Why Has My Sudoku Got Negative Numbers In It???

[@xXMIL10Xx]

seeing Simon get stuck on the 13 cage after having just explained that the 2 has to be grey is so endearing :D

[@brucestuart466]

And painful!

[@ConsorcioToxico]

Just arrive in comments to read this one

[@phyphor]

I think I aged a decade in the minutes it took for him to spot it!

[@ibdoomed]

So screamy.

[@annonamis]

Hey that's a tough cage

[@benedettapierfelice1873]

Mark has WhAt? The thought of Mark appearing in Bridget Jones’s Diary just made my day lol

[@midnight7535]

Seeing Simon desperately avoiding math in 13 cage was hilarious. I've been subscribed for less than a year, but I am committed more than I've ever been. Thank you for all your content. You literally make every day better

[@jplefaivre]

I was losing my mind at 39:29, less than a minute before he said the 2 was negative.

[@timbeaton5045]

Yep. I was looking at that and wondering how he missed that 8+7 required a shaded negative 2 to sum up to 13 for so long!

[@inspiringsand123]

Rules: 03:36 Let's Get Cracking: 06:36 Simon's time: 46m21s Puzzle Solved: 52:57 What about this video's Top Tier Simarkisms?! Maverick: 4x (07:50, 07:55, 16:15, 16:25) The Secret: 4x (06:50, 06:54, 09:20, 09:21) Three In the Corner: 1x (48:30) And how about this video's Simarkisms?! Ah: 21x (10:09, 14:36, 15:07, 18:32, 23:11, 23:36, 28:18, 28:31, 28:32, 34:56, 36:24, 37:51, 39:01, 42:17, 43:59, 45:21, 46:46, 47:42, 49:03, 49:17, 49:50) Checkerboard: 12x (07:10, 07:12, 08:17, 14:38, 14:41, 26:33, 26:49, 26:54, 30:29, 30:35, 31:19, 39:38) In Fact: 10x (00:40, 12:00, 16:11, 17:47, 25:07, 30:04, 33:51, 37:16, 39:32, 43:40) Beautiful: 9x (14:46, 28:36, 28:38, 28:47, 36:48, 42:17, 47:42, 47:45, 49:50) Sorry: 5x (05:05, 15:45, 22:33, 45:36, 45:42) Clever: 5x (10:09, 12:20, 29:40, 36:51, 47:31) Brilliant: 5x (02:29, 02:46, 37:35, 37:35, 53:10) By Sudoku: 5x (19:02, 21:31, 30:10, 33:42, 52:09) Lovely: 4x (11:34, 11:34, 36:32, 36:32) Nonsense: 3x (05:13, 34:43, 44:31) Hang On: 3x (17:04, 17:09, 19:32) Stunning: 3x (38:12, 38:16, 52:36) Naked Single: 2x (33:18, 52:00) I Have no Clue: 2x (35:15, 40:57) Obviously: 2x (44:20, 47:34) Wow: 2x (04:37, 52:36) Cake!: 2x (02:31, 02:51) Good Grief: 1x (47:31) Useless: 1x (35:25) What a Puzzle: 1x (52:59) The Answer is: 1x (08:48) Naughty: 1x (11:06) In the Spotlight: 1x (48:31) Stuck: 1x (39:19) Break the Puzzle: 1x (36:35) Take a Bow: 1x (52:59) Discombobulating: 1x (40:00) Famous Last Words: 1x (14:53) I've Got It!: 1x (14:33) Corollary: 1x (08:23) I Digress: 1x (08:11) Progress: 1x (35:06) Plonk: 1x (32:12) Let's Take Stock: 1x (41:02) What Does This Mean?: 1x (35:46) That's Huge: 1x (22:20) Eagle Eyed: 1x (01:36) Pencil Mark/mark: 1x (33:57) Most popular number(>9), digit and colour this video: Ten (9 mentions) Two (93 mentions) Green (122 mentions) Antithesis Battles: Low (2) - High (0) Even (7) - Odd (0) Shaded (24) - Unshaded (16) Lower (3) - Higher (0) Column (3) - Row (2) FAQ: Q1: You missed something! A1: That could very well be the case! Human speech can be hard to understand for computers like me! Point out the ones that I missed and maybe I'll learn! Q2: Can you do this for another channel? A2: I've been thinking about that and wrote some code to make that possible. Let me know which channel you think would be a good fit!

[@lilywashere27]

Oh,3 in the spotlight! I've been missing him

[@shystudyspy]

This is so cool, I always look for this comment when I watch these videos

[@Jodawo]

I'd like to wish CTC congratulations on their 5th Year Anniversary of doing Sudoku puzzles. On August 26th 2017 this channel did their first Sudoku. It was a Killer Cage. Before that, they were doing Cryptic Crossword puzzles. After that, is when things began to change for this channel. Now they have over 500k subscribers and doing some of the cutting edge in variant Sudoku. I do hope they continue and have many more anniversaries to come.

[@emilywilliams3237]

Amen.

[@djsajs]

With lots of cake!

[@baukewijnsma]

I think it's because numbers are easier to understand in every language and easier to get into then corsswords.

[@ZeAgentboo]

Thank you Simon for the feature! Happy 5th birthday for the channel, and congrats on 500K subs. One of the first things I noticed when playing around with this ruleset is that seemingly useless cages can become very restricted with some shading patterns. So I designed this puzzle with a sort of cascading effect on cages, such that each resolved cage and the resulting shading puts pressure on the next cage. As a result, a lot of cages (such as the 6, -8 and -4 cages) have 0 degrees of freedom when they are needed for the solve, whereas they seem completely innocuous at the start. My favourite piece of logic is the one with the 0 cage at 26:30, I was pleased that you saw it so fast. In fact I think you found every intended deduction in the puzzle, great job! 👍

[@kathyjohnson2043]

Negative numbers = positively great puzzle

[@markschaal6050]

One of my favorite puzzles this year!

[@majestic07]

I love the idea of positive and negative values. An arrow or a killer/arrow combo with the same yin/yang shading constraint would be interesting (and I immediately wondered how minimal the number of given clues (like cages) could go)

[@ConManAU]

This was a really fun puzzle! The interplay between the killer cages and the yin-yang led to some interesting flow. Just like Simon, I hit points where everything seemed useless, then suddenly one deduction led to a sudden run of filling in a whole section as all the "useless" information became vital.

[@bbgun061]

When Simon began speculating about other yin-yang secrets at the beginning, I wondered if the perimeter could be entirely one color.

[@essidus]

Life goals: meet someone who responds to something you make with as much positive energy as Simon does with these hand-set puzzles.

[@jensschmidt]

38:50 Sometimes, I think Simon either has the memory of a goldfish or he is seriously just messing with us. Less than a minute earlier, he told us that the 2 had to be negative for the cage total to work...

[@Nerdnumberone]

I understand how easy it is to drop something when juggling a dozen different thoughts, but it's still painful to watch.

[@xildinoth5707]

all part of the entertainment :)

[@miloclarke6171]

goldfish has no memory is a myth

[@Nerdnumberone]

@@miloclarke6171 True. I believe my mother did an project in school where she had to train a goldfish to go through a maze. I might be misremembering, however.

[@nmappraiser9926]

@@miloclarke6171 I know I have heard that before, but I must have forgotten it.

[@TiagoMorbusSa]

The first and only time I went to the UK, it was London, and the moment I get on the first double decker, I meet a chap watching cracking the cryptic on his phone. It was like being welcomed home, in a foreign country. Kind of weird :P

[@JosueSantiagoG]

"I don't advise revisiting those earlier videos" Everyone goes immediately to search for the first video.

[@wossaaaat]

*"I do think we've improved over the years"* Having watched almost all your early vids, can confirm, definitely improved a lot.... Still interesting stuff to be found there though, and great to see how far you've come.

[@smahoney1212]

Yes, the old videos are still good for basic techniques, and to enjoy classic sudokus.

[@stephenbeck7222]

Debut of the original CTC web app was a huge day for the channels.

[@kana2112]

It's awesome seeing how much they've grown over time. So much happier, confident, and even younger looking. It's wild looking back at the old videos.

[@Anne_Mahoney]

You're both so much more comfortable on camera, and you seem generally happier. I love the way you've got more exuberant over the years -- I don't think we would have seen Mark's fabulous reaction to "poker" in Wordle 5 years ago, for example.

[@gentleOx156]

3:50 - I have always loved how you surmise the rules at the start of a video - what are cages, what are arrows, etc. When I started watching this channel during the lockdown and getting into sudoku again, this has been very valuable. Regarding the timestamp, I really appreciate that you're explaining what orthogonal means. As a non-native (english) speaker, I remember being very confused the first time I read it in a puzzle and it seems others are too. This is a great way to allow more people to enjoy sudoku. Thank you for making these videos.

[@tadperry1817]

Simon, your videos definitely have improved and the fact that you're obviously enjoying yourself more and in a better mood due to your success (making you far more funny and entertaining) just HAS to have something to do with it!!! I don't think I'm wrong when I say that your enthusiasm for the channel really seemed to take off when Mark joined you in making one video per day. I look forward to your videos everyday.

[@Orenotter]

A puzzle in opposite pieces, With strange killer cages, it teases. Part dark and part light, Simon solved it! All right! On this I'll write my anti-thesis.

[@PegV.A]

Thanks, Simon. Congratulations on getting to 500K! You and Mark did this by creating THE nicest community on the Internet, and I hope that you both take a moment to enjoy your accomplishment. 👏👏👏

[@cloudbringer104]

I've been watching the early years today. I like that your more relaxed and your humour shines through now. Congratulations on 500k again. I love watching your videos, especially when I'm not so good, and can't move.

[@killroy42]

BTW, Bunch'a new features just released, so give the settings a look-see!

[@matt2641]

Your channel is one of my guilty pleasures. Watching the solve is mentally engaging, but you are also very chill. It's a great combination of relaxing and watchable. Yet, to my shame, I still struggle to solved newspaper sudokus.

[@lottekrabbendam953]

I can relate completely :)

[@Tker1970]

Celebrating 500K subscribers. I watch nearly every day-yet have never done a Sudoku myself. I just enjoy watching the logic and seeing pathways myself-sometimes. I get overwhelmed by the whole puzzle though. Very fun having them this way.

[@JustForTheTunes]

I'm exactly the same way, get way too intimidated and/or confused by puzzles at this level but am absolutely enthralled with watching the logical process

[@emilywilliams3237]

This is a week for milestones for CTC, isn't it? I feel so priviledged to be part of this wonderful community at this momentous time. Today's video was really fun to watch. Simon, you so clearly love the spacial puzzles, I am happy that sudoku and yin yang puzzles can make such a fine combination and bring you so much pleasure. Tonight's vocabulary that made me smile was "quantum." I truly have never heard that word used to mean what you mean by it anywhere other than on CTC. Congratulations on your 5th anniversary, and again and again on 500,000 subscribers (I meant to mention yesterday your wonderful comparison with the population of Iceland - which I have visited and I am now picturing all of the farmsteads and little villages filled with people watching CTC every day ...) And I am very glad you are home and back in your familiar setting, complete with Maverick flying by. I hope your foot will heal very quickly - I have known of someone else who got stung by one of those fish and will agree that it seemed very painful. Thanks for all that you did to bring videos every single day while you were on holiday. I know that it is not a trivial endeavor, and I appreciate it very much.

[@longwaytotipperary]

well said!

[@Robert_H.]

14:30 5 cell add to 22. The numbers are {2,3,4,x,y}. One of the first 3 hast to be negative. We try to get max value with the first 3: -2 + 3 + 4 + x + y = 22 ➡️ x + y = 17 So x, y has to be {8,9}. Otherwise we can't sum to 22. 21:10 Order because Sudoku with 9 in Box 4

[@maruschke2911]

It is so lovely to see your smile at the end… you’re smiling like a child getting a really big sundae! 😍 congrates to the 5th! I hope you’re going to enjoy many puzzles more.

[@amysteele2488]

5 years, 500k, double congratulations to an incredible, kind, gentle, logical, enjoyable channel!

[@TheBludgeoningEffect]

29:27 "...by the power of two-by-two-ness" a phrase I now desire to incorporate into a conversation 🤣 Simon is simply the best!

[@davidstorrs]

Happy 5 years, Simon and Mark! You guys are brilliant and it makes me happy to watch your videos. Thank you for providing this emotional lift every day like clockwork.

[@yadiracamacho499]

Happy 5 year anniversary! Here's hoping for many more. I like the puzzles, but love your joy while solving them. It's infectious.

[@boredincan]

If you think your old videos are bad it just shows that you are improving. Well done. Being genuine characters in your videos is how you have been able to get half a million subscribers. You should be very proud of all the work you've put in both on screen and behind the scenes. Just fantastic fan engagement. Well earned all around.

[@amyl9864]

Congratulations on the milestones! I am not an original settler to the channel but migrated over on the Miracle wave. What the two of you should do together is do a 'reaction' video to one of each of your very, very early puzzles and/or resolve the earlier puzzle. I watched an earlier puzzle and kept thinking 'Simon of today would have spotted that trick already!.

[@Anne_Mahoney]

Nice idea!

[@joshuaallen4901]

This is the first cracking the cryptic sudoku puzzle I’ve ever tried to do. I got into more special sudoku puzzles about 3 months ago after finding your channel, and I finally beat one of these puzzles! It took me about 3 hours, but I finally cracked it!

[@danezammit]

Finished in an hour and a half only needing to refer to the video for hints twice. Only been following for a few months and my puzzle solving skills have improved drastically thanks to this channel.

[@SamuraiPipotchi]

This puzzle is really intriguing. It looks daunting, but with some basic knowledge and dedicated thinking, it's actually pretty straightforward

[@nmappraiser9926]

I'm in awe of this puzzle. Just such a great idea and so well-crafted. Bravo to Agent.

[@bertbergers9171]

At 39:21 you are not stuck Simon, just having a big brainlapse, from the "2 must be negative in this 13cage" discovery little time before. I am so happy you showing the yin yang conventions, i never remember those and they are of mighty help, in this puzzle for example, but much more often! I start of a bit cheecky, but thank you for keeping up with the puzzles day by day week by week for so long!! Also to Mark!! I love the channel, allthough i sometimes can't help myself posting some less nice comment.

[@th.nd.r]

Welcome back from your vacation, hope it was the best! Can’t wait for the app!!! This puzzle is SO SO SO BEAUTIFUL. Wonderful setting and solving here. Just so many moments where things are forced in beautiful ways, or where everything feels stuck and then all of a sudden you find a secret and then there’s just a flurry of activity. Also, good catch on the 3 in the corner!! Oh and happy 5 years!!!!

[@ruthphelps1440]

Congratulations Simon and Mark, for reaching the 500K subscriber milestone. I really enjoy your videos, and I've learned a lot from you about sudoku!

[@BobWicksVideos]

Thanks Kris and thanks Simon for the birthday wishes. I’m a huge fan of the channel and have been watching daily for at least the past three years!

[@andix4174]

Thanks so much for your birthday greatings! I was never expecting that and you realy made my day. Of course I also want to congratulate for 500.000 subs and the 5 year anniversary. The channel is so perfect so that is definitely very well deserved!

[@kyrnikken]

I found your channel a few days ago and this has been one of the first variant sudoku puzzles I've attempted without watching any of the video first. I second-guessed myself the whole time but somehow managed to complete it without even knowing about the checkerboard or perimeter tricks, though the logic I used was similar. Seeing you explain them and watching your solve made me notice just how many clues I missed that could've sped up my solve, but I'm glad to have tried it on my own and learned from you after. Thanks for the great content and congrats on 500k!

[@Coyotek4]

24:04 ... this was one of my favorite solves this year! LOVED this puzzle!

[@markp7262]

35:57 finish. Absolutely loved the logic on this one! More maths and more negatives!

[@BrooksMoses]

That was an absolutely delightful puzzle, indeed, and a great example of why this channel has so many viewers. With the video length I simply followed along rather than trying it myself, but with the Yin/Yang-puzzle tricks you mentioned and a lot more time, I think I probably could have done it. On the other hand, one of the great things about this channel is that "following along" is really "playing the game of trying to spot something before Simon/Mark does", and your explanations leave enough time that even though I'm nowhere near good enough to do that consistently, I often do spot things a moment sooner -- or at least I have an idea of what logic will get the next step even if I haven't worked it out yet, and I get to see if my idea was right or not. I can't just watch these passively; they're quite mentally engaging. (And, Simon, if that theory is right, that means the times when you occasionally miss something for a bit are actually critical to the channel's success, so don't be too embarrassed about them!)

[@gadois8674]

CTC has given me immense pleasure every day for 2 1/2 years - it has helped me in tough times. I am thrilled to see their success and 500k-Congrats Mark & Simon 👏👏👏 On the sightings - I believe I once saw Mark in the street, but believe we live fairly close and what a brilliant puzzle this was by Agent, took me hours, but at my age that's no bad thing !

[@dannstarrjp]

What a puzzle, I usually don’t attempt 50+min long video puzzles, they’re just too hard for me. I also don’t think I’ve ever done a ying yang by myself. Gave this one a try, took me less than I expected, just over an hour, but solved it all by myself. The endless hours of watching CTC are paying off :)

[@LehaLehan]

Thanks for beautiful puzzle Agent,it was a great pleasure to solve it,and thanks Simon for your fun and kind video content

[@MegaMisch]

Congratulations on 5 years! You guys are awesome, thank you so much for all the great content and the wonderful puzzles.

[@mrplatt4016]

Fun puzzle that I was able to complete. Simon is simply on a different analytical plane and it's so fun to watch and learn from him. Time to recognize the greens were isolated: 1 second Time to remember the solution to the pretty obvious 13 cage: several minutes at least, but only after he recognized the greens were isolated and hooked up with the 13 cage making the 2 a negative number. I'm still smiling. Even after all that he still solves the puzzles in half the time I do.

[@filipecanzi]

Thank you so much for all the dedication into making these videos! They help me a lot

[@G4M1L]

I'm truly impressed, how fast Simon (and maybe even more Mark) are at solving these puzzles, but it seems to come at the cost of also being very fast at forgetting: Simon at around 37:15 about the 2 in r6c12: "We now know that the 2 is the grey digit". Also Simon at around 39:00, talking about the now resolved 2 in r6c1: "I was about to say ... we know that that one can't be green, but actually I know no such thing now".

[@memyself8340]

Simon just did more normal sudoku than I've seen him do in a year or more! Well done on not making me yell at the screen. Other than forgetting to shade that pesky 2, 5 minutes after he said the 2 was the shaded cell.

[@asktheraccoon]

Simon is like that video game character that can jump from 6 buildings without taking any damage but gets stuck in front of a fence thats as high as their knees.

[@HunterJE]

38:50 SIMON, THE CAGE SUM XD

[@frankwales]

Yeah, it's like Simon totally forgot that the 2 has to be subtracted from the 7+8 right after working out how the 13 could come about, and therefore that the 2's colour is forced -- I've paused the video to see if anyone else is metaphorically yelling/gesticulating, so will now be astonished at how Simon finds another remarkable way to get to the answer, as always ;-)

[@frankwales]

Nope, all good -- he's just spotted it with a giggle

[@sxmchn]

Wow! What a puzzle! So many intricate bits of logic. I can't believe I actually solved it. Took me an hour an a half but time well spent. Most surprising for me is I remembered the perimeter constraints with shaded cells and how 2x2 areas can't have a domino pattern with shaded and unshaded cells. That was really useful. Now if I could only start recognizing freaking SET patterns! 😆

[@dertigerbauch]

My friend moved from Switzerland to St Ives 15 years ago, was there about 10 times and it's just an amazingly beautiful area. Have to go back to Cornwall next year...

[@SameM1stakes]

This one was really hard to try on my own, but once you started your process, it was actually really fun to follow along to.

[@puritan745]

Wow, that was the best yin yang puzzle I have ever done!! loved it, thank you Simon!

[@jessicalenoir9979]

So glad you enjoyed your vacation but sorry to hear about the sting!! Congrats again on 500K!♥️

[@joubess]

Thanks Simon! I found this puzzle hard and had to watch some of the video before I could figure out what to do. Once I understood the rules better it was a fun yet very challenging puzzle.

[@Seehart]

Okay. Now I'm inspired. I want to compose a sudoku involving complex numbers.

[@johnportwood4211]

Aye

[@David_K_Booth]

Factorising over the Gaussian integers? The 4n+1 primes decompose nicely into sums of squares, leading to results like 5*13 = 65 = 16+49 = 64+1...

[@Anne_Mahoney]

Perhaps two sudokus in perpendicular planes, one real and one imaginary?

[@Seehart]

@@Anne_Mahoney ... and a third, perpendicular to the real and imaginary sudokus. The Mandelbrot set is projected onto this one when the real and imaginary sudokus are solved.

[@LiveS1s2]

39:45 and I'm yelling "Simon, do math!"

[@LiveS1s2]

"The two in box 4 is gray in the 13 cage" two minutes later "can 2 be green?... i think it can"

[@stevel875]

There was some very elegant logic for the -24 cage that sorts out the colouring much earlier than Simon did. If there were 2 green digits in that cage, the remaining 3 dark cells would need to sum to a minimum of 27, which is impossible. As soon as r6c4 gets coloured as dark, we must avoid a 2x2 dark block narrowing down that green digit to one of 3 cells, so r8c2 and r8c3 must be dark, which forces some green along the bottom row.

[@ericpraline1302]

A smashing puzzle which flowed beautifully.

[@PauxloE]

I think instead of talking about "shaded" and "unshaded" cells, it might be better to call them "positive" and "negative". Quite early, I miscounted the number of cells in the -23-cage (4 instead of 5), and deducted that at most one cell can be positive, and if so, it would have been a 1. This allowed me to mark C2R8 as negative (because of the 1 in the column), and therefore (using the perimeter rule + the 2×2 prohibition) the cell below it as positive (and therefore the whole lower perimeter). This allowed me to color the 10-cage too, and some more in row 8, but not much more until I got more on the top part of the grid. The logic was wrong (which I noticed a whole lot later when I came to that cage again), but fortunately this "guess" turned out to be correct.

[@doncook4097]

The videos have definitely improved over the years. Cheers to you both; I don’t even like classic sudoku anymore - give me variant or give me nothing. It would be nice to find older videos easier with some sort of database and to be able to use the newer app with older puzzles

[@longwaytotipperary]

Welcome back, Simon! Glad you had a nice holiday!

[@vidiot5533]

16:00 I saw fairly quickly that the 6 couldn't be a 123 triple, because that means the 16 would need a grey to avoid a 2x2 region, and the only way to make a 1 grey 2 green triple add to 16 is a 189 triple, repeating the 1 in box 2

[@stevesebzda570]

Congrats on the 500k. I missed yas last night [gardening and such -- Yeah, that's my story -- and I'm stickin' to it lol] Congratulations again. [Best of luck on this endeavor -- no idea how you're makin' a go of it -- keep a foot in the door somewhere]. YAY [it's been 4 or 4 1/2 years -- I know because something tragic happened about then] Good to see someone's making a go with things. Best of luck again.

[@madislegames1743]

Not my birthday but I am eating cake while watching this

[@sarahnash7174]

Oh jealous! I love Cornwall and St Agnes is beautiful! Ouch to weaver fish though, you're right they do bloody hurt!

[@Raven-Creations]

I remember the early videos - you used to be able to do sudoku back then 😜 31:36 - "I still don't know what my ten cage is" - well, if you'd followed up on placing the 7 in the -4 cage you would. It puts 7 in R5C9, which in turn puts 7 in the ten cage. 38:53 - extended brain fart time - "I know this is one of each" - no, you know the 2 is shaded, you worked it out just a few moments earlier, and it's not hard to work it out again 8-2-7 is not -13. Two Agent puzzles in quick succession, and I've thoroughly enjoyed both. I'm looking forward to the next. The sign was wrong for my brain - I couldn't help thinking that shaded=positive, so I just flipped the colours. I used green for shaded, and grey for unshaded, which let me think about grey as shaded and positive. Bridget Jones? Please explain.

[@fristlsat4663]

The commenters on these videos are an eclectic bunch, we get everything from detailed word and phrase statistics to limericks, and either have avoided the trolls or someone is actively moderating the comments. The result really is an example of what a positive internet space can look like, even in the belly of the KZbin beast. The popularity of this channel also grew enormously as a result of the Covid pandemic and Simon and Mark increasing to one a day, one of the few good things to result from that communal evil. So often we don't get to have nice stuff, congrats to you guys for bucking the trend.

[@bobblebardsley]

Completed in 111:07 and by far the hardest sudoku I've ever successfully done 😅 I quite like the yin-yang logic so glad I gave that one a go, and quite happy with the time too.

[@jfirth816]

Delighted by the the Mark "Bridget Jones" joke. Had no idea he was a cousin.

[@MitsuoRLCoach]

Simon's wordage highlights for this video: Additivity two-by-two-ness green-ness grey-ness "get the green out of it's cul-de-sac" "7 is plonked" "nebulous F pentomino" grey-ing

[@langy2068]

There were several times in that video where I saw things well before SImon, but I’ll put it down to him still being in holiday mode, and recovering from his weeverfish incident. Good to know he’s also a Tom Lehrer fan. :-)

[@shawnward6607]

500k! lets get to 600k Mr. Simon and Mr. pencil Mark. Having my sandwich at my desk and solving puzzles during my Lunch break. Please take a well needed break if needed,. Cheers mates!

[@_aullik]

Color Simon and Pencil Mark

[@shawnward6607]

@@_aullik I do not know how Mark feels... but the nick name "Pencil Mark" makes me happy and i would like to think its not that bad cause Mr. Mark pencil marks a tonne of digits. Cheers :)

[@_aullik]

@@shawnward6607 I think Mark is quite ok with it, otherwise Simon wouldn't say it.

[@shawnward6607]

@@_aullik Pencil Mark and Color Simon seem like great pseudonyms! cheers!

[@chipsounder4633]

That was magnificent, the 17 cage in row 9 and the f pentomino with the 29 pencilled, i was wondering how that could have ever been a 2. Love your work, music, crosswords, wordles and the occasional poetry to watch the sunrise with😁❤️ oh i sing 3 in the corner everytime i solve a daily killer🤪

[@Sam_weiqi]

Really nice rule set. I hope there are more like this in the future!

[@Zardox2]

5yr anniversary today... and hit 500K yesterday... 2 red letter days!!! Drinking a bit of wine, in my "Bobbins!" mug, of course. 😁🍷

[@Tony_Regime]

out of all the Tom Lehrer songs that Simon could start singing, I would have expected it to be Lobachevsky

[@simonedgar7566]

I was at St Agnes for a week a month ago. There is nowhere like the north coast of Cornwall. Bedruthan Steps is the best beach ever!

[@stevieinselby]

That was a great puzzle, although sadly I have to confess that I didn't do it justice 😭 I got off to a good start, but then it all went 🍐 shaped when I thought that there was no way for the unshaded region to connect the top and bottom through the gap in r4c3 without breaking the 23-cage or 10-cage - turns out I hadn't considered all the possibilities after all..

[@emmanuelderaps4249]

Hey Simon! Just an idea like that, for the free app: y'all shouldn't release a new app! You can just add a new free pack in the Cracking the Cryptic newest app, with the new interface. No? Actually, I'd say, you shouldn't release ANY new app, only add free / paid packs in that app. Would be way better to have everything under a unique app, than have to navigate between tens. What y'all think?

[@emmanuelderaps4249]

I would even argue that would have been the best path for all your previous app too, but what's done is done, and I don't think it would be feasible to migrate your multiple apps under the newest. But, going forward, I think it would be a great idea to concentrate under a single app with multiple packs!

[@RichSmith77]

Although he keeps referring to it as a new free app, I think either himself or Mark has also talked about is a being a free extension pack in the latest app. I suspect that's what it will end up being, but let's see.

[@emmanuelderaps4249]

@@RichSmith77 That would be awesome :)

[@ThecrystalwizardCoUk]

Happy 5th Anniversary!

[@TheRaker1000]

around 40 minutes, im yelling at the screen, "2 must be grey! total to 13, 2 must be grey!!!"

[@robert-skibelo]

Simon has the most bizarre lapses. At 37:20 he tells us the 2 in the 13 cage is grey. Two minutes later he's forgotten this and is staring at a 13 cage containing 2, 7, and 8 without seeing that it's obvious now that the 2 must be grey, even if he hadn't worked it out before. That poisonous fish must have addled his brain.

[@leppyr64]

It's 8AM and I'm drunk playing the drinking game "Take a shot every time Simon touches the 13 cage and asks a question about it's colour without realizing he just hasn't coloured it yet"

[@leppyr64]

Not an absolute imbecile. Not even close. Absolute genius. But if you think you are and you're ok with that, we're all quite happy that you're OUR absolute imbecile, and we choose to join you. Thanks so much!

[@amitl2308]

14:52 "Famous last words" lol

[@JalebJay]

39:09 I got a lot of uses out of known fact about yin-yang and 2x2s

[@rayflyers]

If you don't cringe at your earlier work, then you haven't grown. You deserve to be proud of your growth.

[@_-_-Sipita-_-_]

31:39 for me. i would consider this approachable compared to other ying-yang sudokus.

[@Lara-cm9go]

I love your videos! I didn't know I needed them but now I can't stop watching. I would love if you said hello, my birthday is coming up on sep 11. Hope you have a great week 😊

[@RichSmith77]

Since I haven't seen anyone else link it, here's that first sudoku video from five years ago (sorry Simon 😂) kzbin.info/www/bejne/nGaXdI2ohrqrg9E Three things struck me while watching it. 1. The 45 info back then wasn't a secret. 2. It's possible to talk through the solve of a Killer sudoku and not once refer to a "cage". (They were all boxes back then). 3. Sven's software is something to be treasured.

[@hillrp1]

I actually had a similar idea for a ruleset. A killer thermo sudoku with a hidden snake of negative numbers. But I couldn't make it work well

[@nikkisweezea2388]

And then, as if I could not have loved him any more, Simon makes a Tom Lehrer reference. My kind of man!!

[@ipudisciple]

I missed that. Timestamp?

[@fulltimeslackerii8229]

i remember like 9 months ago i asked for a negative cage digit puzzle and wow was the wait worth it

[@cryam6428]

What got me struggling was I'm on my phone and can't easily see the minus symbol. They overlap with the cage dots well. I like the rule so if we get more like it my suggestion is to use accounting logic where negative values are represented either in red or since not everyone can see red, parentheses. So the top left corner box would have been (34).

[@TheTwin12321]

I love how the first sudoku video falls on my birthday!!!!

[@DS-xh9fd]

A great puzzle, and I think more approachable than the video length may suggest.

[@michaels4340]

22:00 You should consider the case that the 1 or 2 is green, though?