JetPunk Daily Word Search - Follow-up
First published: Monday February 21st, 2022
Today we look at how JetPunk's newest minigame has performed over its first 3 weeks, and more importantly we're looking for feedback from the community on it.
Recap of JetPunk's Daily Word Search
In case you've been living under a rock for 3 weeks, let me recap on what this is all about.
Three weeks ago we introduced a brand new minigame, this provided a word search puzzle that was the same for everybody. A new puzzle is available every single day, hand crafted by yours truly. Each day comes with a different theme, they are:
| Day | Theme |
|---|---|
| Monday | "Easy Monday" - smaller grids, easier words, nothing backwards (may have a theme sometimes) |
| Tuesday | "Countries Tuesday" - only countries of the world in the grid |
| Wednesday | "Wordy Wednesday" - random words with no semantic theme |
| Thursday | "Capitals Thursday" - only capitals of countries in the grid |
| Friday | "Fresh Friday" - a brand new theme each friday, never repeated (within the past 6 months) |
| Saturday | "Hidden Saturday" - countries in the grid, but no word list and no number of words to find, you have to click "Done?" when you think you've found them all |
| Sunday | "Cryptic Sunday" - instead of words we provide clues to the words, in a twist of Crossword meets Word Search |
Now I'll show you an example:
JetPunk Word Search #1
To many of you, this may be a rare sight! In fact, since the first is impossible to play again, I suspect many reading this would not have played this grid.
This is how we started, a simple grid with a list of words provided at the bottom. As mentioned above, the format is different for Saturday, whereby the list is not visible, and also for Sunday, where clues are provided instead of words.
Below are some examples of what other days of the week look like as well, I've also filled in some words so you can see how that looks. Personally, on the visual side, I think it's quite intuitive. You select words by either dragging from start to finish, or by clicking the start letter and clicking the end letter.
Below you can see puzzles #2, #5 and #6.
The first showcases how the dragging motion words, with some examples of the words present that day.
The second shows what Saturday's looks like, as you can see there is a green "Done?" button which indicates you need to submit your score when you think you've found all the words.
The last image shows how clues work on a Sunday, specifically that the clues provide a cryptic clue, the length of the word and also cross themselves out when you find the word.
Word Search Stats
Now we've gone over the basics, let's take a look at the stats!
First and foremost, something unrelated to Word Search, but the prominent placing of the Dark Mode option on Word Search has resulted in Dark Mode usage doubling in the past month! This is measured by quizzes taken by day using Dark Mode, which is now up to 2.8% average.
Next, some quickfire stats!
- All 21 word searches have been played over 45,000 times in total so far.
- Currently, logged-in users represent 68.1% of all takes.
- 84.2% of all takes were submitted before the end of the day.
- Over 13,000 unique people have played a single word search.
- So far 74 people have completed the word search every single day.
- Over 2,000 people have played at least 7 word searches.
- Last week 17,000 takes accrued, 570 people played all 7 word searches, and 7,000 people played at least 1.
- The first person to complete the word search each day has been a different person every single day, except overtired, who has managed to be the first person twice!
- The hardest word search so far was #13 (a Sunday) where only 61% of people completed the grid.
- The most-taken word search so far was #15 with over 2,800 takes!
Alright that's probably enough quickfire stats for today.
The Current Themes
So, here's my thoughts on the current themes. So far, the unique themes have been quite varied, and I've been quite proud of them. So far we've had:
#4 - Red Things
#11 - Musical Instruments
#14 - Valentine's Day
#16 - 4 letter words
#18 - Outer Space
#21 - Palindromes
I have received very positive feedback from others that they enjoy these unique themes, as they switch it up and give something fresh for the user.
Then we get to the weekly themes, it is clear that the most popular (by takes) is Countries Tuesday, followed by Wordy Wednesday. Capitals Thursday and Easy Monday follow close behind those. However, takes are not necessarily the best indicator, as some have mentioned that they find midweek "boring" or "easy", despite my attempts to switch up the difficultly and the themes a bit. This is where I am looking for community feedback the most, whilst remembering that you, as a JetPunker, are "above average" when it comes to ability.
In fact, in the very early days of Word Search (on the easiest one we had) I had some users complain at me very vocally that Word Search was a waste of space because they were far too easy and completely boring.
What they didn't realise is that it was Easy Monday, it's in the name! Plus, they were a hardcore JetPunker and so likely found these puzzles much easier than the general public.
Anyway, for weekday puzzles, the suggestion I would be making is to change Capitals Thursday to simply "Geography Thursday", this allows for more general extrapolation, for example to use U.S. States, State Capitals, English Counties, Lakes, Rivers etc...
Now we get to the weekend. After ironing out the minor kinks in the first couple weeks, it seems many really enjoy the challenge of a Saturday, despite the stress it induces if you're not sure you've found them all. I was wondering if there's any appetite to change the behaviour here, I've already modified it so you now see where missing words were after you submit, but is that enough?
Finally that brings us to Sunday, which appears to be many people's favourite day of the week. The challenge of getting clues instead of words adds another dimension, especially when additional words are snuck into the grid, despite not being the answers to any clues!
Feedback, Suggestions, Improvements
Finally, this is where you come in!
Please let me know below of any feedback (good or bad), suggestions or improvements you have for Word Search. I will note though, there is no guarantee your suggestions will be implemented, but I will respond to anything serious with reasons why I think it should / should not be done.
Remember that, even if you have no suggestions, positive feedback is very welcome! Often people only mentions "problems" or "suggestions" and it skews the overall feedback because positive feedback is often unspoken.
Some suggestions which are impossible due to the way Word Search is set up right now, so please don't suggest them:
- The ability to "replay" the current day's word search.
- The ability to play previous day's word searches.
- User-created word searches.
- Live competitions.
- A "timer" of any sorts, since we can't track time between sessions on the same word search.
Some suggestions which will not happen, not due to technical reasons:
- Comments on the word search page.
If only I was one of those 74 peopleAnyways, it was very interesting to see the data behind the new mini-game
I have a whole folder in my bookmarks for daily games like wordle just so I wouldn't ever forget c:
Saturdays are also great but I find once a week is enough for all the double checking to make sure you've not missed anything! I wonder if giving the number of words (but not what they are) would be popular on that one? Curious how other people feel.
If not then perhaps if you implement Gassu's great suggestion of an option to hide the words on weekdays, then the quiz should finish when you've got them all vs having a done button. I'd definitely like that mode if available, and Saturday would still be unique. (I was thinking that the palindrome one in particular would have worked great as a hidden word round as you're searching for patterns as well as words!)
All are fun though and the variety of subjects and difficulties is great. I've definitely appreciated easy days as well as harder ones. Thanks for all your work making them!
The number of words being shown on Saturday I'd be reluctant to do, since then the whole concept of a "Done?" button is irrelevant, and such Saturday becomes much easier.
Glad you enjoy Sunday's though!
On the quickfire data: How many users have currently the biggest streak? Or JetPunk don’t have these data?
- use pictures as hints
- allow answers with overlapping letters, e.g. Somalia and Mali
- options to display the number of answers left (Saturday quiz is really hard)
- the leftover letters can form a word that is the final answer to the quiz
Answers with overlapping letters are already possible, but I generally avoid them because they can cause confusion for people. However, these only account for "embedded" answers like Mali and Somalia. It would not allow things like Mali and Lima, since those kinds of overlaps are illegal in word searches.
An option to make Saturday easier might be interesting, but as I said to overtired above, I feel like that makes Saturday go from really hard to too easy (since now there's no risk in submitting early). If there's appetite to change Saturday's in general though, it's something we could look at.
The leftovers are not always possible to achieve. For example, #20 had no letter leftover, but #18 had like 15 letters left over, which then becomes too challenging to rearrange all those. I like to leave a hidden message in the leftovers (when I remember), but I think only as an afterthought
I'm not convinced Jetpunkers are above average when it comes to solving wordfinds [knowing countries of the world? sure!] or that there's a 'general public' that finds them harder in contrast. That's not to say certain words aren't trickier to find than others, or that some can't find them quicker than others. But with a given list, the notion of 'ability' in wordfinds is questionable. Compare sudoku or crosswords, which require sophisticated logic or special knowledge.
These are musings, not complaints, and I'm not implying you change anything. The minigame is a great addition to the site. :-)
I disagree that there's no "ability" in word searches, because there's definitely "strategies" that you can use (and people generally don't think of doing) but also some people find it easier to visualise in their heads the words. I.e. those that find them difficult would struggle to "read" a word from the grid easily, since there's a lot of letters clumped together. (These are generally the same people who struggle with word scrambles from my experience).
You're right that they're not to the same caliber of Sudoku or Crossword though.
Glad you've enjoyed them so far!
My suggestions:
1. All-time stats like featured in other games and not just the recent stats.
2. A specific button which would show you the words you missed for Saturdays and Sundays on the next day.
That's all I can think. If my school hadn't started, I would surely have become the first user to complete at least one or two word searches of the day. :)
I can look into making a way to see all stats not just recent ones, this would be limited to the current user, not global ones though, due to speed issues.
Not sure on (2), we couldn't show previous days in entirety, because this has problems scoring wise. Currently, Saturday's show all the words you missed after you click "Done?".
Totally not biased and not playing favoritism here
First thing is check messages, then the wordsearch, then RUB etc.
The only issue I have is with the Saturday edition.
Not having the words or even the number of words is fine, however after I have clicked "Done" it would be good to see which, if any, words I have missed. I think you may have addressed this , so I will wait til this Saturday to see how it goes.
Great addition to the site btw !
Glad you've enjoyed it though!
My feedback:
1- I appreciate the variety of themes you offer us. Keep it up and it's perfect!
2- Instead of a Done button, Saturday grids could automatically end when all words are found or display the number of words left to find. I think both could work even though my heart goes to the 2nd possibility. That would make these grids a little easier and less stressful.
Would it be possible to know how many users have lost their strike because of these Saturdays grid?
3- Thank you for this amazing feature and congrats to the 74 peoples that have completed all the grids!
1) Thanks! I'm trying my best to provide variety
2) The issue is I think this just makes Saturday too easy, since if I add Gassu's suggestion above, then Saturday would become absolutely no different for many people. I would be interested to completely change Saturday's, but making them the same as other days is not what I'd like to do. I agree though that high-stress is not necessarily the emotion I want people to endure.
3) Thank you! :)
Stress is the part where the fun is atUnless, perhaps you have a list of starting letters that doesn't remove them as you go. Then you don't know if you've found all the Cs for example
In terms of feedback, I agree that Tuesday could be a bit more diverse. We already have only countries on Hidden Saturday, and so it feels like the two days are themed pretty similarly. Expanding Tuesday to just general geography would be nice.
In terms of other possible puzzles, I think it would be cool to have hidden themes. For example, you could have things like "Fuji," "Sushi," "Yen," etc. as the words. The theme here would be "Japan" but you wouldn't explicitly say it's Japan--that would be an extra word hidden in the grid that you need to find. I think that would add a bit more of a puzzle element to it. I think that would especially work well if you want to theme some puzzles around specific countries (or as Flabber mentioned, states).
Does this make more sense now? If it's too confusing that's understandable, just thought it would be an interesting concept to potentially add.
That is all. Thanks for all your work and desire to get our feedback about this fun minigame!
But also, I'd argue for the majority of people, they have more time on weekends, which works well for the current state of Saturday and Sunday