I hope you enjoy these puzzles I've written. If you're in the mood for a whole group of related puzzles with an associated metapuzzle, I recommend the ones from Puzzled Pint and from Puzzle Hunts 15, 19, and 20.
What's a puzzle, you ask? It's a unique challenge whose nature you deduce as part of solving it. You're done when you've condensed what you've solved to a single word or short phrase; that's the answer. Typically, solving involves three steps: find a pattern that lets you figure out the nature of the puzzle, solve the underlying puzzle you discovered, and extract an answer from what you found. You can find more tips for solving puzzles at this link.
If you've solved a lot of puzzles and now want to try writing one, you may be interested in my article, How to Write a Fun Puzzle.
Puzzled Pint is a monthly event held at bars in cities around the world. Before the event, people visit the website to get a "location puzzle", the solution to which reveals which bar will host the event in their city. People usually come to the bar in teams of about 3–5 people, and take about 1–2 hours to solve about four puzzles and a metapuzzle.
| August 2013 | Variety Cooking Light Cosmopolitan Rolling Stone Wired Magazines |
Microsoft Puzzle Hunt is a weekend-long puzzle competition held for Microsoft employees and their guests. Teams of 12 people work to solve about 60 puzzles for about 30 hours.
| Puzzle Hunt 20: The Play That Goes Wrong | May 4–5, 2019 | The Play That Goes Wrong Fiddler on the Roof Guys and Dolls Hamilton Hedwig and the Angry Inch Les Misérables Shakespeare The Sound of Music Stephen Sondheim Tennessee Williams Twelve Angry Men |
| Puzzle Hunt 19: Channel 19 | May 5–6, 2018 | SNL Intro Jon Bovi Celebrity Jeopardy! Colon Blow Tom Brokaw Pre-Tapes The Californians Bass-O-Matic |
| Puzzle Hunt 17: KPUZ Music Festival | May 21–22, 2016 | Hello, Goodbye |
| Puzzle Hunt 16: Library Island | April 18–19, 2015 | The End |
| Puzzle Hunt 15: The Motion Picture Post-Apocalyptic Adventure | June 21–22, 2014 | 300: Rise of an Empire Airplane II: The Sequel Look Who's Talking Too The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift The Matrix Reloaded Sequels: The Metapuzzle |
| Puzzle Hunt A: Atlantis | February 10–11, 2007 | Atlantis FAQ Close to Lascaux Crossing Over Hidden Passages Moving Pictures Obsolete Satellite |
Microsoft Intern PuzzleDay is a one-day puzzle competition held for Microsoft interns in the summer. Teams of 12 people work to solve about 35 puzzles for about 8 hours.
| Intern Video Game PuzzleDay 2012 | July 7, 2012 | NPCs |
| Microsoft Intern PuzzleDay 2010 | July 10, 2010 | Cyber Cipher |
| Wits, Wizards, and Wands | June 30, 2007 | Invisibility Cloak |
| Intern Pirate Day | July 9, 2005 | Cursed Treasure |
| Puzzling Urban Legends | June 26, 2004 | Static Obscures Armstrong Quote Twins |
| The Real World: Microsoft | June 28, 2003 | Meet the Marks The It Factor |
College Puzzle Challenge is a recruiting event run by Microsoft at college campuses around the country. Teams of four people work to solve about 30 puzzles for about 12 hours.
| Apocalypse How? | 2010 | Pandemic Illiteracy |
| Movie-making | 2009 | Script Rewrite Threading the Reel |
The Enigma is the newsletter for the National Puzzlers' League. It includes puzzles of various types, all written by its members.
| June 2007 | Hidden Passages |