PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools)

Theme: Two Hard!

Rules: Standard Cross the Streams rules.

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the black segments from left to right for the marked rows, and from top to bottom for the marked columns, going in order from A to B to C to D and separating each row’s entry with a comma.

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 5:45, Master = 11:15, Expert = 22:30

Solution: PDF

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools)

Theme: Happy Pi Day!

Rules: Standard Cross the Streams rules.

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the black segments from left to right for the marked rows, and from top to bottom for the marked columns, going in order from A to B to C to D and separating each row’s entry with a comma.

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 3:14, Master = 5:30, Expert = 11:00

Solution: PDF

Editor’s Note: Or, for our less pi-ous solvers, Happy Tau/2 Day as well! We’re very open-minded here at GMPuzzles.

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools)

Theme: One Small Step for a Foxger, …. Grant’s first “official puzzle” after yesterday’s TomTom is one of his own genres, Cross the Streams.

Rules: Standard Cross the Streams rules.

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the black segments from top to bottom for the marked columns, going in order from A to B to C to D and separating each row’s entry with a comma.

Time Standards (highlight to view): Grandmaster = 2:00, Master = 3:15, Expert = 6:30

Solution: PDF

Editor’s Note: It is with great pleasure that we add Grant Fikes to our list of Contributing Puzzlemasters. He is not just a prolific designer but an immensely creative designer too, and his projects like ChipIn for Children’s Charities show off his generous character.

(View image directly for larger form.)

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools; use tab to shift between shading mode and the composite Yajilin mode where left click marks cells, right click marks dots in cells or X’s on edges, left click+drag draws lines.)

Theme: Block Party — repeated clues in each corner.

Rules: Standard Tapa rules.

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the shaded segments from left to right for the marked rows, starting at the top. Separate each row’s entry from the next with a comma.

Time Standard: Tapa Grandmaster = 4:30, Master = 7:30, Expert = 15:00

Solution: PDF

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools; use tab to shift between shading mode and the composite Yajilin mode where left click marks cells, right click marks dots in cells or X’s on edges, left click+drag draws lines.)

Theme: Greek Cross

Rules: Standard Tapa rules.

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the shaded segments from left to right for the marked rows, starting at the top. Separate each row’s entry from the next with a comma.

Time Standard: Tapa Grandmaster = 1:30, Master = 4:30, Expert = 9:00

Editorial Note: The solving path on this puzzle is quite narrow to start, but it is recommended that you find it instead of randomly guessing.

Solution: PDF

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools; use tab to shift between shading mode and the composite Yajilin mode where left click marks cells, right click marks dots in cells or X’s on edges, left click+drag draws lines.)

Theme: A little of everything — clues from 1 to 8 exist in value-mirrored (9-x) symmetric locations throughout the middle of the grid.

Rules: Standard Tapa rules.

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the shaded segments from left to right for the marked rows, starting at the top. Separate each row’s entry from the next with a comma.

Time Standard: Tapa Grandmaster = 0:45, Master = 1:15, Expert = 2:30

Solution: PDF

No real news this week. I’m moving away from San Francisco, so this week and next will be pretty brief Doctor’s Note-wise.

This coming week contains Tapa and Sudo-Kurve puzzles. As I’ve never posted a *classic* Tapa puzzle despite writing several, I needed to make a new example worthy for posting tomorrow on the Rules page. This example (about Wednesday difficulty) is a bonus puzzle for today, and there will be three more Tapa puzzles throughout the week.

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools; use tab to shift between shading mode and the composite Yajilin mode where left click marks cells, right click marks dots in cells or X’s on edges, left click+drag draws lines.)

Theme: Quadrants

Rules: Shade some squares black to create a single connected wall. Numbers in a cell indicate the length of consecutive shaded blocks in the neighboring cells. If there is more than one number in a cell, then there must be at least one white (unshaded) cell between the black cell groups. Cells with numbers cannot be shaded, and the shaded cells cannot form a 2×2 square anywhere in the grid.

Answer String: Enter the length of shaded segments, from left to right, in each of the indicated rows. Separate each row’s entry from the next with a comma.

Time Standard: Tapa Grandmaster = 1:00, Master = 2:00, Expert = 4:00

Solution: PDF

Second in a series with puzzle solving tips. This time, Nurikabe solving tips for last Friday’s puzzle.

A few simple Nurikabe rules will get you through most of the puzzles quite fast; but some of these rules are uncommon enough that you mainly learn them from solving rare puzzles like ours.

(more…)

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools)

Theme: Nurikabe Time; don’t wait for the 13th hour to figure out where all the clock islands go.

Rules: Standard Nurikabe rules.

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the black segments (the unnumbered, connected “ocean”) from left to right for the marked rows, starting at the top. Separate each row’s entry from the next with a comma.

Time Standard: Nurikabe Master = 3:00, Expert = 9:00, Novice = 30:00

Solution: PDF and solving video; advice on solving this puzzle has also been posted in “Ask Dr. Sudoku #2“.

PDF

or solve online (using our beta test of Penpa-Edit tools)

Theme: Imbalance – the lower-left is slightly heavier than the upper-right, and is distributed less evenly, affecting the solve.

Rules: Standard Nurikabe rules.

Answer String: Enter the length in cells of each of the black segments (the unnumbered, connected “ocean”) from left to right for the marked rows, starting at the top. Separate each row’s entry from the next with a comma.

Time Standard: Nurikabe Master = 1:45, Expert = 5:15, Novice = 17:30

Solution: PDF