Dobdodle

Dobdodle poses a biographical riddle by showing almost nothing: two dates, two places, and a map. The prompt fits in the question on the home screen, 'Where in the world were they from?', and the board takes that literally. Two cards face each other, BORN and DIED, each with its date, municipality, province and flag, and beneath them a movable map links the two points with a dashed line. No portrait, no initial, no explicit profession: just category banners placed above that indicate the worlds the person belonged to. The data come from Wikipedia and Wikidata, and the footer specifies that they are sorted by page views, which skews the pool toward very consulted figures.

1. Choose your format at the top of the page: Daily, Unlimited, or Rapid, or enter via one of the ten categories offered on the home screen.
2. Read the twin cards: date and place of birth on the left, date and place of death on the right, country flag included.
3. Look at the category banners displayed above the cards; there can be several for the same person.
4. Work the map: it moves, it zooms, and each marker opens on click, the legend reminds you beneath the frame.
5. Type a name in the 'Who is it?' field; the dots on the right indicate how many guesses remain.
6. Click 'Need a hint?' when the two places are not enough.

The idea is subtler than a biographical quiz: Dobdodle doesn't ask what the person did, but where they began and where they ended. The dashed line between the two markers becomes information in its own right: an exile, a return home, a life entirely in the same valley. You find yourself reasoning like a genealogist, weighing the distance between two municipalities and two dates rather than rummaging through birthday memories. The three formats cover three moods without stepping on each other: the shared ritual of the Daily, the series of five when you want more, and the one-minute sprint where intuition replaces deduction.

The count is graphical: five dots to the right of the question 'Who is it?', filled at the start. The only other visible lever is the 'Need a hint?' button placed under the input field.

Daily challenge

One mystery person per day, five guesses, and the home screen emphasizes: 'Same puzzle for everyone'. The board header repeats the date and the rule.

Unlimited

Five people in a row, five guesses each, with a fresh series to start whenever you want, according to the home screen description.

Rapid fire

Sixty seconds, one guess per person, and the goal is to name as many as possible, as the home screen puts it.

• The category banners are a real clue, not decoration: the same person can carry several, and their combination rules out entire swathes of the pool before you even look at the map.
• The birth/death pair often tells a trajectory more than an origin: two distant points within the same country, or separated by an ocean, do not suggest the same kind of life path.
• The sorting of data by Wikipedia page views works in your favor: the answer is rarely an obscure figure, so it's better to look among the most consulted names in a category than its specialists.
• Rapid fire allows only one guess per person: it's the mode for answering the first instinct, not for careful deduction.