GAMES Magazine
GAMES Magazine is a United States-based magazine devoted to games and puzzles, and is published by GAMES Publications, a division of Kappa Publishing Group. It was originally published by Playboy (debuting with the September/October 1977 issue), was briefly out of business in the late '80s, and was bought and brought back to life by the mail-order company Bits & Pieces in 1990. The magazine was based in Manhattan until Kappa acquired it in 1996 and moved the Games office to Kappa's headquarters in Pennsylvania. The magazine is published ten issues a year; monthly, except January and June. Each issue contains reviews, articles, the Pencilwise section (pencil puzzles), and a contest. Hidden among the advertisements is usually a fake ad, which readers must spot. The cover of the magazine itself is usually a puzzle of some kind. Periodically, the magazine also has a "Hidden Contest," wherein the rules are concealed somehow in the issue. Annually, one issue includes a compilation of new and noteworthy games in its GAMES 100 list, somewhat akin to an American version of the German Spiel des Jahres.
The Pencilwise section contains: Crossword puzzles, cryptic crosswords, word searches, cryptograms, math and logic puzzles, as well as other regular and periodic puzzles.
GAMES Publications also publishes GAMES World of Puzzles on a bimonthly basis. This magazine is similar to an extended Pencilwise section of GAMES Magazine. It also contains a contest in every issue, most famously its Calculatrivia-style contests.
Will Shortz, the editor of Games Magazine from 1989-1993, is currently editor of the New York Times Crossword Puzzle.