Hello!

This time I'll lead with the results from last week. It was an interesting week! All median times were higher than I expected, and there were some surprises. I think some of the numbers are explained by many new solvers again joining the crowd. Welcome! Still, one day stands out: Friday.

Friday took me by surprise. I was worried it might have been too straight forward for a Friday puzzle, but in the end it had one of lowest % of perfect solves ever! And the median time was pretty high for a Tricky puzzle as well.
I think there were several reasons. Based on shared results, looks like C1 was the most common mistake. Perhaps it was easy to forget that "at least 3" doesn't mean the same as "exactly 3"? But the one I received the most mails about was the other common yellow square: B4. Clues like Fred's are notoriously hard to get right, it's very easy to miss someone! If you feel like your logical choice at B4 based on Fred's clue wasn't accepted, try seeing if you overlooked Brian.

The puzzle was themed after a friend of a friend. If you want to see the streamer in question reacting to the puzzle (and pulling off a perfect solve while landing in top 50%), check it out here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4iiFYcSM4s&t=264

Regarding themed puzzles and custom names: Having characters named after your friends and family is requested now and then. Currently I rarely do it, since it causes a surprising amount of additional stress to my workflow. What if I get the date wrong (Has happened)? Or get a name or gender wrong (Has happened)? Or just forget about it (Has happened)? I'm planning a system where you can "book" a name for a certain day, perhaps as part of premium membership. But things are always moving way slower than I'd like to, so I don't have any promises when this feature will be available.

Anyway, here are the links and results for last week's puzzles. Last time I forgot to mention what the numbers mean! They are: Top 1% / 10% / 50% times, then comes % of perfect solves and finally % of solves without taking hints. You can find the same stats in a perhaps more readable format on the home page.

Mon 2026-09-07 (Easy): 1m 32s / 2m 21s / 4m 55s / 44% / 77%
Tue 2026-09-08 (Medium): 1m 51s / 2m 56s / 6m 29s / 33% / 61%
Wed 2026-09-09 (Tricky): 2m 46s / 4m 33s / 9m 28s / 35% / 63%
Thu 2026-09-10 (Tricky): 2m 29s / 3m 59s / 8m 4s / 29% / 56%
Fri 2026-09-11 (Tricky): 3m 6s / 5m 22s / 11m 6s / 11% / 46%
Sat 2026-09-12 (Hard): 3m 19s / 5m 39s / 11m 30s / 19% / 53%
Sun 2026-09-13 (Hard): 3m 21s / 5m 35s / 10m 44s / 23% / 57%

And then some bonus puzzles! This time I included two medium ones, since I know there are again many new subscribers who might want some additional warm-up. But don't mistake them for easy puzzles! Even the "Easy" ones are super tough until you've gotten used to all the tricks.
#1 Medium - https://cluesbysam.com/archive/c2871111433d
#2 Medium - https://cluesbysam.com/archive/7b4541beaf8b
#3 Tricky - https://cluesbysam.com/archive/131ccd405521
#4 Brutal - https://cluesbysam.com/archive/3558f1a3b7b0

And here are some of the top rated community puzzles. Some great puzzles last week, well done everyone! This time we have again two by one creator (called f0fb73 until we have a name system available). If you want more, check out the community archive!
#1 Tricky - https://cluesbysam.com/s/share/?puzzleId=f9fb73-dd6ff5e0b8f8508b
#2 Tricky - https://cluesbysam.com/s/share/?puzzleId=f9fb73-b3d3d6d049c9a1b8
#3 Tricky - https://cluesbysam.com/s/share/?puzzleId=9dd43d-6836a2c88050b849
#4 Hard - https://cluesbysam.com/s/share/?puzzleId=dae4d9-9cbe2f883b3ed8c4

And that's all for this week's newsletter! I hope you have a good one!

-Sam