Any other fans of "Games" Magazine?

Cafe Society
21

I discovered Games magazine in college. My freshman year I was sortof lonely and I hated checking my campus post office box to find it empty day after day. So I picked a few magazines to subscribe to to at least get the thrill of receiving mail. Stuff like U.S. News and World Report, The Sporting News, Penthouse, … and Games!.

I loved it. I’d balance calculus homework with puzzles. Over the years I’ve dropped and picked up my subscription several times. In fact, I just had a subscription run out last year. I love most of the wordplay puzzles and I really love the Paint-by-Numbers, but I got pissed off because of their marketing.

No matter when my subscription is set to expire, I *constantly * got renewal notices. Some of them were from Games/Kappa but most of them were from these skeevy companies with names like “Magazine Subscription Services.” And their mailings looked like invoices with things like “Past Due Amount” on them. They all act like they are the ones you are supposed to send money to and they are not. How Games lost so much control over its subscription list I don’t know. A couple of years ago they sent out a mass mailer to subscribers warning them that there were companies misrepresenting them and not to send them any money and to only use the official Games/Kappa re-up notices. They listed like 10 company names that were trying to hit up Games subscribers for renewal business.

Even the official re-subscription notices pissed me off though. I had a 2-year subscription and EVERY MONTH starting with month 2 I got solicitations to renew (“Your subscription will expire soon–re-subscribe now!”) Soon? Like, in 2 years? I fianlly got so fed up I sent the card back with my expiration date circled and my note that if they sent me a solicitation at any point before 2 months prior to my expiration date I would cancel my subscription.

(Well, I didn’t cancel but I did let it lapse).

22

To delphica and Scarlett67 – wow, we were a trio of teens who were hooked on the same scavenger hunt, and now we all end up here!! Amazing. Does it ring a bell that another required item was a business card (or possibly a yellow pages listing) of a fortune teller named “Madame ___”?

twickster, my apologies for thinking you were a guy. I’m confusing you with another puzzle-esque poster, I believe. Anyway, thanks for responding with your info … I was hoping to ‘hook’ you into this thread! That’s quite incredible that they wouldn’t have anyone on staff who could solve their own puzzles.

BTW, delphica, you’re in ‘Empire State’ – not in NYC, are you? Because if you can pick it up on a newsstand, I wanna know which one! I’ve looked in some big mag stores here and never strike gold.

LurkMeister: YES Calculatrivia! Oh my, that was a lot of fun. I remember showing it to my pop and he even took a stab at it. I loved seeing him looking at a puzzling magazine; just seemed so incongruous to see a parent in such an activity, although now as an adult I don’t know why I found it so strange! He always loved math and logic conundrums (he even wrote rhyming scavenger hunts for me and my sisters when we were really young), so this stuff would’ve been right up his alley. Anyway, just another fun Games memory that until now I’d all but forgotten. Funny that both my parents got involved in my Games loving ways.

Now I know I really need to pick up one of these issues. There’s a lot of nostalgia, not just for the mag itself and what it meant to me as a young 'un, but for my late parents too.

23

$847.63

This was a tricky one… Mostly because it was JANE Dulo who played 99’s mother. :slight_smile:

Hrm, this is a toughie. According to an LA Angels fan blog, the Angels were the first to reach this achievement in 2000. So if that’s right, the answer would be 0 in 1996.

Tasmania is about 68K square kilometers, and according to Wikipedia, there are five larger than that (Baffin Island, Victoria Island, Ellesmere Island, Newfoundland, and Banks Island).

Of course, all this goes to show what Games said in a recent “look back” - that these kinds of contests are a lot less interesting in the age of Google and Wikipedia.

(Another fan here, BTW; bought my first issue as a little kid. Little did I know then that I would grow up to meet, and become fairly good friends with, not one, but TWO contributing editors.)

24

That scavenger hunt you’re all talking about … was one of the items a collapsible dodecahedron calendar? If so, I remember that. I didn’t bother trying to enter it, but I was impressed with the creativity of the items.

I had a subscription years ago, as a teen, and loved it. I subscribed again last year but let it lapse because I just don’t have the time to do more than a few puzzles per issue.

25

Me, too. Do you know why she was on the cover? At the time, the magazine was owned by Playboy. Hef is a big fan of games.

26

I’ve recently gotten it at the news/tobacco shop on West 3rd between 6th Ave and Macdougal, and in the magazine section of the Barnes & Noble at Union Square.

27

Leaper - I may have mistyped June instead of Jane.

And a few weeks ago I was going through a box of old papers from my move down to NC and found my June 2003 issue of World of Puzzles - still in the mailing wrapper!

28

To clarify: Jennifer Orehowsky, who edits the Pencilwise section of Games and World of Puzzles in its entirety, obviously can solve them – but since she’s already edited them, she needs a second solver to check the edited version, and to giver her a second opinion on specific clues.

What I do is no only solve the puzzles but send back comments. These can be overall general comments like “puzzle #2 is actually easier than #1” (it should be significantly harder), plus a list of specific comments on individual clues/answers, like “surface sense funky here” or “I don’t understand why XXX is the answer” or “I only got this answer by using a crossword completer, clue is really murky” or “X not a a good synonym for Y – try Z,” etc. This takes maybe an hour for a straightforward (sic) cryptic crossword, and two or three hours (in three or four sittings) to solve a good, hard variety cryptic.

There are a couple of other people there who can solve them, but they’re higher up on the food chain and have other things to do so don’t have the time available. You do need someone who’s been solving cryptic crosswords for years to check them – unlike, say, logic problems, which I can train any reasonably intelligent person how to check fairly quickly. They test-solve everything else they run in-house.

29

Who? PM me – I’m curious to know if they’re anyone I know.

30

Hi twick.

The very 1st issue was Sept/Oct 1977.I have it in front of me now with no pencil marks in it at all…along with mebbe the next 20 issues,all unmarked. :slight_smile:

31

I think the issue came out in 1983. Loving was wearing and surrounded by “pun” items. The only one I remember clearly was her wearing a garment over her rather impressive breasts with little plastic toy tanks stuck to it, hence, a “tank top.”

32

I loved Games magazine when I was a kid. My mom got me a subscription sometime in 1983, and we kept it renewed, switching to Games Plus when that option was made available. Unlike what I’ve heard from other former subscribers, we never received word that the magazine had folded, nor were we switched to another magazine. I picked it up on occasion after its relaunch, and have a couple recent issues sitting around right now, but I haven’t taken the plunge to subscribe again. The puzzles are still fun, but the current magazine (as others have noted) doesn’t seem as cohesive, editorially, as it did in the Playboy years, and it also seems to lack the sense of humor I recall from the original. (Which is why I tend to spring for the World of Puzzles as opposed to the plain Games-- skip the editorial, and more games!) That said, it’s certainly a sight more interesting than other puzzle magazines, even those published by its owner, Kappa. My ex knew I loved puzzles, and would try to be nice and pick up, say, a Dell mixed-puzzles magazine… blah.

Anyway, Games was a school-day highlight for my friends and me. Most of the puzzles, even easier ones, could be too difficult for a first- or second-grader on his own, but we’d team up and combine our knowledge to crack the crosswords and such. I cut my crossword-solving teeth on Games. By third grade, we could usually do two-star Pencilwise puzzles individually; for group-work, we liked to work together on the color-section games. (I particularly remember an adventure game, similar in feel to an Infocom text adventure, that required things like changing a flask of “argon” to an “organ” using a device that scrambled letters, so that the organ could be played to get past some creature… an amazing blend of wordplay and adventure gaming, all in a two-page spread.)

Now, I usually have a Games or one of the better/difficult crossword magazines on-hand for short bursts of amusement when time allows. I suppose, for many, this is what a Nintendo DS is for, but nothing beats the feel of pencil/pen and paper when doing a puzzle. Unfortunately, I no longer have the time like I did in elementary school, so I can’t just work from cover to cover… I just randomly open a page and take a stab at solving a single puzzle, then usually stop midway through to go back to work.

I’m surprised to hear that others have difficulty finding the magazine for sale. Games and World of Puzzles are both perpetually in-stock at the local chain bookstores (locally, Waldenbooks, Borders, and Barnes & Noble), and newsstands. They’re more rare at discount stores and drug stores, though-- don’t know why Wal-Mart can have 500 different Kappa word-search titles, but not Games.

33

One of the things I like best about GAMES and World of Puzzles is that they have some very fun, clever, do-able variety cryptics. So, my compliments to you for your part in that, twicks!

(And yes, I too miss the fake ads. It’s just Wrong that they stopped doing those.)

34

I was a huge fan of this magazine in grade school (starting from 4th or 5th grade, IIRC). Pre-Internet, it was the resource for offbeat fun. Just a tad on the hard side for the most part.

Just a few questions…

  • Anyone ever figure out “What Are The Rules of This Contest?” That one was just wild.
  • Anyone have the rules for the “Doughnuts” contest, which reportedly cost them over a million dollars due to no tiebreaker provision?
  • Were there ever any “Escape from…” challenges after Dungeon and Forest? (BTW, I loved the “deny THIS!” alternate solution to Dungeon, which apparently several readers came up with.)
  • The one with the blank cover…what was that all about?

Oh man, so much I’m missing here, there’s gotta be a CD compilation, right?

35

I still love GAMES after many years. I agree that the overall quality has declined. Too much video game stuff (I am an avid video-and-computer gamer). It also seems like the whole “Letters” page is “Laundry” - ISTR that there was MAYBE one Laundry letter per issue. Has their quality control slipped?

I remember being a little disappointed when they doubled the Pencilwise section, but now it’s by far my favorite part of the magazine. Battleships are my favorite, but I love just about all of the puzzles there…

Joe

36

Also, try looking in the “games books” section - I’ve found it there before.

Joe

37

The 1977 Dodgers had Baker, Cey, Garvey, and Smith. The first?

38

I discovered Games in the late 70’s early 80’s. I was hooked from the first issue. The artistic envelopes, fake ads, and the macro photos were a few of my favorite sections (other than Pencilwise, of course). I was not offered an alternative when the mag went belly-up either and was quite annoyed. It was a GREAT puzzle mag and for them to fail was just unbelievable to me. I’ve pick up a few copies over the years but either the mag’s just not that good anymore or I’m not as interested as I once was.

39

Choie, I had a subscription to GAMES Magazine when it first came out. I loved the fact that it was an obviously intelligent & playful magazine that didn’t take itself seriously. Yep, I loved the “Spot the Fake Ad” in every issue (remember the ad for Lady McBeth Spot Remover? The ad showed a woman in medieval dress screaming, “Out, out, damn spot!”)

I loved the games reviews, as well as the yearly “100 Best Games of the Year” each December.

I subscribed again last year, & my subscription just ended; I don’t think I’ll renew, for a number of reasons. First, the puzzles & articles aren’t as playful as they once seemed. Second, I don’t play many online/video/computer games, and the games reviews seem to lean heavily toward the genre. I do buy the magazine on newstands, though, from time to time.

Love, Phil

40

I’ve been a subscriber for a while now…since 2003, I think. I enjoy the articles, and I love the Paint-by-Numbers, and it’s where I first saw Sudoku (I don’t think it was called that at the time, though.) Unfortunately, I don’t have much time lately for solving puzzles, so most of my issues these days are pretty pristine. I used to pick up World of Puzzles at the newsstand occasionally–would again if I had more time. My 11-year-old daughter loves the Battleships. Other puzzle mags just do not compare in variety or quality. I actually think the articles are getting a little better lately, but then I do like video games quite a bit.

I really wish they would come out with a pure Paint-by-Numbers magazine…even quarterly or a summer special would be nice. I picked up one in a Japanese bookstore in Portland called (IIRC–I can’t read Japanese at all, but I compared the title to pictures on the Internet) Logic Paradise, and it was wonderful. I worked on that for several years, on and off! I just can’t understand why Sudoku has more appeal than P-b-N. I get so much more satisfaction from solving a P-b-N, which has a picture to show for your efforts, than I do from completing a crossword or sudoku grid.