The Telegraph Cross Atlantic Crosswords 1

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For too long, people have considered games to be filled with needless violence or boring stories, when that’s simply a common misconception. The televised The Last of Us is a great demonstration of gaming’s worth as a medium for art and world-building. So far the show has been very faithful to the game. People who’d never think to turn on a PlayStation (or indeed any games console) are loving the series, and it’s scoring highly with critics and audiences alike. Some of the puzzles we’ve been running at The Telegraph have been around for decades and decades. Our world famous Cryptic Crossword, for example, is known for playing a crucial part in World War II. In 1942, it was used to test the wits of the fastest solvers in the country, which led to the best of them being invited to work as code-breakers at Bletchley Park. Even with our long history of puzzling, we’re dedicated to giving you new and exciting puzzles. This is where Cross Atlantic comes in.

The New York Times The Crossword - The New York Times

Video games are a passion of mine, so much so that it was my entire career before choosing to write about puzzles. This means I’m particularly delighted that The Last of Us show from HBO is making some waves. You’ll find references to the book, various members of the royal family and even Frogmore Cottage, erstwhile home of Harry and Meghan. Don’t worry if you’ve studiously avoided all of the articles, podcast and television coverage of the book; the beauty of a Mini Crossword is that by solving just one clue, you straightaway get letters to help you find three or four other answers. However, the fact that THE SCOTTISH NATIONAL PARTY is a jumble of OH, NASTY TARTAN POLITICS still raises a smile. All of this was evidence of “an age of restless intellectualism,” writers argued. Columnists coined words such as crossworditis. People worried that puzzles would replace literature, that the utility of three-letter words— gnu! emu! eel!—would rewire people’s brains. Word games were derided as childish, even as a form of madness. “There is a taste for raw meat,” the legendary ad man George Burton Hotchkiss said in 1924. “Plain speaking has become fashionable. Entertainment is sought more widely than instruction, possibly because information is too cheap.” The best thing about aptagrams is that they do sometimes relate to current news stories. I'm indebted to those who have been in touch over the last week or so to remind me of two such instances.Perhaps the most well-known example is "moon starer", which is an anagram of ASTRONOMER. This may be slightly unfair on Galileo et al, as the Moon is only one heavenly body out of countless billions, but there's no doubt that it's appropriate.

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Perhaps best of all, anyone of a mathematical bent may appreciate the fact that ELEVEN PLUS TWO is an anagram of TWELVE PLUS ONE.

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Today, the smartphone is the attention portal that stirs the most awe and anxiety. A century ago, the crossword puzzle occupied this cultural space. And this process of creation won’t stop with Cross Atlantic. Rather, it will be the first in a production line that should see a new puzzle or game delivered every six months or so. ‘It’s a whole new area of game development,’ says Silver. ‘We’re already working on next year’s candidates. Who knows where this goes?’ Dan Silver: “This is an American-style crossword but wearing a bowler hat, carrying a briefcase, with a rolled up umbrella under its arm, and a British accent.”