Puzzle Writing Resources
This is a list of resources specific to writing hunt puzzles and running hunts. Puzzle Resources gives a list of general resources, while Puzzle Solving Resources gives resources tailored for solving puzzles; many of these resources are helpful when constructing puzzles as well. (for instance, if you want to find words that fit a certain pattern when filling out a grid)
Answer Checker
Guides
Puzzle Writing
- How to write a fun puzzle, by Jay Lorch
- Introduction to Writing Good Puzzle Hunt Puzzles
- Puzzlecraft, a paid resource but contains tips on creating many specific genres of puzzles.
- How to Write a BANG Puzzle
- Foggy Brume's Blogs on Puzzle Construction - Part 1 Part 2 Part 3
Puzzle Hunt Event Hosting
Hunt Organization
For smaller hunts, a spreadsheet may be sufficient for tracking progress.
- Puzzlord, an updated version of Puzzletron written in Django by Galactic Trendsetters
- Puzzletron, hunt organization software used by MIT Mystery Hunt writing teams from 2011
- Puzzup, a fork of Puzzlord, maintained by Palindrome
Hunt Website Frameworks
- Ephesus by betaveros (Wiki link), a simple way to host your hunt online (without learning a full framework)
- gph-site, used by Galactic Puzzle Hunt
- hunter2
- puzzlehunt_server, used by Puzzlehunt CMU
- silenda Fork of spoilr (written for MIT Mystery Hunt 2014 and passed down), used by MIT Mystery Hunt 2021
- tph-site, used by Teammate Hunt
- wizard, a tool created by weeklies.enigmatics.org for creating Discord-based unlock structures
Puzzle Construction Tools
- Puzzle JS, library for setting interactive JS based puzzles in HTML.
- Qxw, for setting crosswords
- Crosserville, for setting crosswords
- Extraction Finder, for checking whether a target answer can be extracted by indexing into a given list of strings
Grid Logic Editors/Players
Wordlists
These word lists may be helpful for constructing word puzzles (such as crosswords), as well as defining what words are legal for interactive puzzles and games.
Scored wordlists
- Peter Broda's Wordlist - Also includes unscored wordlists of entries found in particular crossword publishers (e.g. all NYT entries)
- Spread the Word(list) - Also includes other links to wordlists in resources page.
Unscored wordlists
- [1] - Contains ENABLE, UKACD, and YAWL wordlists
- SCOWL and friends - includes 12dicts, 3of6game
