6/4 - Thomas Snyder does the Nikoli.com puzzles
*Numberlink - 24x14 Hard by Guten - 2:53
Nurikabe - 10x10 Easy by Ryohei Nakai - 0:28
Yajilin - 10x10 Medium by Kumotan - 0:49
Hashiwokakero - 16x9 Hard by Ogawa Minori - 1:37
*Outstanding
So I think I could be learning one way to construct these large Numberlinks and that comes from looking deeper into Guten's theme. Its an incredible symmetric design. I mentioned last time that some Numberlinks don't get a standardized set of numbered clues from top to bottom. This one certainly has a specific choice of numbers and it has to do with number pairs. There are 16 paired sets of numbers here, with 1-2, 2-3, 3-4, 4-5, ..., 16-1 all present. So, if you linked adjacent numbers in this solution you'd have a loop. The solve wasn't too difficult but took the standard step-wise observation of "easiest" numbers to collect to get started. 123 certainly come early but getting the 4 takes some time.
The Nurikabe is an "even" number puzzle I guess, with seven 4's, two 6's, and an 8. The theme could be done even cleaner if desired, but this solved alright and the 8 at the end was a good conclusion. A solid easy nurikabe.
The Yajilin was a little better than other recent 10x10 puzzles but not too much to the theme or the solve except that 3 intersecting a 0 that gave a few seconds worth of pause.
The Hashiwokakero was somehow labeled a hard. You can sort of build the whole outer border at the start but then need to slowly piece into the middle using some of the larger numbers. It wasn't too hard and there isn't too much to the digit selection so I wasn't impressed.
Nurikabe - 10x10 Easy by Ryohei Nakai - 0:28
Yajilin - 10x10 Medium by Kumotan - 0:49
Hashiwokakero - 16x9 Hard by Ogawa Minori - 1:37
*Outstanding
So I think I could be learning one way to construct these large Numberlinks and that comes from looking deeper into Guten's theme. Its an incredible symmetric design. I mentioned last time that some Numberlinks don't get a standardized set of numbered clues from top to bottom. This one certainly has a specific choice of numbers and it has to do with number pairs. There are 16 paired sets of numbers here, with 1-2, 2-3, 3-4, 4-5, ..., 16-1 all present. So, if you linked adjacent numbers in this solution you'd have a loop. The solve wasn't too difficult but took the standard step-wise observation of "easiest" numbers to collect to get started. 123 certainly come early but getting the 4 takes some time.
The Nurikabe is an "even" number puzzle I guess, with seven 4's, two 6's, and an 8. The theme could be done even cleaner if desired, but this solved alright and the 8 at the end was a good conclusion. A solid easy nurikabe.
The Yajilin was a little better than other recent 10x10 puzzles but not too much to the theme or the solve except that 3 intersecting a 0 that gave a few seconds worth of pause.
The Hashiwokakero was somehow labeled a hard. You can sort of build the whole outer border at the start but then need to slowly piece into the middle using some of the larger numbers. It wasn't too hard and there isn't too much to the digit selection so I wasn't impressed.