be extracted, which means I can use them with ITSTOOHARD. Not all of the puzzles are original (though most are). Where I have used an unoriginal puzzle, I will of course provide full information about the source, and where you can get others of that creator's puzzles.

Everything ends May 26th at 11am (GMT). The contributor level for all games is set to 1. I am using SGTools with the rules that an entrant must not have been VAC banned and must have activated all gifts. If these rules cause a problem for you, please let me know.

Also, I don't really care if you do not play your wins, but I do care deeply if a game does not reach 5 entries, so if you are one of the first five to solve something, and you wouldn't mind seeing that game in your library, then please enter the giveaway. You can always choose to remove your entry later (once 5 people have entered it). This is particularly so with the hidden secret giveaways.

The puzzles are:

• Like the Earth
• That Which is Concealed
• Poetry
• Cross Wits
• Bullion
• Why Are There So Many Songs About Rainbows?
• Switcheroo!
• Traveling Around

If you get through them all, you can always go to I solved them all - Is there a special prize for that? - Note you do not need any hidden or bonus puzzles.

Additionally, there are some secrets:

• I found Hidden Giveaway Number One
• I found Hidden Giveaway Number Two
• I found Hidden Giveaway Number Three
• I found Hidden Giveaway Number Four
• I found the secret bonus crossword puzzle

Each solve has at least one or two good games (18pts+) and some smaller games. The prizes for this event include:
Trine 3: The Artifacts of Power
The Surge
Submerged
GALAK-Z
Endless Legend
Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion
Shadowrun Returns
Shadowrun: Hong Kong - Extended Edition
Shadowrun: Dragonfall - Director's Cut
The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing: Final Cut
Hard West
The Invisble Hours
Dandara
Mortal Kombat: Komplete Edition
The Inner World
Planar Conquest
Winds of Trade
Syrian Warfare
Battlecore Arena
Figment
Octodad: Dadliest Catch
Battlerush 2
Violett Remastered
Beholder
Super Trench Attack
ICARUS.1
Industry Giant 2
Knights and Merchants
Learn Japanese To Survive! Hiragana Battle
Fault Milestone one
Chime Sharp
Evilquest
Auditorium
Vzerthos: The Heir of Thunder
Merry Glade
Shooty Squad
Radar Warfare
After Rain: Phoenix Rise
Ink Plane
Thug's Law
Suits - A Business RPG
Indecision
Music Racer
Zombie Flick - Bloody Mary
Sparkle ZERO
Bad Rats
2V Hoverbike
Simple Story Alex