An Extraordinary New Sudoku Rule

[@CaptZebraCakes]

Thank you Simon for featuring this puzzle! It was a lot of fun to construct, and I am so glad you and others have enjoyed it. Wishing you and the CTC team all the best!

[@dinane]

I loved it. Thank you!

[@puritan7473]

This was a wonderful puzzle sir, I agree 100% with Simons comments!! Thank you for such a creation.

[@davidrattner9]

Wonderful setting from you!!! Excellent job!!

[@FrancisFjordCupola]

Loved watching the solve. Bit too sick to try myself now. Thought it was genius. Excellent.

[@nickellis999]

Brilliant puzzle. Thank you very much.

[@Raye938]

Simon "Ah.. Oh yes, ah.. um.. ah! That means...! Ah!" me: "whaaaat!?" also me: "Let him cook"

[@michaelmatter1222]

Indexing idea: Use the pen tool to draw a line between the two pilled digits, and then use that same color to highlight the indexed cage.

[@nathanmays7926]

i colored each region, and flashed the pills with the region color

[@parksantiago3511]

If you did enough, coloring the pill the color of the rest of the region it is indexing also works and it looks less mess imo

[@Tsunami14]

Exactly my thought as well. Otherwise, it gets taxing very quickly to keep track of the relationships.

[@johnharriman85]

@@parksantiago3511 small point IMHO: the 39 pill serves as complete cage AND pill, so I think flashing helps to keep all the region colors unique.

[@jimmyh2137]

Instead of a line between use it around the border of the (pill's) cells

[@doujutsugg184]

I found the 45 and 39 cage in 3 minutes and then couldnt solve the puzzle at all. stuck for 15 minutes and decided to watch simon.

[@nilsleder2957]

This is such a fantastic puzzle. Already after testing it, I was sure it had to go here. I think you have done a great job of adapting to the new ruleset and explaining the logic that comes from it, Simon. In particular, I liked your tricks with the 12 candidates. There were some logical steps I had missed in my own solve. Thanks for this great video solve! And, of course, big thanks to CaptZebraCakes for setting this gem!

[@MattYDdraig]

19:00 An absolute masterpiece. I am in awe of the construction skills of CaptZebraCakes. 👏

[@studgerbil9081]

"Alexa, I seem to be stuck" "It's sudoku, Simon."

[@CrankyOtter]

Very Simon to deduce the two 6 options in box 8 from logic in Box 3/5 rather than seeing that the 6s can only be where they fix the 6/8 pair in box 5.

[@MartinaNegro]

I didn't know how much I needed Simon to play Fix you but that alone made my whole week, thank you

[@RianneOK]

I was very proud of myself that I worked out the 45 cage and the pill that had to say 45 because of the 2-cell cage that had to be 39 and so on. And I did the mapping of the digits in the 45 cage that were missing in its box as well. But all this took me already nearly 50 min (that I started last night before bed and continued this evening for a bit) and then I didn't know how to deal with all the 5-cell cages... still I had a great time with this. I am always happy when I can do a little of it without Simon's help but I still get to watch Simon solve it. When I solve it myself completely I don't usually have the patience anymore to watch Simon solve the same puzzle.

[@chelseac4553]

What an amazing puzzle! I was intimidated at first, thinking I could not possibly break into the logic. But after pulling out a note pad and going through ranges of sum options, the path forward came so naturally! BRAVO!

[@pzaan]

This puzzle was a fun exercise in notation. I tried a few options and settled on drawing a colored line through each pill corresponding to a colored fill of each cage.

[@adammandell]

I keep coming for the sudoku but staying because yall seem like genuinely kind people who not only have a passion for the game but also love interacting with the audience. I dont know why but it does so much, and is so heartwarming. I dont even know much about sudoku but i want to learn because of yall

[@erickaguirre4888]

I have absolutely no idea how to even begin with this puzzle lol

[@joelwagg8314]

It took me a while (I'm getting quicker though the more I try!), but the first important thing is that the most limited digit is the tens column of the pills. That combined with the fact cages cannot sum to 10 or 11 is suddenly interesting for the two cell cage...

[@MaryVidal-pt8bx]

A Simon guitar intro had me hit “like” before even watching the video.

[@Norkas_0]

I loved this puzzle. Can't wait for Simon to love it too.

[@frankjiang1857]

Finished in 38:12. It helps to figure out what the limits are for each cage and use that by process of elimination with the unique killer cage sum rule to figure out which pill represents which cage. Fun puzzle!

[@jackmalcolm]

I really like how this puzzle starts. The 2 cell killer cage and its minimum sum ruling out 1,2 and 4 in the tens place giving you both digits.

[@JohnGottschalk]

With the amount of unlabeled killer cage puzzles you do, it would be really nice to have a way to mark killer cages where the markings: 1. Sit nice and small in the corner 2. Don't disappear when you enter a digit 3. Order based on input (eg. so you can type 21).

[@bubrub23]

I haven't played a sudoku in years but every time I see one of this guy's videos I absolutely love it

[@CapKhoury]

Wow. Wow wow wow. I'm so glad that I tried this one before I watched Simon's solve. What a spectacular puzzle, and what a beautiful solve path when you go about it the right way.

[@corin3029]

I am always amazed at watching these videos. You look like you have so much fun with these puzzles. I hope that one day, my logic and puzzle skills allow me to enjoy puzzles of this difficulty.

[@paulanderson5704]

40:52 my time, 2nd time in my life faster than Simon! I only saw the rules and got a thought, that I must solve it myself. Brilliant puzzle!

[@ericpraline1302]

That was really neat, thanks. At first look a bit of a headscratcher, but once I got my eye in my biggest challenge was understanding my own notation for which sum related to which cage.

[@DWargs]

Simon to a Puzzle: "I will tryyyyy to solve you!"

[@avishagkelhamer]

yet another satisfying and intelligent solve! I'm a very casual sudoku solver so this is way beyond my level of capabilities but your videos are always so fun and relaxing to watch and I understand every single solution you explain, thank you:)

[@skid68]

Love watching Simon solve a puzzle like this, it makes me so happy and you feel no problems in the world when he is solving it :)

[@ashg231]

I was screaming about the 5 in box 5 as soon as you filled the 14 pill! Very interesting puzzle though!

[@guywithoutpfp]

I was waiting for him to notice the 3 in box five from about halfway through the video, and had to wait until the very end

[@andymoss]

There’s no way in hell I could even start a puzzle like this never mind finish it, but Simon’s abject basic sudoku towards the end was hilarious!

[@letamchau6255]

I love your guitar intro! I have been watching your videos for a while, your talking and solving reminds me of my grandpa, I love that so much. I hope you and Mr Mark have a great day. Sending love from Vietnam, thank you so much for the content. and I hope 1 day I can hear you say "happy birthday" to me, I would be so grateful, and thank you, again!

[@chocolateboy300]

I finished in 127 minutes. This was a brilliant puzzle with a cool ruleset. I love the kind of logic this produced, calculating for regions elsewhere. Discovering that the 12 pill had to go in the top right corner, due to a 12 pair seeing all the others, was fantastic to see I think my favorite part was seeing that the 12 in r5c5 had to go into column 9, disambiguating that cell, leading to a massive chain of digits. I really liked this one. Great Puzzle!

[@jurgenbaumann67]

42:10 Directly after founding R1C2 is 6 or bigger I saw C2 has 3x 6,7,8 and 9 and once only 7 and 8. So the 2, 7 and 8 had to be a 2.

[@LyuboRyuk]

Very beautiful ruleset ❤ And the puzzle is perfect. Good job Captain ❤

[@joelwagg8314]

The one frustrating thing about solving then watching is that Simon inevitably chooses different colours to me.

[@stevieinselby]

Very neat solve! Unfortunately I had a complete spasm and mistakenly thought that the cage with the 12-pill had to add up to _more than 20_ (as Simon would say, "naughty brain!") because I knew it couldn't add up to exactly 20, and so ruled out all of the 4-cell cages as options ... and funnily enough, everything went wrong after that 😢

[@MyRegularNameWasTaken]

32:27 such a randomly satisfying "Ahh"

[@jaredbitz]

This was an amazing puzzle - I'm in awe of the construction. Incredibly fun to solve!

[@brianj959]

Beautiful puzzle, beautiful solve, topped off with Simon overcoming chromatic disappointment to clean up redundant colouring! 😉👏

[@crazypantaloons]

Teenage cages are a great idea! Both in sudoku, and for teenagers.

[@y_prime]

solved in 23:52 - very good idea. I liked trying to keep track of which cages had which totals

[@OverkillSD]

Just barely beat Simon's time, coming in at 45:06 What a marvelous puzzle!!!!!

[@geminimaxxim]

This new pill rule is actually really exciting. Imagine applying it to something other than killer cages, like a diagonal clue for example. There's so many possibilities

[@stevenx2523]

How do people even come up with this stuff? I'm a sudoku beginner so all of this is well above my paygrade, but watching you solve these things is still a lot of fun.

[@davidrattner9]

Lovely puzzle and great new rule set!! Wonderful guitar playing for us Simon!!

[@russhellmy]

OMG I cant believe the 5 in C6R4 was the absolutely last digit to be placed. It was given by basic Sudoku at 43:58. I have notice that Simon has a penchant after placing a digit to NOT scan that digit's Column, Row and Box for what falls out from the digit placement, but rather immediately has a compelling urge to look in completely unrelated areas for a unrelated New complex Logic foot holds then gets stuck for 2-3 minutes. Simon would instant be a level higher (than the obviously very high level he already is) in Sudoku solving if he only forced himself to scan Column, Row & Box after every digit placement, before going of on the next Complex Logic search.

[@AwareOCE]

Your birthday wishes and genuine personality just make my day, the puzzles are also great 😅 This is an incredible ruleset though, almost remids me of a game of Risk in a few ways.

[@TegukiSix]

Took a little under four hours. (Then again, I wasn't pausing while running errands.) I deduced the bottom pill and the 45 quite quickly, filled out most of the 1s and 2s, and everything was smooth from there. I finished it to the tune of "God Only Knows" and "The Other Side of the Wall". I haven't solved in a while -- this was a great puzzle to come back to.

[@davidhughes7174]

A new rule. yes please. thank you Simon and CaptZebraCakes!

[@MatthewBouyack]

I found this puzzle quite enjoyable. Not actually too difficult - though I got stuck for a while after forgetting that I had to have a 1-2 pair in a cage label somewhere. 1:52:17 for me!

[@longwaytotipperary]

❤ the guitar intro - just what I needed!!

[@davidrattner9]

Guitar intros from Simon are just magical and special..💜🤎

[@longwaytotipperary]

@@davidrattner9 🧡💙

[@kurzackd]

39:19 -- We've got an *entirely NEW pronunciation of "genre" just invented...* You heard it HERE first, folks !! :D .

[@Gonzalo_Garcia_]

15:44 for me. What an interesting idea, I really enjoyed this one. Fantastic puzzle!!

[@mery1973able]

53:30 - Time to be remembered. At that time Simon placed 2 consecutive digits in the grid WITHOUT mistiping!!!!🤣

[@adrianhead6272]

A fine example of GEOMETRY and LOGIC leading to a "fairly" straightforward solve. Completed in 13m17s.

[@inawoodenhouse]

Simon decided to go cracking the Coldplay today I see 😍 a beautiful intro, a beautiful tribute to the most beautiful band 😍

[@Piatato]

Yes!!! Excellent puzzle 😊

[@Press_goal]

I was not expecting to see Simon playing the guitar, but it was very nice!

[@MarkBennet10001]

Went for it when I saw it was featured and I hadn't solved it - maintaining the quality, I would say - great puzzle.

[@MarkBennet10001]

And I would say I was ahead on some things, but the thing that held me up was (having done all the thinking) not realising that the 23 total was the maximum for one of the cages ... That wasted me a few minutes thinking time. Simon, you are such a good solver - the clarity of your thinking (and the consistency of that) is ahead of mine

[@Rubrickety]

Amazing puzzle! Glad I managed to solve it, despite botching the second half multiple times (as is my MO).

[@marytataryn5144]

The back of my head feels like its expanding or being tickled everytime I listen to his logic

[@basilefff]

Took me 02:25:03. Great puzzle, very nice solutions. Took me way too long to find one digit at the end

[@dr.rishabhgautam]

How he did that @ 26:20 when he said "I got a 1,2 pair in coloumn 5. So that's a 3". How did he pull out that one? Can someone explain plz...

[@bait6652]

Fascinating design....looks to have 7 solutions without the given...crazy how a given can wrok a rulset. Interestinf how the cages are grouped into 7 pillset and 2pillset

[@Kinada]

Very cool puzzle, and not has hard as I had expected. Took me a bit over and hour even with distractions.

[@srwapo]

56:55, I got to the 3,9 cage in box 7 and didn't know what to do from there. Decided to watch the video long enough to be reminded that the 3,9 meant another cage summed to 39 and slapped myself on the forehead and went back to the puzzle to solve it. It was still hard and I seemed to have screwed up a lot at the end and had to undo a bit of work.

[@SonGoku-tz9vt]

@@srwapo could you explain to me why that cage has to be 39, I didn‘t understand it

[@srwapo]

​@@SonGoku-tz9vtI had to go back and redo my work, lol. It has to sum to a two digit number that shows up in a "pill" in another cage. Both those digits see each other, so it can't be a repeat (eg, 11) and can't have a 0. Those two digits, read left to right, must also be the sum of another cage. That means the "tens" digit can't be larger than a 4. Its in a two cell cage, so it's totally can't be larger than 17 (8+9). So I just worked out the numbers 12 through 17. Working backwards, things like 17 and 16 would make that cage, at a minimum, 8+9 and 7+9, which would mean the sum of another cage is 89 or 79. Way too big. So make the tens digit a 4. The biggest that could be is a 4,5, which would sum to 9, which is too small to me called out in any of the other pills. So drop the tens digit to a 3. You can get 3,9 which sums to 12, which is possible in another pill. 3,8 sums to 11, which would have a repeat. 3,7 sums to 10, which would have a zero. Anything lower would sum to a single digit number. You can try a 2 in the tens digit, but the largest it can be a 2,9, which sums to 11 (repeat), then 2,8, which sums to 10 (zero), then everything else sums too small. A 1 in the tens digit is also way too small for the sum to appear in any of the other pills. So, 3,9, in that order, is the only thing that can work there. Sorry, rambling a bit trying to remember all my logic from a few weeks ago, haha.

[@lecallion_marx8243]

lol me and Simon both have times when our brains arent braining

[@sheepdude860]

I got stuck on this one but it made a lot of sense when I watched the video!

[@tank2045]

One additional feature I wouldn't mind seeing on Sven's programming: On the completion screen it shows how many people have solved the puzzle PLUS how long it took you to finish the puzzle...Adding the average time for all solvers would let you know how you did compared to others...

[@letsmakeit110]

this is already a pretty gatekept hobby with every other comment being "took me 10 minutes. pretty slow teehee". Your feature would suck all the joy of solving for beginners. the best solvers solve the most puzzles so most ppl would be below average.

[@Anne_Mahoney]

@@letsmakeit110 Good point; so make it an optional feature, for those who are currently working on speed. Those who will just find it frustrating to be told "the average solve time on this puzzle was 1/50th of your time" can turn it off.

[@Cymindis]

I really enjoyed this puzzle, though I needed some Simon hints at moments

[@andrewdipplecomedy]

I was so sure I found something that could have busted the whole thing wide open ... Literally ended up being the last digit he placed 😂😂😂

[@CharlotteMimic]

I would not have solved this on my own but WOW what a beautiful puzzle

[@MyriamTT]

A great puzzle. Thank you !

[@mikepictor]

44 minutes....that took some very delicate colouring and flagging. It's not obvious, but the clues are there.

[@Blue-Delu]

"Oh, the puzzle Is done"

[@goldcakes]

I should have spent 7 more seconds checking it before clicking submit. My time: 01:51:04 (secret: the time format on sudokupad would show something I enjoy if I did that)

[@Mikey-rj4fg]

Coldplay jumpscare. lol, loved it.

[@HalfBakedLunatic]

Very clever all around!

[@whelmking6497]

Wow.. one of the most enjoyable hard (very hard for me) puzzles I've solved. Brillant eureka moments. 100:19.

[@zirco77]

30:05 I made the same mistake 😅and figured it out a moment later. Had I not seen it, I would have got it right by luck (as it sometimes happens to Simon as well, but that's probably only a couple of times a year, quite less than mere mortals like us)

[@johnallegood4469]

I got mixed up thinking the cage in box 1 was the 14 cage, rather than the one in box 8/9. Otherwise I managed to follow the logic very well! A challenging and fun puzzle to be sure

[@timjensen4320]

For the hopefully next puzzle with these rules, use the pen tool to re-outline all the cages in different colors then color the pills to match

[@AndrewMooreMar]

The only downside to that is when the cells you want to outline with different colors are adjacent (like the pills on row 5). A cell border can only be colored as one type, so it ends up being a little confusing. I've thought of that approach on different previous cage puzzles, and had to step back for that reason Anyway, I still think it's a great idea, and in this particular puzzle, there would be only two troublesome cell borders

[@sanctionbuster]

45:39. Even with the chat at the start I beat you! I think for the second time ever. This padwan of yours is learning...

[@MORISENSEIISGOD]

For this puzzle, shouldn’t there be a rule that prevents two pills indexing the same cage? As that was the assumption used to solve after filling in the 45 pill in box 2, then deleting 4 as an option in the tens position if every other pill at 17:41

[@chrisinbcn]

At 15:48 how do you deduct that the pill on the bottom left can't be more than 12? I get that it can't be less, but why not more? ................. Oh,I just got it! Cause it must start with a low digit and the unit digit can't be more than 9! Ah, the beauty of logic!

[@Etterbeer]

Very fun solve. Took me around 80mins but I wouldnt call it too difficult.

[@iaincook5835]

Simon, following that superb guitar intro, can you next do Steve Hackets "Horizons" from Genesis' Foxtrot?

[@AFT3RDAY5]

That was a fun one 😄👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👍🏻

[@SergiChc]

Ok, there is something I do not understand. 15:31 What is the minimum value of a pill? 12. Ok, easy. But then, that pill is a 39. Why? Why cannot the 39 go in another pill? Why cannot that pill be a 12? That would mean another cage is a 4+5+1+2, for example. I do not get it

[@voldy2189]

because if the pill in the 2 cell cage was a 12 then that means the sum of that cage would be 3. That sum would have to be represented by another pill which would be 03 but 0 is not allowed

[@SergiChc]

@@voldy2189 Ohhh Thanks!

[@LithmusEarth]

9.5 minutes in i'm like, that pill-is-cage one, i'm like okay, it's gotta be a 2 digit number so it's going to be like 3+something high, but it has to be at least 12 so it's two different digits... and i'm like 3+9 boom.

[@boman987]

Mark and Simon are on my Avengers roster alongside the likes of Bob Ross and Mr Rogers.

[@RoderickEtheria]

Solved in 37:01, but not without having to correct myself a few times.

[@emilywilliams3237]

I thought this was really interesting, but even more than how interesting the puzzle was, I was fascinated by how smoothly and easily you could figure out the relationships, Simon. I always enjoy the videos, especially when they're this kind of fun!

[@davidrattner9]

We agree on this kind of fun. 😁

[@Jacobi111]

Do you post covers to KZbin? I would be genuinely interested in listening

[@Lutterot]

What a clever puzzle!

[@MasterPredator93]

Which song is it?? Good idea to do the intro with the guitar!

[@pixihawk]

Fix You by Coldplay!

[@MasterPredator93]

@@pixihawk oh thanks!

[@debrabowen4276]

Lovely guitar!

[@soocool78]

14:50 -- Zebra Cakes is a US pastry snack, like a Twinkie (only its not).

[@six_5000]

😫 took me over two hours... but I got there

[@awilliams1701]

any chance the 600k puzzles could be put on the CTC app?

[@LillaJag]

I hope. The app is the best way to solve on. Patreon is not something everybody has access to..

[@awilliams1701]

@@LillaJag I mean patreon is just a website, so you can get it, but the app is better than sudoku pad. If I tap a number it highlights them. Sudoku pad doesn't. Also I can get smart hints, which don't always work, but sometimes they do. I kind of hate how the steam version of the older apps don't have that (like classic). The android versions all have smart hint though. Honestly they should release everything on CTC. I'd be happy to buy all the packs again. And even the empty stars is a nice feature so I can keep track of my progess when I redo the puzzles again.

[@DarkChasm]

crazy puzzle but loved it :)❤❤❤

[@ronjohnson6916]

I used letters to link the cages. A in the first position means it's clueing A in the second position. Coloring just got too confusing for me.

[@DineshGupta-bk7qx]

I have solved the puzzle and just watched this video just to reassure that I have done it right and not guess work.. 😂😂