Sayonara, Summer

Scott Hardie | August 23, 2015
Russ, nice solo solution on that tough Music goo. You definitely earned those points. :-) For anyone curious, we once discussed player-created goos needing to be recognizeable in their gooed forms (as in, they should bear some resemblance both to human beings and to the source images), and I agreed to hold future goo creations to that standard, but this Music goo by Chris predates that standard, and there are still a few more in the queue from before that agreement.

The season wraps up at the end of this week. As of now, there are seven players within a thousand points of the lead, which means we're going to have a very close finish. The lucky cats might matter more than ever, so good luck, players. :-)

Samir Mehta | August 24, 2015
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Chris Lemler | August 24, 2015
It's a surprise for everyone :)......Good Luck to the players! Just like Scott said it will be a interesting finish

Samir Mehta | August 28, 2015
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Justin Woods | August 29, 2015
Sorry to rain on the parade Chris but Joanna and I have been with out Internet for 2 days and hopefully be back up tomorrow. No way we can use phones to search our remaining goos. Congrats Samir!!!

Chris Lemler | August 29, 2015
Congrats Samir well deserved victory :)

LaVonne Lemler | August 29, 2015
Samir, you had an excellent round! Congratulations on another win! I always enjoy your created goos....they're interesting and challenging. Keep 'em coming! :)

Scott Hardie | August 29, 2015
That was a close finish! I'm used to this scoring system determining a winner by Friday morning, but this time, it could have gone either way right up until midnight. Samir, congrats on a hard-fought and well-won second victory! Chris, kudos on a season very well played; nice work. Russ, you came very close in the end too, no doubt helped by your determination to finish every last goo. You all played well, as did everyone else in the season who solved the same goos but perhaps just weren't as lucky with the cats as to approach the top of the pagoda this week. :-)

This was a fun season, and I'm looking forward to the fall!

Chris Lemler | August 29, 2015
Thanks Scott, Samir played a excellent round . I had a feeling I wasn't gonna win cause I was down by alot of points. But I'm happy I did the next best thing .........:) BOOM!!! . Looking forward to next round :)

Russ Wilhelm | August 29, 2015
Remarkable strategy, Lucky Cats, interesting Goos, tough contenders. It all made for a great round.

Congrats Samir, and well deserved.

Chris, Chris , Chris,,,,Always challenging me into my "A" game. Thank you.

Chris Lemler | August 30, 2015
Russ ik you and Steve and Samir and etc can figure my goo's out. I figure everyone could use a brainteaser :) I will try and show a face with my goo creation from here on out :)

Scott Hardie | August 30, 2015
I will decline to say exactly how long Chris's backlog is, based on his preference to keep it private, but yes it is less than four digits... for now. :-)

Joanna Woods | August 30, 2015
Finally have internet back. Congrats on the win.

Chris Lemler | November 28, 2015
Mike Congrats on your victory i played well but the better player won this round!!!!! Nicely played

LaVonne Lemler | November 28, 2015
Mike, congratulations on your 4th victory in another exciting and awesome round! Best of luck in the next one!

Scott Hardie | November 28, 2015
Congrats, Mike! What a crazy finish. I thought Chris had victory locked up and I even congratulated him, but obviously that was premature. Well played, both of you, and everybody else too: This was a close season all the way up to the final week.

Mike, this makes four victories for you, one of the game's best win rates. If you weren't already in the hall of fame, the entry would practically write itself. Keep it up. :-)

Steve West | November 28, 2015
You've got a really good run going! Congrats.

Chris Lemler | November 28, 2015
Thanks Scott! There is no shadow of doubt that Mike deserves this victory he played hard and was victorious

Russ Wilhelm | November 28, 2015
Congrats Mike, very well played.

Mike Rothstein | November 30, 2015
Thanks everyone. It was a really tight one, and credit mostly goes to some very well timed lucky cats. Looking forward to the next one. Hope everyone had a great thanksgiving.

Scott Hardie | December 9, 2015
Congrats also to Chris on another perfect season. :-)

LaVonne Lemler | December 24, 2015
OMG, Chris --- what a sports goo that was! Trying to decide what sport was involved and whether the celebrity was male or female really had me going --- of course, in the wrong direction! :-) I have one thing to say...."Congrats to those players who solved it!" So-o-o funny!

Scott Hardie | December 24, 2015
I also liked Chris's goo. I wonder, of the players who solved it, how many did it on a blind leap of faith based on the clue, with little confidence that they were correct?

Steve West | December 24, 2015
I was able to identify the face by sight (I was pretty sure anyway) and from that was able to find the source image much to my surprise when I saw it.

Samir Mehta | December 25, 2015
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Scott Hardie | December 26, 2015
Philosophical question about the game: Is misleading bad, if the difficulty level is appropriate? Back when seasons ended in tournaments of really hard goos, I would occasionally throw out a misleading clue that seemed like one celebrity when the answer was in fact another. (For what it's worth, Chris's original clue was longer with more red herrings that I removed.)

Samir Mehta | December 26, 2015
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Steve West | December 26, 2015
Misleading clues cause me more wrong guesses than anything else so I'd have to say I don't like them. What I don't like more, though, is a scanned image that is otherwise unavailable to find on the internet as impossible as that sounds.

Scott Hardie | December 27, 2015
Well, I'm glad not to use either of those techniques very often, but they can be potent once in a while when the game needs something really tough for a tournament. Both of them in the same goo would be especially mean. :-)

LaVonne Lemler | December 28, 2015
Scott, I agree....misleading clues and images are needed in the game occasionally to keep it challenging. As long as a goo is solvable by even one player, whatever it takes to accomplish that is acceptable. I recall many years ago when no one solved published goos, mostly during tournaments. Has that happened in recent years? There's a lot to be learned in solving goos, especially when an answer is revealed on a missed goo --- just have to take the right path, which is not always easy!

Scott Hardie | December 30, 2015
LaVonne, you got me curious, so I looked it up. On the surface, there isn't anything too different. Here's how many goos went unsolved each year, vs. the total number of goos that year:

1998: 2 of 34 (6%)
1999: 3 of 57 (5%)
2000: 0 of 66 (0%)
2001: 0 of 51 (0%)
2002: 1 of 56 (2%)
2003: 2 of 50 (4%)
2004: 0 of 105 (0%)
2005: 11 of 267 (4%)
2006: 3 of 221 (1%)
2007: 5 of 257 (2%)
2008: 2 of 254 (1%)
2009: 8 of 331 (2%)
2010: 1 of 288 (0%)
2011: 1 of 250 (0%)
2012: 0 of 261 (0%)
2013: 3 of 260 (1%)
2014: 3 of 320 (1%)
2015: 1 of 359 (0%)

You joined the game in 2008, LaVonne, so perhaps you're thinking of the spike in 2009? The numbers have stayed fairly consistent year to year, however.

But when you consider which goos have gone unsolved recently, a trend emerges: They're all Chris's. :-) The last four unsolved goos were Beverly Leech, Milton Chapman, Ty Wigginton, and the unfortunately-named David Buttolph, all of which were created by Chris. The last time that one of my goos went unsolved was Rodney Ansell back in August 2013, which was hard on purpose because it was a tournament goo (although I have a feeling Chris's goos are also hard on purpose).

These unsolved goos are only a small fraction of Chris's creations, so on the whole his goos are tough but solvable, with some being medium and one being easy. But if you ignore player-created goos and treat my goos as the game's baseline, then you're correct that the game no longer has really difficult tournament-style goos that go unsolved.

Samir Mehta | December 30, 2015
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Scott Hardie | December 30, 2015
I changed it a few years ago because the phrase "Golden Imelda" was too weird and kept needing to be explained. And yet the term has proven sticky by remaining in common use despite the official change to the supposedly more self-evident "Solo Solution."

LaVonne Lemler | January 1, 2016
Wow, Scott! Interesting stats! You undoubtedly took some time to come up with those results...thanks! Earlier I had a fleeting thought about whether there were goos not solved by anyone in the last 2-3 years because I didn't remember any; however, being an aging senior citizen, the mind is the first to go! :-) Upon seeing again the above goos that Chris created, how quickly I remembered the aggravation I endured trying to solve them at the time!! It seems, now though, there was enough information in the clues (somewhat twisted perhaps but nonetheless there), to make them solvable----hindsight, right?!!

I would think any player, at some time, might like to try and create a goo that no one could solve --- certainly a challenge for the creator, with the many great players in the game now! Bring 'em on, players! I probably won't solve them, but will have fun trying! Love this game!!

Scott, nice to arouse your curiosity --- thanks for the info!

Scott Hardie | January 3, 2016
Sure thing. I have noticed that most of the goos submitted by players are very difficult, and i reject most of them asking for less distortion in the image, or more information in the clue, or fewer misleading red herrings in the clue. The final versions that get published are, I hope, still difficult without being impossible. But solvability is subjective and what seems too difficult to me may in fact be easier or more desirable than I realize. I have considered adding a "very hard" difficult setting for these and letting them run as they are.