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What is a Fun Puzzle?

I was curious to learn what makes a puzzle Fun so that I could devote my time to only working on Fun Puzzles. With that goal in mind, I set out to make a list of Fun and Not Fun puzzles. I knew this would be a contentious topic with many opinions, so I took an informal poll and below are the results. It turns out, I didn't agree with all of the choices, for example I like Logic puzzles. But I decided not to impose my beliefs, and have passed on the list to the puzzling community.

If a puzzle conforms to a special rule, we call it a Fun Puzzle.
Use the survey results below to find the rule.

Fun Puzzles ™ Not Fun Puzzles ™
NO COMPUTERS KNOWLEDGE
FLAGS PROOF
LATERAL THINKING RED HERRING
HUMOR UNSOLVABLE
FOLDING OPEN ENDED
PATTERN TILING
HATS WEIGHING
REVERSE PUZZLING CALCULATION PUZZLE
ANAGRAM LOGIC
VISUAL STORY
METAPUZZLE WHAT IS A WORD
MUSIC CONNECT WALL
NETWORK PACKING
ENIGMATIC LANGUAGE
BOXES AFFIX RIDDLE
CHESS CRYPTOGRAPHY

And here is a CSV version:

Fun Puzzles™, Not Fun Puzzles™  
NO COMPUTERS, KNOWLEDGE  
FLAGS , PROOF  
LATERAL THINKING , RED HERRING  
HUMOR , UNSOLVABLE  
FOLDING , OPEN ENDED  
PATTERN , TILING  
HATS , WEIGHING  
REVERSE PUZZLING , CALCULATION PUZZLE  
ANAGRAM , LOGIC  
VISUAL, STORY  
METAPUZZLE , WHAT IS A WORD  
MUSIC , CONNECT WALL   
NETWORK , PACKING    
ENIGMATIC , LANGUAGE  
BOXES , AFFIX RIDDLE   
CHESS , CRYPTOGRAPHY

What is the special rule that determines a Fun Puzzle?

Hint:

If you disagree with the poll results, feel free to swap the columns of any rows for the same answer.

Hint 2:

If it's not clear from Hint 1, this is not a What is a Word puzzle, it is a What is a Fun Puzzle puzzle. Follow the X's and Z's

Hint 3:

The answer to row 1 is ONE. Row 3 is lying to you.

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  • $\begingroup$ This one is easier and not terribly creative, so I apologize in advance. I think I was just drawn to the title. I promise to work harder next time. $\endgroup$
    – Amoz
    Mar 23, 2021 at 16:54
  • 3
    $\begingroup$ To confirm, this is definitely meant as an [enigmatic-puzzle] and not, as is usual for this format, [pattern] & [word-property]? $\endgroup$
    – bobble
    Mar 23, 2021 at 16:56
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    $\begingroup$ The only thing I know for certain is that this is a Fun Puzzle $\endgroup$
    – Amoz
    Mar 23, 2021 at 17:39
  • $\begingroup$ Interesting tidbit: Should you take the pill? Not sure, but this puzzle functions as a hint for that one. $\endgroup$
    – Amoz
    Mar 29, 2021 at 15:48

1 Answer 1

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It seems that in the opinion of the OP, a 'Fun Puzzle' is:

ONE FOUND ON THE PUZZLING STACK EXCHANGE!

If we:

Take the letters in each line that are shared by both tags - and ignore those for the line containing 'RED HERRING' (as per the hint), then we end up with the following letter set:

NOE
F
(red herring)
UO
DNO
NT
H
EPUZZLIN
G
S
TA
C
K
ENGA
XE
CH

These can then be:

Split into groups of consecutive letters that can be anagrammed to make the words of the solution:

NEO / FUODN / ON / THE / PUZZLING / STACK / ENGAXECH

i.e. ONE FOUND ON THE PUZZLING STACK EXCHANGE!

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