Greetings fellow addicts! welcome This game is a slight twist on the old schooldays word guessing game to gently tickle your grey cells. Here, the guessers start off by building a nonsense anagram of the answer, because the setter will simply enter each correctly guessed letter (including any duplicates) into the first available space(s) in the outline, except for the first letter of each word which will be correctly placed. At some point, there will be enough letters to create scope for a guess at the answer by unscrambling them, or at least that is the general idea...

Rather than being limited to a single word the puzzle will often be a title or character, adding a flavour of the game of charades.

Please read the instructions carefully as these are not the usual rules of the traditional game. Hopefully everything is reasonably clear, but please do not hesitate to ask for help or clarification.

The rules

(i) The setter puts up the outline of a word or a short reasonably well-known expression in blank (so that all the other players know are the numbers of words and of letters in each word) together with an indication of the nature or category of the word/expression. An expression might be for example a book, play, film or music title or the name of a famous person or character, or perhaps a proverb or saying: it is entirely up to the setter, but please give enough of a hint to narrow the category.

(ii) Someone else posts at least two letters which he/she thinks might be in the word/expression.

(iii) The setter enters into the outline any correctly guessed letter, but only in its correct position if it is the first letter of a word: otherwise the letter and any repetition of it will simply be placed in the first available empty space (which might entirely coincidentally be its correct position). The space for the first letter of each word is therefore left blank until that letter is correctly guessed.

(iv) Meanwhile the setter also starts to add the hanged person to the gallows with one step for each incorrectly guessed letter or position of letter. Seven steps are needed to complete the victim (head, body, right leg, left leg, right arm, left arm, face). [If having to do this deters you from playing, feel free not to bother.]

(v) Someone posts another two (or more) letter guesses and/or a guess at the correct position in the outline of at least one of the already posted letters, and so on. There is nothing to prevent the same person from posting consecutive guesses, or even hogging an entire game; on the other hand, do not hesitate to steal a game from under someone else's nose!

(vi) The setter keeps score by posting a list of wrong guesses and the number of steps remaining.

(vii) Once only two steps remain, single letter guesses are permitted.

(viii) At any stage anyone can try to guess the whole word/expression or individual words of an expression consisting of more than one word, and each wrong word guess results in two steps towards the completion of the picture, but without any indication of whether any of the individual letters guessed (in a wrong word) are correct.

(ix) Any letter appearing in its correct position (whether coincidentally or as a result of a correct position guess, or because it is the first letter of a word) will be shown in bold italic.

(x) Apostrophes will not be shown, and any letter following an apostrophe will be counted as part of the word which it follows (so that for instance Wayne's World would be two words 6,5). Any other punctuation will usually be omitted (including hyphens).

(xi) The setter wins if the picture of the hanged person is completed: otherwise the person to correctly guess the word/expression is the winner, and hopefully then sets the next word/expression. Don't be afraid to have a go: there is plenty of help available if you have any difficulty, and you can always edit your way out of any errors.

Note for setters on creating the picture of the gallows and hanged person

The picture steps (kindly contributed by Pandora) are in a photobucket album on the internet which are accessed by using one of the urls (web addresses) below, and here's how you do it:

In the full reply screen one of the option buttons across the top is "enter an image" which then offers you a choice of various image positions to insert followed by a dialogue box for a url.

You just copy and paste the url you need, deleting and replacing (using the edit process) as you go through the game and want to change the picture.

[I have been using the position "non-floating image"]

The urls

The gallows, in place at the start of the game
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/PandoraSD/Hangman/G4.gif

Step one, the head of the condemned person
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/PandoraSD/Hangman/H1.gif

Step two, the body
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/PandoraSD/Hangman/H2.gif

Step three, the right leg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/PandoraSD/Hangman/H3.gif

Step four, the left leg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/PandoraSD/Hangman/H4.gif

Step five, the right arm
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/PandoraSD/Hangman/H5.gif

Step six, the left arm
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/PandoraSD/Hangman/H6.gif

Step seven, the head - game over!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/PandoraSD/Hangman/H10.gif

A TV series from the past..(4,6,5)

H E E E * _ L L L _ _ * B _ _ _ _

Hill Street Blues solved by Urban Warrior

incorrect guesses: A, N
steps remaining: 5

A and E.

E is good

L and N.

L is good

H and B

UW Welcome

It's been a while, manxman - to Mrs Worrier's disgust I never read instructions, so wasn't quite sure what to do until I buckled down and read Lex's carefully constructed rules

The series of which I have all 146 episodes on video: "Hill Street Blues"

Welcome Rog, and well guessed: what a great series that was!

Hope you enjoy this little brain-teaser of a game.

Well done UW. Now you get to post your choice for us

Thanks, manxman.

Off we go, and let me know if I look like making a rat's armpit of things:

Pre-war classic film (10,8)

_ T T T E E A I I N * _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Incorrect guesses: R
Steps remaining: 6

T, E

It says (10,8) but the blanks are (8,7)

I think Rog has assumed that * denotes the first letter of each word, whereas all it does is denote the gap between words (as for some reason this cannot be made apparent by simply leaving a larger gap between the blanks).

BTW are the armpits of rats known to be particularly fragrant? This is not an expression I have seen before (although a rat's posterior is a common point of reference in this household!).

Thank you, Lex - the malodorous rat strikes again. Correction made (I hope)

A whole raft of Ts, manxman, and a pair of Es to go with them. Looks like a pretty good start!

Lucky guesses. Let's try A, R this time

A looks good, but - nada for R

If it's what I think it may be, there is in fact an A (and setters' errors are no strangers to this game)....and I will also guess I and N.

A lot of editing and a lot of egg on the face are now called for

Looks like you have it, Lex - two good ones

Editing and corrections are to be considered de rigueur as part of the mental juggling of the letters...

Battleship Potemkin?

Take it away, Mr L

This one is the normally used rather than absolutely full name of a well known person from public life 7,9:

W T R S O I I * C N N C _ _ _ _ _

Winston Churchill per Manxman

Wrong guesses: EA
Steps remaining: 6

Has to be E and T

T but not E.

I have slightly narrowed the category although doubt that this was really necessary.

A, R

R but not A.

S and O

I, N

All four good.

W, C

Both good: looks like it's in the back of the net, unless of course someone beats you to the final punch...!

Winston Churchill

Over to you.

Thanks Lex. A movie title...(4,4,3)

_ O O O * L O N _ * N _ _

Don't Look Now solved by Lex

incorrect guesses: U
steps remaining: 6

O and U.

O is a hit

L and N.

Quickest solve in history

Don't look now.

Just some lucky opening guesses!

Good job

This one was a TV show based on a book 3,4,4,3:

T H E * _ E R O * _ S N T * M _ _

The Four Just Men per MxM

Wrong guesses:
Steps remaining: 7

T, E

A good start.

first word THE and letters H, R

Both on track.

O, S

Still looking good.

M, N

Correct and I see that I had cheated you of a T at an earlier stage (now added) for which apologies!

Thanks Lex. I was wondering about that
The Four Just Men

Just so - over to you!

Thanks Lex TV show _ O A E R D _ _ (1 word, 8 letters)

incorrect guesses: T, N, S, L, G, B, V
steps remaining:

Jeopardy guessed in post mortem by Lex.

O and A.

T and E

Three out of 4. A, E, O are good

R and N.

R is good

S and L.

Two misses

No idea about this yet - D and G.

D works

B?

Not this time Lex

Still no idea, and probably hanged - V.

it is a game show

Certainly not my area of expertise and hardly ever watched in this household!

A certain amount of head scratching and a bit of googling belatedly leads me to guess Jeopardy.

Thats the one. We watch it pretty well every night here.

This one is a twentieth century novel, one word of 11 letters:

_ T E E E A R L N N _

Greenmantle per MxM

Wrong guesses:
Steps remaining: 7

T, E

Both good.

A,R

Also both good.

L, N

And again.

Greenmantle

Correct.

Musician/singer (Canadian)

_ A A N * _ R L _ _ _ (4,6)

Paul Brandt solved by Lex

incorrect guesses: O, E, I, C
steps remaining: 3

O and A.

A is good

E and N.

N is good

I and C.

Two misses

R and L.

both good

Must be Paul Brandt, not an artist I knew but I had thought that Paul or Mark was likely to be the first name.

I note that Convoy was one of his songs which I had heard. A voice quite reminiscent of John Denver on his other songs.

Yes it is. Convoy was a remake of the original by C. W. McCall.

Another piece of twentieth century fiction 7,2,3,5:

B E O A O S R * O F * T H E * R M I B _

Bosambo of the River unscrambled by Manxman by the skin of his teeth.

Wrong guesses: NLDGPC
Steps remaining: 1

T, E

Both good.

A, O

Both on the right track.

second word "of"
third word "the"

All good.

N, S

S but no N.

L, R

R but no L.

D, M

M but not D.

G, P

Two misses.

By way of hint you are still lacking a vowel.

hmmmmmmmmmmm how about an I

Yes!

The remaining letters are all consonants and two are the same.

C

No, but the remaining letters share that vowel sound.

Good hint Lex
How about B?

Twice blessed!

that would leave V i think and the title in that case would be....

Bosambo of the River

Yes bwana.

I was very keen on the Sanders of the river stories, my father having ploughed a not wholly dissimilar furrow!