How to use Puzzle Maker Pro - Word Spiral and Secret Word Spiral
This tutorial explains how to use Puzzle Maker Pro - Word Spiral and Secret Word Spiral.
This tutorial applies to two Puzzle Maker Pro puzzle types:
The main tutorial for Crossword Variations shows all the steps and information that applies to all the different puzzle types.
Introduction
Both Word Spiral and Secret Word Spiral offer you a couple of different shape variations of the spiral (also called word snake in some magazines). Because the number of letters is important for the spiral, for these puzzles you set the approximate number of letters, instead of the number of words. (The minimum number of words setting will not be used).
On the Variation tab you can find all the different settings and options.
Variation tab
Letter count
The number of letters determines the length (and part of the shape) of the spiral. Common lengths for the word spiral are 70 to 100 letters in a puzzle. You can also indicate that the length can be a bit longer or shorter. This improves the results when you use a word list that is not specifically prepared for a word spiral with an exact length.
Additionally there's an option to sort the words from long to short - this way the longer words will be on the outer part of the spiral, and shorter words will be on the smaller inner side.
Spiral Style
The screenshot above shows we call a 'real' spiral. All the letter boxes are placed along a natural looking spiral. Additional you can use a "Square" spiral, as shown here:
Cell Shape
Additionally, you can choose to use square or circle shapes for the lines around the letters. For the 'real' spiral, the use of circles will actually result in a slightly different shape as well.
Smoothness
When using the "Real Spiral" with Square cells, you can adjust the shape 'smoothness'. That will align horizontal and vertical square a bit more, giving semi-straight lines, instead of jagged lines. (This way you can control the drawing style).
Layout Options
Finally there's an option to make the overall shape more rectangular / elliptic instead of square. This is especially useful if the image you're creating is rectangular, for example when you use the built in Social Media image output in Puzzle Maker Pro:
