One fact I omitted to mention in my previous posting: Kirk Bevins, our first competition winner, spotted all five anagrams correctly in a fraction of a second without needing the clues I provided! This is the type of feat regularly accomplised by him at the end of many Countdown episodes, in which the players are shown a nine-letter scrambled word and have to buzz in with the correct answer before their opponent spots it, so both are given a maximum of thirty seconds to unravel the conundrum.
Most of the top players like Kirk usually spot the conundrum almost immediately (and there are no clues to help them). Sometimes they buzz in with the answer before the thirty-second clock has even been started! Kirk is, of course, one of those contestants who could spot such conundrums within micro-seconds, as he did with this blog's competition.
The advantage for other entrants to this blog's tests is that you don't have such a rigorous time limit. So you will have plenty of time, if you don't see a word immediately, to play around with the letters. So it's not a question of speed in this blog's case, whereas speed is part of the thrill of playing and watching Countdown.
On the other hand, even this blog requires entrants to get their answers in by e-mail before anybody else, so do work quickly enough!
I happened to be watching Countdown the other night (the repeat) and came up with the same nine-letter word as the champ, viz. GESTATING and got the counundrum SCOUNDREL! Rarely happens... But it's nice to get the occasional nine...
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of COuntdown, I had to buy a new TV second-hand recently and the one channel it doesn't have is Channel 4, so that I can't see Countdown!!! I've tried watching it on Ch 4's 'replay' facility on the Ch 4 website but there is some technical problem with it - isn't there always? Oh well, I suppose there's always the fan websites which reproduce the letters and numbers games each day. But somehow it's just not the same as watching the show itself and playing along.
ReplyDeleteAt least I still have my Scrabble - and Super Scrabble - board games at home. I also have a Countdown board game, and there are websites which allow you to play games of Countdown also.
My geek credentials are intact.