BACKGROUND
Code-Cracker is compiled by Simon Shuker, a Wellington, New Zealand resident, and is a hugely popular addictive puzzle enjoyed in many daily newspapers throughout New Zealand. The puzzles provide a sometimes tough but enjoyable challenge with great solver satisfaction.

The puzzle originated when Britain's second-largest newspaper the Daily Mail (daily circulation 2.4 million) wanted to establish a new puzzle. The newspaper's puzzle editors knew of Simon Shuker's Take5 puzzle, a popular feature in the New Zealand Listener, and asked Simon to develop a larger puzzle in the same style as Take5.

The result was a puzzle titled Codeword, which became an immediate hit with Daily Mail readers. Initially appearing five days a week in the Daily Mail, it quickly went to six puzzles a week, then seven when Daily Mail Weekend magazine also began running Codeword.

In the hugely competitive UK newspaper puzzle world, the life-span of any puzzle averages about four years. Codeword is well into its second decade, still one of the Daily Mail's most popular puzzles, and still compiled by Simon Shuker.

Simon named the New Zealand version of his puzzle Code-Cracker, and New Zealanders also quickly took to the puzzle, establishing it as one of the most popular features in many New Zealand newspapers.

Further afield, Simon Shuker's Code-Cracker is also enjoyed around the world, from Belfast to Bangalore; from Natal to Nairobi.

IMITATORS
In the UK, other dailies quickly became aware of the popularity of the Daily Mail's Codeword and began to introduce their own versions of the puzzle. It is said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery: one of the most recent to introduce a puzzle was the broadsheet The Daily Telegraph who unsubtly title their puzzle Codewords.

Imitators on this side of the planet have been even less subtle, with puzzles appearing under the titles Codecracker, Code-Crackers and even New Zealand's Code-Cracker, all on the coat-tails of Simon Shuker's Code-Cracker, the original Code-Cracker.

HAND-CRAFTED PUZZLES
Simon Shuker's Code-Cracker puzzles are individually handcrafted. Simon incorporates a definite "word trail" through every one of his puzzles, an important feature of his Code-Cracker. By beginning with a unique starter word (or interlocked group of starter words) and then limiting the number of new letters found at each step, the solution is revealed at a controlled rate and the challenge level is maintained.

Puzzles that are computer produced quickly "blow out" with the solver simply filling in letters for numbers, a much less satisfying solving experience.