Hearst Newspapers acquires puzzle games platform Puzzmo

Hearst Newspapers has announced the acquisition of Puzzmo, a new collaborative puzzle games platform. The announcement was made by Hearst Newspapers President Jeffrey Johnson.

Developed over the last three years by founders Zach Gage and Orta Therox, Puzzmo.com is the new place for thoughtful puzzles. The site will be the home of web-based versions of Gage’s award-winning puzzle games catalog, including Apple Arcade mainstays like SpellTower and new and exclusive releases beginning with FlipArt and Wordbind. Puzzmo will connect each game and every player with a unified system of points, achievements, social connections and multi-player modes never before seen in the puzzle games category, creating a sense of community. Gage and Therox will lead game development and technology for the platform at Hearst.

“Zach and Orta are truly innovators, and we are thrilled to partner with them on the launch of Puzzmo,” said Johnson. “Puzzmo brings all the challenges of traditional newspaper puzzles to a new level of design, collaboration and interactivity, and we believe they will become a daily habit for our readers across the country.”

“Puzzmo’s design was inspired by traditional newspaper games. As an icon in the newspaper industry, we’re proud to have Hearst as our long-term partner,” said Gage.

“The power, flexibility and scalability of what we’ve built makes it a smart choice for publishers, and we’re excited to reach so many players across Hearst’s audience,” added Therox.

Fan interest has been unprecedented since Puzzmo opened its waitlist on Oct. 19, with aspiring Puzzmo users competing for one of just 500 daily access “keys” to unlock the site. In just over a month, 100,000 puzzlers made over a million attempts to gain access to the site prior to launch, and to be able to purchase one of the brand’s coveted “lifetime” subscriptions.

Hearst has begun rolling out Puzzmo to readers of more than 50 of its iconic brands, from the San Francisco Chronicle to Popular Mechanics to Hearst TV’s suite of local news apps and sites. The platform includes zero-code tools for publishers outside of Hearst’s network to tailor Puzzmo’s look and feel, settings, games and paywall to their unique needs. In addition to Hearst’s own properties, premium publishers including Vox Media’s Polygon, Digg, theSkimm and more than 120 of Postmedia’s news brands across Canada are launching games sites on the Puzzmo platform.

Players everywhere can access the puzzles at Puzzmo.com and on Hearst Newspapers sites.

About Hearst Newspapers:

Hearst Newspapers is the operating group responsible for Hearst’s newspapers, local digital marketing services businesses and directories. With approximately 2,600 employees nationwide, Hearst Newspapers publishes 24 dailies and 52 weeklies, including the Houston Chronicle, Times Union (Albany, New York) and San Antonio Express-News. It also operates digital marketing services and directories businesses under the LocalEdge brand.