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Listener No. 4388: Cycle 20% More By Smudge

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upsetter | 12:26 Sat 05th Mar 2016 | Crosswords
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Six answers entered after six hours of solving - anyone else doing better?
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I'm tending to agree with sunny-dave on this one.
I'm still on holiday and without access to a printer but have managed the two previous offerings without too much trouble. This one, however, cried out for a hard copy that could be scribbled on and erased repeatedly.
Given so much thematic material, I feel that the clues were unnecessarily extra difficult, which in the end detracted from the elegance of the puzzle.
Sorry Smudge - I realise that you have put in a great deal of thought and effort, but I think that you overtightened the screw.
I agree with sunny-dave that some of the definitions were unnecessarily obscure, but I don't agree that the wordplay was 'distinctly flaky'. It was often difficult to work out what contributed to the wordplay, but I found it generally perfectly sound. As for the gimmicks, I thought that used for the downs was fully justified; the modified words removed from the across clues were pretty tangential to the theme (especially 15,16,17) so perhaps an easier gimmick could have been used there. That might have kept on board those solvers who decided to abandon it early on.

By the end I thought it was an excellent puzzle. The main weakness for me was that the gimmicks resulted in some pretty dire surfaces, and for me half the pleasure of a puzzle lies in smooth clue surfaces and clever wordplay.
Finally there, but I'd worked out the creators and by extension the theme, the sign and the contest some time on Saturday. For three days since I've been confirming the inevitable, which is a shame. I like to have the theme revealed a lot later, when I'm desperate for that final clue which will make sense of the whole thing. Having said that, at no point did I want to let it beat me, so thanks, Smudge!
That was very hard work and has taken much longer than usual.

It wasn't my favourite by any means, although I did enjoy the depiction of the 'Creators going their separate ways'.
Aiming for the second Friday club but enjoying the toughness of it. As one previous poster mentioned there is a real thrill at unravelling any clue - which makes a change from recent weeks. Have the creators, modes of entry and know what the final title line needs to be so feeling optimistic that I'll finish or get close

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