We publish 12 games every single day, and now, a weekly batch of bonus puzzles. At the same time, we’re always experimenting with new types of puzzles and games in the background. One of two things happens: Some puzzles, like Crossplay and Pips, are released to the public and added to our app. Others, like Digits, are quietly retired. One of the many lessons this job has taught me is when to let things go. As we’ve written about before, our process for creating new games is fun, but it can be long, and laborious. By the time we release a game in beta, we’ve spent months refining and testing the concept and debating over puzzle construction processes and editorial choices. I never see the sunset of a game as wasted work; we refine our process and our philosophy each time. We released our latest attempt at a chess puzzle (RIP Chess Replay), Capture, to a limited audience in 2025, and felt sad when it didn’t perform to our expectations. But having put so much effort into refining the puzzle, we wanted to keep it going longer. So, we tried a third thing: Sharing the remainder of the unreleased puzzles with our most dedicated audience. We loved seeing how you all responded to our take on Chess, and say thank you to everyone who wrote in to us about it. Unfortunately, it’s time for us to move on to other types of puzzles. Starting Sept. 28, Capture will no longer be available in the newsletter. Instead, we’ll share a mix of our favorite puzzles from our archive. Past Capture puzzles will remain playable for another week, and we’ve included a few below you may have missed. Don’t worry, we’re always secretly experimenting with new, fun games, and I hope to continue to share our process with you. Keep watching this space for more peeks behind the scenes. Solve Today’s Capture
Here are five Capture puzzles from the archive for you to play:
Puzzle of the WeekThis week, check out this great themeless crossword by Brian Callahan from Saturday, Sept. 26, 2026. In his constructor notes, Mr. Callahan wrote: “Much of the inspiration for this grid shape came from studying puzzles by Kameron Austin Collins and Ryan McCarty. The fact that each of them has produced so many excellent low-word-count, wide-open grids is mind-boggling. This puzzle has 64 words. Maybe one of these days I’ll try to take a shot at 62. Wish me luck!” For more about today’s puzzle, read the Wordplay column.
How are we doing? We’d love your feedback on this newsletter. Please email thoughts and suggestions to crosswordeditors@nytimes.com. Thanks for playing! Subscribe to New York Times Games or follow us on Instagram. If you like this newsletter, you can tell your friends to sign up here.
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