Why are online puzzle games having a moment?

The Vergecast

Vox Media Podcast Network

News, Tech News, Technology

4.4 • 4.1K Ratings

🗓️ 2 September 2025

⏱️ 78 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Hooked on LinkedIn’s Queens? Gotta extend your Wordle streak in the New York Times games app before you start your day? You’re in good company on today’s Vergecast episode. Allison Johnson is joined by Simon Anthony and Mark Goodliffe, world-class puzzle champs and hosts of the delightful Cracking the Cryptic, a YouTube channel where they solve a puzzle on camera every single day. They specialize in Sudoku — and not just the classic number games you might be familiar with. Simon and Mark tackle mind-bending, seemingly impossible puzzles, working through it all in realtime, sometimes over the course of several hours. What happens when you get stuck? How can you tell the difference between a puzzle made by a human and a computer-generated one? Why are we addicted to puzzle games all of a sudden? They help us crack the clues. Then Allison sits down with Marc Levoy, one of the pioneers of computational photography, to talk about his new camera app: Project Indigo. Levoy is known for his earlier work on the Pixel camera, and was a driving force in shaping phone photography into what it is now. We last caught up with him in 2020 when he left Google for Adobe, so we got up to speed on what the heck he’s been doing for the last five years — and the important difference between HDR and an HDR-ish photo. Finally, Allison takes a hotline question from someone who is not particular about their phone camera’s image quality, but does have a beef with camera bumps. Cracking the Cryptic — YouTube This 25-minute video is the most riveting sudoku puzzle you will ever watch The Atlantic is making a big push into games I regret to inform you that LinkedIn’s games are very fun The mastermind of Google’s Pixel camera quietly left the company in March The brain behind the Google Pixel camera is building a universal camera app for Adobe Marc Levoy on the balance of camera hardware, software, and artistic expression Adobe launches a new ‘computational photography’ camera app for iPhones Adobe’s new camera app is making me rethink phone photography Email us at [email protected] or call us at 866-VERGE11, we love hearing from you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Vergecast, the flagship podcast of Looking for Naked Singles.
0:08.6	I'm your host Alison Johnson, and that makes sense in this context, I promise.
0:12.6	It is a Sudoku thing.
0:14.6	And on today's episode, I'm talking to a couple of world champion puzzle solvers who started
0:19.8	their own YouTube channel where they solve
0:22.6	a Sudoku every day. They're ridiculously hard and surprisingly fun to watch. After that, I'm talking to
0:29.4	Mark LaVoy, who's one of the pioneers of computational photography and really just phone camera
0:35.4	technology in general. We're going to talk about his new camera app called Project Indigo.
0:40.8	That's all coming up right after the break.
0:44.6	Introducing the new Dell AIPC, powered by the Intel Core Ultra processor.
0:49.7	It helps do your busy work for you, so you can fast forward through designing presentations, summarizing meeting notes, finding files, synthesizing data, organizing decks, organizing feedback, managing multiple schedules, responding to James' long emails. Leaving all the time in the world, for the things you actually want to do, no offence, James. Get a new Dell AIPC at Dell.co.uk slash AI-PC.
1:15.9	Dell, how those ahead, stay ahead.
1:22.2	Introducing the new Dell AI PC, powered by the Intel Corps Ultra processor.
1:27.2	It helps do your busy work for you so you can
1:29.9	fast forward through enhancing security, simplifying IT management, automating workflows,
1:35.5	synthesizing data, improving user experience or responding to James's long emails.
1:43.4	Leaving all the time in the world for the things you actually want to do.
1:46.8	No offence, James.
1:48.0	Get a new Dell AIPC at Dell.com.uk slash AI-PC.
1:53.5	Dell. How those ahead, stay ahead.
1:58.9	There are some things you should always check, like the hygiene rating on your local takeaway,
2:05.5	the setting on your razor, and whether the party actually is fancy dress.
	...

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