It was a little over a month ago when Sierra released their word puzzle title, Hoyle Crosswords. Now the folks at WizardWorks have put together their rendition of puzzle games with The New York Times Crossword Puzzles. Both are budget titles and both are excellent ways of spending those extra moments you have at work or at home. Is either of the two titles better than the other? Not particular, but let's have a look at The New Times Crossword Puzzles anyway.

The New York Times Crossword Puzzles features over a thousands puzzles from, you guessed it, the New York Times. Granted they are older puzzles, ranging in date from the late 80's to the most recent one, which is dated 1994, I suppose that means nobody will remember the solutions to them. The entire collection is listed in chronological order so you can mark your spot when you close up shop. There's no random puzzle generator, a feature that certainly would have been welcome, but with as many puzzles as there is in New York Times Crossword Puzzles, it shouldn't be much of an issue. I'd assume that by the time you complete all thousand puzzles, you'll be more than satisfied as to where your $20 went.

The puzzles range in terms of difficulty and should give all ranges of intellect a solid challenge. A Smart mode is offered up which gives players real-time feedback as to whether they're on the right track with their words. When entering your solution, the game will check to see if the letters you are entering, one by one, are correct or not. If they're incorrect, an X will come over your selection. Worry not though, you can turn off the Smart mode and simply go with your instincts, a feature I'm sure many advanced players will quickly adjust. When completing a puzzle, there are buttons to verify whether words are correct or not and there's a puzzle solver, which will give the solution to the entire crossword puzzle if you're stumped beyond belief. Last but not least, WizardWorks has included the ability to receive clues in an attempt to help those having difficulty and who don't wish to have the answers given to them.

Graphically, The New York Times Crossword Puzzles is fairly basic in it's design. At first glance it might appear extremely bland with its Window'ish design, but you can customize the colours within the puzzle itself if that's worth much. In terms of audio, New York Times Crossword Puzzles features only the bare essentials, which are mostly found in audio-feedback. There's no music accompanying each puzzle or anything of the sort, so you can pop in your favourite CD while you fiddle around.

New York Times Crossword Puzzles, like Hoyle Crosswords, offers gamers the chance to print our the solutions to puzzles or unsolved puzzles themselves if they wish to take a few with them on a road trip or something along those lines. Personally, I don't quite understand why somebody would purchase a computer crossword puzzle only to print it out and do it ala pen and paper, but I suppose it's good to know one can do that if they wish.

Plain and simple, The New York Times Crossword Puzzles is a challenging and thorough set of crossword puzzles that is sure to please crossword puzzle fans in general. Although the puzzles aren't original, nor is there the ability to create random puzzles, it will certainly make for an excellent time waster on those rainy days, or a time waster at work (just don't tell the boss).

[ 10/20 ] Graphics
[ 08/15 ] Sound
[ 24/30 ] Gameplay
[ 16/20 ] Fun Factor
[ 00/05 ] Multiplayer
[ 07/10 ] Overall Impression