Listener 4614 - From Here To There By Shenanigans

[Philoctetes]

Another odd one here. There were some terrific clues, and enough entries to get in quickly. The moving words were nicely done, and none too obvious. I really enjoyed the solve, and a nice PDM as to the sentence. I had a good idea what to look for, and was not disappointed. And then....Have I really got the two unclued entries? Do they have any connection to anything?
Better than average, I'd say. Intermediate

[perseverer]

I found this quite tricky, struggling to spot several of the moving words, not helped by not reading the preamble properly.
I am quite happy with my answers to 14 and 24, if I have understood that part of the end-game properly.
Thanks to Shenanigans.

[Hagen]

I also misread the preamble and spent far too long wondering why the first part of the message appeared to be gibberish. The moving words were hard to find and I ended up with several false candidates. I'm happy enough with the answers to 14 and 24, as they can't be anything else, but these words don't seem to have any thematic relevance as far as I can tell. Overall a difficult but satisfying puzzle; thanks to Shenanigans.

[emcee]

I came here ready to say exactly what has already been said.

The clues were enjoyable to solve, especially the 24 'specials'. As to the endgame, it appears to be another of those 'Is that it?' types where you wonder whether you have missed something more subtle.

As has been said the two unclued entries can't be anything else, but thematic they certainly aren't.

[emcee]

My apologies to Xanthippe for not commenting on last week's puzzle sooner -- I came to the puzzle late.

It provided some happy memories of playing, as a teenager, "Castle of Riddles", a text adventure for the BBC Micro back in 1982! I wonder if anyone else remembers it?

Great puzzle, Xanthippe, and one which was accessible to all.

[sunny-dave]

Pretty much exactly as per emcee at 10:36 and 10:54 - saved me a lot of typing - we must have been separated at birth :)

Thanks Shenanigans and Xanthippe

[upsetter]

A wonderful construction.
Thanks, Shenanigans.

Philoctetes - think of the assignations in the novel.

[upsetter]

@emcee - The Acorn Electron was my first introduction to computer games.

I used to love the text adventures - having to create a mind map to be able to navigate must be useful training for the memory.

[Scorpius]

Enjoyable, mainly because of a very good set of clues, and it was fun finding the right words to move and where to place them. However, I thought the thematic material was just a little bit thin.

[Graejen]

Hello everyone. We've been following this thread for quite a while and thought it was about time we posted something rather than just stalking! We don't start the Listeners till Saturday morning and we've just finished this one.That's quite quick for us. Really enjoyed it - as we did last week's. Is there really a thematic link for 14d and 24d as upsetter suggests? Thanks to all the setters whose ingenuity week after week never ceases to amaze us. We've recently started doing the Magpie ones as well and there are some real corkers in there.

[emcee]

Graejen -- welcome, hope you enjoy posting here.

sunny-dave and upsetter: I loved the Acornsoft text adventures. There was Sphinx Adventure, Philosopher's Quest, Castle of Riddles, Countdown to Doom, Acheton (I think), Quondam. They were all extremely difficult and needed some slick lateral thinking. C of R was my favourite. I still have them in the loft. Happy days!

[olichant]

I thought this, and last week’s Xanthippe, very enjoyable.

I do remember some of those Acornsoft adventures. I made virtually no progress of Castle of Riddles - maybe I should dust off my ancient BBC and give it another shot sometime. If I can find the cassette...

[HappyUncle]

I finished the puzzle on Sunday but have only just thought to look at the comments here. There seems to be widespread confusion about the thematic significance (or not) of the unclued entries - but surely the first three words of the second part of the quotation, together with the fourth, provide both illumination and justification enough. Nor is it true that 14d and 24 couldn't be anything else: try -A---N and H---L- for one alternative, if one were just guessing.