Two Key Members of the Maze Blog, And as Such Crystal Maze Superfans, Shortlisted for The Crystal Maze Live Experience Superfan Competition

"These old doomsday devices are dangerously unstable. I'll rest easier not knowing where they are."

- Professor Farnsworth

Great words by a great man, and words we can all live by I'm sure you'll all agree. But another great quote of his, far more relevant to anything going on today - 

As you may have guessed from the overlong title, two of our number have been shortlisted for The Crystal Maze Live Experience's Superfan competition. 

Interview With Games Designer David J. Bodycombe

In another entry in our series of interviews, Phil Newton-England talked to a fellow designer of games for the original series in David J Bodycombe

Firstly, tell us a bit about yourself.

I grew up in the North-East of England. I lived in Darlington and studied maths at Durham University. At the end of the academic year, it was normal for there to be quite a lot of dead time waiting for exam results to come out, in addition to the usual summer holiday lull. So, there was often lots of time to do something creative. I wrote a few puzzle books which were published by a company called Robinson Publishing (now 'Constable Robinson') who were able to use my Crystal Maze credits as part of the blurb. After university, I lived a double life for a while. By day, I was a management consultant. By night, I was still writing puzzles for various books and magazines. After three years, I was earning enough to work in games and puzzles full-time, and have been working as a freelance TV producer, games consultant and question writer/editor ever since. 

 When did you first become interested in designing games/puzzles?