Those were perfectly vague in just the right way. Thank you!

Side note, fan of your work! Always respectfully jealous of game devs, let alone game writers, let ALONE game writers for funny games!

That got me there, thank you!

Very yes! I've been on my desktop off and on today staring at these godforsaken emojis and cursing the day man put a colon next to a closed parenthesis.

More just thinking out loud, forgive me, but an idea I had was taking the emoji in a witnesses' name and apply it to the various raddles where an emoji currently is, but using what the hint "would" be. A "LIQUID" when it gets DE VIL/BELL/BROWN

...which that feels too juvenile. Argh.

I was also thinking of taking the last names and applying it to someone else's emoji puzzle ("Drop the outside letters of XXXXX to get a 🌎 city (familiarly)" feels like it's something?) but again, getting lost in the sauce. I appreciate even that help, man, thank you!

So far, what I have is that each Raddle has an emoji, not to mention that each name *seems* to clue to a different emoji (SMILEY -> face? BROWN -> poop emoji?). Keying what letter out of each one after Sandy said that you have to solve all seven raddles first? Oh boy.

So incredibly jealous! Do you have anything, a wisp of a hint, a vibe of a clue, that could be wafted my way? Because holy fuck I'm so lost

I feel like if we can figure out why Bo Peep doesn't work as a whole might help; Meriadoc being "Merry", I feel like that ties in to George Smiley, but Bo Peep I can't find any reason why it wouldn't be used.

CURSE YOU SANDY YOU MAD GENIUS I STILL RESPECT YOU.

I thought the same, but it just doesn't sync! I also thought "How many from the top is the emoji?" and using that to key into, well, ANYTHING, and it just feels like flailing in the dark.

Yeah that's true. My wife solved that one, I was impressed lol

Very fair and valid lol

I've been trying to apply a line with an Emoji to all the names too (remove outside letters of a word to get a town, apply to TINKER, BELL, CHARLIE, BROWN, etc) to no avail

Something I love about Sandy's puzzles is that unless it's explicitly stated, most of the time you don't need pop culture knowledge. He does word play focus so it's more of an even field.

Right, same with Powers. Superhero? Bicep? Lightning bolt? Not sure on all three, let alone what to do from there.

Frick this is hard!

My initial theory on at least half of that is that Meriadoc is "Merry" in Lord of the Rings; same raddle as George Smiley. So "Merry" as a descriptor wouldn't work but Smiley does.

So I thought it was cluing to the names being a hint to an Emoji itself, but I have nothing from there.

Went on here hoping someone had any hints, but oooof! All seven raddles solved, we saw the emoji, but no ideas from there.

Man, this one is super hard! The wife and I have solved all seven raddles and we see a pattern but have no idea what to do with it. Oooof lol

There's a great, well curated list of software alternatives for all KINDS of stuff out there, as well as if they're free, what operating system is needed, etc. It's good stuff!

No joke, yesterday I got an ad on Facebook saying SoundBlaster is back

And, like....what.