I am relieved that I had Simon's exact line of thinking about the start of the puzzle...up until he figured it out. Then we sort of went different ways. He went on to solve the puzzle, and I just watched someone do it XD
I was really happy. Thought it was broken about 5 seconds before he said it was broken, and spotted the solution 3 seconds before he did. Perfect timing to make me feel really clever without being frustrated.
I was really frustrated after 15 minutes cause I'm like "oh I'm going to feel so stupid." I was right. I did feel stupid. Regardless, really neat trick even if I didn't spot it.
My version of Simon's call to Mark was me realizing, "Wait, they wouldn't have uploaded the video if the puzzle was unsolvable." Otherwise I would have assumed there was a mistake and dropped it.
Videos like this always make me wonder what we're not seeing. Sometimes early in the video, Mark or Simon say something like "I'm not sure this is possible". I'd love to see a video where it is not, just to see the actual reactions, etc.
@@nickcranston5292 sort of how in some of the set theory puzzles recently where Simon puts the puzzle through a solver first, he says he's not really going to spend much time doing his normal pencil marking.
Appreciate the full disclosure on these vids, a lesser channel would have edited out the phone call, but confirming the puzzle is correct was part of the solve so it stayed in. That's integrity, pure and simple. I don't have a hope of solving these, but that's the kind of stuff that keeps me coming back.
The break-in trick feels like one of those little fidget puzzle toys where it seems like there's no way to make the rings unlink from the cord or whatever until you figure it out and then the solution seems obvious
I've probably watched 50 videos on this channel, and this is the first puzzle to make Simon make a phone call saying it's broken. Take a bow Prutsbeest.
Simon, A couple days ago you mentioned those who find calm in these videos. I want to say thank you for this. I suffer from depression from losing my daughter at 35 weeks back in 2012 and not a day goes by that I don't think of what might have been. Your videos give me 30 to 60 minutes to forget about the world and look for patterns. Thanks for all you do and I look forward to supporting this channel for many days and months to come.
Dear Shane, I cannot imagine what pain you must feel from this loss. Something like this is just wrong. A mistake in the universe. I too suffer from depression. I comes and goes and it didn't stop when my son was born in 2019. It is a burden you have to carry, I wish I could say something else or give you the key to a magical healing. Don't give up. You are not alone, even in having lost something so precious. While we listen to Simon and his joy while cracking I'll be thinking of you tonight and hoping, that you will get through this.
That phone call to Mark is one of my favourite ever moments on the channel! Also very chuffed that I managed to solve this one before watching the video.
He also calls the purple "pink" ;) (to be fair I know that different monitors etc will have the colours look slightly different. But to me that's definitely crossed the line from pink to lavendar)
I gave up after 5 minutes of trying to not-cross thermos in the middle, decided it's broken. Went to watch the video, saw you calling Mark about it and felt so satisfied that I caught the same thing! Then we got hit with a "think harder", you got your Ereka moment and I had to pick my jaw up from the floor. The rest of the puzzle was fun and approachable, but that start hit me harder than the crazy SETs. At least with SETs I can nod my head like "Yep, wouldn't see that no matter what, thanks for the start Simon", but this thing had me actually disappointed that I didn't try harder myself. Amazing logic - love the comparison someone made between this and puzzle toys, it felt exactly like that!
I agree. I was annoyed that I missed it, but it is very difficult to see. It's most likely one of those things where kids can 'see' the pattern better than adults (as some studies of complex puzzles/patterns show). This is also most likely why it felt more like a puzzle toy than a serious game (though, I guess it's both).
Rules: 03:11 Let's get cracking: 06:06 And how about this video's Simarkisms?! By sudoku: 9x (15:31, 27:28, 32:33, 34:02, 38:49, 39:17, 39:20, 44:58, 45:02) Beautiful: 8x (00:24, 13:07, 13:10, 26:36, 26:36, 26:36, 29:00, 37:18) The Answer is: 5x (14:44, 29:14, 38:42, 40:09, 43:12) Sorry: 4x (14:21, 28:17, 40:53, 41:04) Clever: 4x (12:53, 14:04, 14:05, 29:47) Hang On: 4x (14:16, 14:16, 14:16, 41:43) What on Earth: 3x (08:15, 20:49, 22:56) Useless: 3x (21:00, 21:33, 32:39) Lovely: 3x (19:11, 37:32, 37:32) Surely: 3x (07:19, 19:19, 40:58) Naked Single: 2x (37:05, 42:40) Brilliant: 2x (12:59, 16:09) Ridiculous: 2x (31:40, 35:22) Oh It Can!: 2x (18:46, 39:48) Take a Bow: 2x (13:00, 46:28) Bobbins: 1x (31:30) Good Grief: 1x (32:26) Knowledge Bomb: 1x (19:33) You Rotten Thing: 1x (24:09) Break the Puzzle: 1x (10:27) Fascinating: 1x (41:06) Incredible: 1x (00:21) Extraordinary: 1x (46:08) Syzygy: 1x (06:21) Shouting: 1x (12:15) Magnificent: 1x (02:14) Alacrity: 1x (13:18) FAQ: Q1: What is a Simarkism? A1: A Simarkism is something that Simon and Mark typically or frequently say. Q2: How do you do this so fast? A2: I'm not made of flesh and blood, but of sand ... Q3: Why don't you include 'XX' and 'YY'? A3: Probably it's already on the list ('Scooby-Doo' for example), but not mentioned in this video. But if you think it's not, tell me what you'd like me to include and there's a good chance I'll add it! Q4: You missed 'XX' at 'YY:ZZ'! A4: That could very well be the case! Human speech is hard to understand for computers like me, especially British sometimes! Point out the ones that I missed and maybe I'll learn! Q5: Could you turn these statistics into videos? A5: I've been playing around with the idea and I'm open to input as to what people would like to see. Let me know if you are interested in this and/or have suggestions.
This is the first time I'm reading the FAQ and I only now realise you're using some sort of program to scan the video for specific phrases. For the longest time I thought you were some kind of superhuman madman
I love the relationship you and Mark have. Also, bit late, but it was great to see Mark in Tom Scott's card game video! Hope to see you or him in more like that, you guys are great in all that you do 👍
Mark opted to stay at home, expecting a call from Simon, knowing exactly what he was going to say, and so looking forward to it, grinning smugly to himself all day.
This reminds me of the Miracle Sudoku when Simon was convinced that Mark was trolling him but then had that Eureka moment. Lovely puzzle and lovely solve. Thanks Simon and Prutsbeest!
I don't know when exactly it happened, but recently I've transitioned from usually going "I probably can't solve this" to usually "I probably can solve this" on CtC-featured puzzles! And I loved this one. I didn't catch it until halfway through the solve either, but the reason the symmetry of the puzzle is broken is the black and grey squares. In order for a thermo sudoku to be rotationally symmetrical with d mapping to 10-d, the bulb of a thermo has to rotate onto a tip and vice versa, and the grey and black thermos are both tips.
@@amoswittenbergsmusingsin ordinary Euclidean space that's correct. However, Wenninger (and also me in high school when I needed a new username) proposed that, since in projective space parallel lines meet at infinity, the cube might be "stellated to infinity". The resulting shape is known more commonly in the literature as a tetrahemihexacron.
@@stellatedhexahedron6985 Fascinating! Coxeter's Polytopes is one of my all-time favourites. I don't recall him mentioning Wenninger. I need to read up on this. As projective space is in many respects much more general than affine space, perhaps this perspective (no pun intended) enables a more general classification than the usual Schläfli/Coxeter/Dynkin one.. Thanks for your reply!
The opening trick only stumped me for a moment, since I have a background in graph theory, but I'd still call it a eureka moment. I absolutely LOVE how the symmetry breaks down in this puzzle, I can say from experience that it's very very difficult to set something that has so much symmetry and then diverges at the last second.
It was very clever. The symmetry operation is a 180 degree rotation followed by replacing every number x by 10-x. This sends increasing ordered numbers to decreasing ordered ones so to preserve the properties of a thermo, the 180 degree rotation needs to send bulbs of thermos to tips. The puzzle does this for every bulb and tip except the grey and black ones. Since those tips are there primarily as late puzzle disambiguation, it allows the puzzle to retain a lot of symmetry till right at the end.
I admire Simon's confidence in his logic. As soon as I got my first asymmetrical digit, I was just ready to restart the whole puzzle from scratch and had to pause and think for quite a while before pushing forward
I immediately gave up because it also seemed impossible to me. I thought I had misunderstood the "no crossing" rule and that it actually meant that thermos can't cross *themselves*. Then I started the video and had the pleasure of seeing Simon as baffled as me, only to get told it was indeed possible. And it's really clever, I'm just sad I didn't think of that.
Wow! This is the coolest puzzle I've ever solved from this channel. I started the video with just a few minutes left at work, couldn't see how the middle area was possible, then had my own eureka moment as I was driving home and imagining thermometers bending around one another. Got home to play with it and found the solution in about 50 minutes. Now to watch the video.
I actually clapped out loud at the brilliance of this puzzle Prutsbeest:) I assume you must be lurking on this comment chain. I would love to see a setter's video for how you went about this. Specifically I would be curious about the mental gymnastics you went through with the symmetry of the puzzle. I suspect you wanted the puzzle to remain symmetrical and couldn't find a way out of the corner you had boxed yourself into. To be honest though I believe the puzzle works better with the asymmetry towards the end, as it stopped Simon from automatically assuming symmetry. Again Kudos to you Prutsbeest, a fantastic debut on the channel!
That blue thermometer stumped me, and I literally laughed out loud when I saw the solution. Have you considered doing any videos with the app in dark mode? I think it would be great for the bedtime viewers out there.
I was stuck with the same barrier thoughts as you when you called Mark. Had to watch your video until the Eureka moment and then finished the rest myself with very similar amazement and joy as you. Great puzzle, Prutsbeest is certainly no Prutser. Best hour of my day ^^
Well, when Mark said "think harder", i paused video and spent about 10 more minutes thinking. And I did found that zig-zag blue pattern myself, which made very excited)))
I felt really smart when I saw the snake configuration at the beginning before Simon. Then he pointed out 4 more consequences that I missed right away, and put me in my place :-)
I did have the same moment at the start, but it was fleeting and I didn't need to use my "phone a friend" lifeline. I had a chuckle imagining you on Who Wants to be a Millionaire, and phoning Mark, only to be told "think harder". I think my experience thinking topologically helped me at the start. Imagining the red & green lines offset vertically does not change the topology, and it reveals how the blue might be able to get through with an S or Z shape. Rotating this shape to create the space on the diagonals revealed the solution. I had a moment of panic later on when I thought I'd broken it once the symmetry broke down. What a fantastic puzzle. I did try to use the line drawing, but alas it won't do diagonals, and you can't change the colour so it doesn't obscure pencil-marks. Something for Sven to ponder?
This is the first puzzle I was able to solve without watching Simon solve it. I've learned so much from you guys and I'm incredibly proud of myself for solving this one! Thank you for the great content!!!
I'm stoked I found the Eureka moment first, but hadn't realised it could go either way. I did happen to pick the right path to begin with, but chose to restart. One of the few puzzles I've solved by myself (pausing the video several times to get ahead).
SPOILER: This may be the first time on the channel that the puzzle is solved with something still unsolved! The grey/black thermos have finally created SCHRODINGER CELLS
Don't think of the gray/black cells as a thermometer. Rather, it's a restriction that states that one of its neighbors must be lower than it and neither it nor that neighbor may be part of a thermometer.
@@hhaavvvvii it's fine to think of it as a thermometer. You just need to realise that although there are multiple possible thermo combinations, there is only one correct set of digits. And that is ultimately the target of the puzzle
This is the biggest shock I have ever had solving any puzzle ever. I did not even start it because I was so fanatically convinced it was broken. I am not as open-minded as I thought. This sudoku is a true masterpiece.
I too gave up immediately because it was "clearly impossible". Sort of thing I might have seen easily while sketching on a whiteboard, but highlighting squares makes it seem like you've built an impenetrable barrier! Still a cool puzzle, but it truly defeated me. :D Although my assumption wasn't that it was broken, but that the very subtle wording of the rules has a reading that I assumed away. It says "thermometers cannot cross and *different* thermometers cannot share a cell". The fact that *different* is only called out once suggested to me that *maybe* it was supposed to be read as "thermometers cannot cross (themselves) and different thermometers cannot share a cell". That is, perhaps the rules actually allowed *different* thermos to cross. So I hoped over to the video to more carefully listen to the rules, and then immediately found Simon also giving up lol.
How could any thermometer ever cross itself when the digits on it have to be strictly increasing? Thinking of it, even a "slow thermo" can't cross itself as that would require 4 consecutive digits on it to be the same, of which at least 2 would share a row, and 2 others would share a column. The rules here would still be unambiguous when they would've only said that different thermos cannot share a cell.
@@nickellis999 the direction of the thermos would prevent you from being able to swap the numbers around in this puzzle. It didn’t solve when I treated the silver tip as a bulb instead, but for different reasons.
@@reina4969 With this particular construction then no, it probably wouldn't work, but I'm sure it's possible to create a similar setup that has a unique solution where the unmatched ends are a bulb and a tip.
11:30 The hazards of live streaming. But we are all impressed by Simon's honesty. 12:20 No, Simon, there is a very non-obvious way of connecting the middle 3 thermometers. But it is the key to the break-in.
I actually broke into this puzzle incredibly fast and completed without any hints or tips! I love thermo sudokus and thoroughly enjoyed the aspect of hidden thermos! A great puzzle with excellent logic along the way!
I started by thinking THIS CANNOT WORK! Then I got drawn into Simons solving and didn't even try it myself even after the break in. It was such a delight to watch.
31:50 for me. The video title perfectly describes my thought process with this puzzle. Such a great idea, I loved it so much. Another awesome puzzle to add to the list of my favourite ones.
I've had the same moment as in the video title =D And it took me about 3 minutes of unsuccessful search and then 4 minutes of Simon struggling with the puzzle start to actually realize how does that work. That's just mindblowing. Great break in, if it is one, it's awesome!
I loved that it tricked us into thinking it was going to be symmetry and therefore easy, but it was sneaky with the just off perfect symmetrical grid which made it really interesting! Loved this puzzle and solve, Fantastic!
Interestingly, I knew the approach from the outset, due to playing Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, which included this exact problem in one of its puzzles. How to get something North to South, whilst creating to East to West side bridges. Granted it's tighter here, due to the grids limitations :D That said, it didn't mean the sudoku side of this puzzle was at all straight forward for me, hah. Glad to see you conquer it, Simon!
Yay! No idea how, but I’ve done it in about 1.5 hours. The hint that it’s possible is actually kept me going, and after you get the thermo positions it’s pretty manageable. Thank you for a great puzzle!
Yes Simon, you are correct. I immediately thought it was broken and started to play the video, and stopped once you showed the example puzzle with the diagonal thermos, and I also had an instant Eureka moment that it might be possible and went back. Didn't spot it immediately after that, but a little bit in I did, and found it absolutely brilliant. I loved this!
I loved this one! I was stuck the same way you were, Simon, but once you resolved that I was actually (for once!) able to slowly get to the end of the puzzle on my own! I really feel like watching these videos is teaching me all sorts of new ways of looking at how the numbers align themselves, and where to look to rule out possibilities. Thank you for bringing this one to us! *Edit:* now that I've resumed watching your solve, you got to the (4) tip of the darker hidden thermo _far_ more quickly than I did! I genuinely did forget about those two thermo tips until very late in the puzzle, at which point it did exactly as you speculated-I had been left with (14), and suddenly realized it couldn't be a 1!
Wow that was a beautiful puzzle. I thought I was stuck after getting the blues figured out at first, but the puzzle solved very nicely afterwards. I did have a Simon moment twice where I was making great moves seeing elusive logic, but then completely missed obvious numbers looking into boxes forcing the remaining options.
Doing puzzles like Flow Free makes the pathing pretty straightforward. It was a joy to see Simon struggle and solve this. But I do wonder if all their phone calls are that terse. Very British, indeed.
I understand the logic of the break-in, but I think it would be easier to understand visually with the pen tool, rather than coloring, so that one can view the path of the blue thermometer. The problem is, I can't seem to make the pen tool draw a diagonal line.
as soon as Simon pulled the puzzle up and i saw all those colors, i thought, "boy that'd be rough for colorblind people"... and then before he even began, he said "i'll make a colorblind friendly version" you, sir, are a class act
Don't feel too bad. I had the same problem, staring at the grid for a good five or six minutes. I came to the video to watch how you'd probably solve it in like five seconds, and the very second you said "AH!", I said it, too. Something about watching you hit the same wall I did made me realise how it worked.
Given that the solution makes it possible for both gray and black to be four cells long, I'm wondering if the 'two cells length' clue was meant to read two cells beside bulb and tip.
@@apet1572 Never said otherwise. If you think about it, it's redundant anyway, since the last two cells of a longer thermo would always form a valid two cell thermo, and there is no rule that thermos must be as long as possible. The point is that the puzzle as is isn't uniquely solvable if you consider painting the thermos part of the solution, as you can paint them various ways. Or rather: If you consider painting them in to be part of the solution and use uniqueness for the solve, you'd think that grey could never be a 9 unless all but one of the surrounding cells are part of another thermo, which isn't possible and breaks the puzzle. I mean, there could also be sudokus which ask "what digit has the marked cell" and somehow are not uniquely solvable, but the marked cell would always contain the same digit - would finding out that digit mean the entire puzzle is solved, or is it unsolvable?
There are *two* symmetries broken: the obvious 1/9 2/8 etc symmetry, known in Jewish mystical combinatorics as Atbash (אתב"ש) *and* the chirality of the central thermometer.
I was on the edge of my seat the entire time. I was also sure it was broken in the beginning and would have never spotted the trick. What a great puzzle!!
First time I got the break in a little quicker than Simon... I am so proud of myself! In the end it took me way longer to solve the whole puzzle. Really nice break in, many thanks to the setter!
Finished in ~85 minutes. Spotted the opening trick fairly quickly, but worked it backwards (red going up) at first and had to double-back. Then I somehow overlooked the singleton 4 on the black tip and burned a bunch of time Goodliffing futilely before giving up at about the hour mark and starting to watch the video. As soon as Simon reached that point, I realized my oversight and was able to press on to finish. Great puzzle!
This was delightful to solve and I’m glad the video gave it just as much respect as it deserves! I might have judged the starting configuration to be impossible myself if it weren’t for the video’s title giving me an extra hint. In the end, this masterpiece gets to join the (rather sparse) list of puzzles I’ve completed for myself. Having watched this channel, I genuinely think a puzzle which breaks symmetry in an unexpected fashion is more impressive than a puzzle where symmetry is maintained for the entire solve. It’s like the puzzle creator is using a symmetric configuration to get you started with the tricky deductions, and as soon as you find that single in box 1, the puzzle drops that crutch since it’s no longer necessary. Bravo, Prutsbeest.
If you dig deeper into this, eg. by switching the grey dot to a bulb, you find that the symmetry of the puzzle has already been broken, even without the black/grey dots. I don't know why.
Wow what a great puzzle. My complement to the constructor. Brilliant. I hope their will be more puzzles like these. ☀️👍🏻😁 It makes me smile. Thanks for that.
I too thought the puzzle was impossible at first. But as soon as I watched Simon explain the rules and realized “Oh right, thermos can move diagonally” the solution was obvious.
I wonder that aswell because saying "yes it is Simon" makes absolutely no sense so I think it was staged. But still it was a good addition, I like the show.
I thought exactly the same thing about the opening. 🤣 Also I loved that you phoned Mark during the video. Excellent variety. Reminded me of one of those game shows with “life lines” or some such things.
I needed just a bit of a hint from the start of the video, then I easily deduced the break-in from there. But then I went through a couple of false starts as I jumped the gun on how the numbers resolved. Once I got around that, it was a messy, but fairly direct, solve. Like Simon, I was a bit taken aback when I came across the broken symmetry. I was really afraid I'd royally screwed it up. But it did resolve, so whew! My final time on the last run was 79 minutes, and add another 20 or so for the false starts. So well under two hours for me, and not as bad as the last couple of evil slogs I've had to suffer through. A very interesting puzzle, all told.
I was first stuck with the same problem, checked your rules and realized that thermos can cross the corners. Then I quite quickly realized how to do it.... but I had the advantage of knowing it would be possible, since otherwise there wouldn't have been a video :P. The way I discovered the orientation of the blue thermo is similar, but felt quite differently: - Look at the grid at 22:00 - If the 2, 3, 4 in the blue thermo is on the right-hand side, then in box 5 col 6 we get a run of 249. Since this run repeats in Box 2 col 5, it would also have to repeat in Box 8 Col 4. - This is broken because neither 2, 4 or 9 can connect the yellow bulb to the yellow end.
I had done some pen and paper puzzle earlier in my life which had this same setup. Three pairs of dots in this formation and you need to connect them without lines crossing. After figuring it out back then, it was quite intuitive what these thermos need to do.
@@ragnkja The Three utilities problem is unsolvable for sure, it's well-known: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_utilities_problem. I referred to a similar type of puzzle which was unsolvable only at first glance. Its' solution was basically the same as the key point of this sudoku puzzle.
I think this is the only time I will ever see something before Simon. Just before he made the call I thought ohh that's how you do that, its not impossible. Once in a lifetime event :)
One of the great puzzles. So fun all the way. Not too hard. And after solving the puzzle watching Simon solve a puzzle I had so much joy in and having almost as much joy as I did was super fun to watch.
57:22. Ridiculously clever break-in, and that alone is worth the puzzle, but the logic past it is delightful. One of the best thermo puzzles in recent memory. And yes, I did just the same mistake as Simon at the start, it was only the benefit that knowing this was solvable because there's a video that didn't stop me right there.
Me: "this is impossible"
Simon: "this is broken"
Mark: "Think harder"
Me (baffled): "Simon, think harder!"
This made me cry laughing
I am relieved that I had Simon's exact line of thinking about the start of the puzzle...up until he figured it out. Then we sort of went different ways. He went on to solve the puzzle, and I just watched someone do it XD
I happened to spot the solution within a second and it was so painful to see him struggle for sooooo long. I kept screaming at him to get it.
Same here. I said that it is also broken. And couldn't figure it out. Haha
I was really happy. Thought it was broken about 5 seconds before he said it was broken, and spotted the solution 3 seconds before he did. Perfect timing to make me feel really clever without being frustrated.
Me too!! Glad I wasn't the only one
I was really frustrated after 15 minutes cause I'm like "oh I'm going to feel so stupid."
I was right. I did feel stupid. Regardless, really neat trick even if I didn't spot it.
10:35 greatest moment in CtC history.
For your merch, I suggest the quote "think harder."
I'd buy that shirt with the blue 9 boxes below it
My version of Simon's call to Mark was me realizing, "Wait, they wouldn't have uploaded the video if the puzzle was unsolvable." Otherwise I would have assumed there was a mistake and dropped it.
I think you just used uniqueness to finish watching the video
Videos like this always make me wonder what we're not seeing. Sometimes early in the video, Mark or Simon say something like "I'm not sure this is possible". I'd love to see a video where it is not, just to see the actual reactions, etc.
@@chris5619 this just a collection of them make the video 45min+ long
@@nickcranston5292 sort of how in some of the set theory puzzles recently where Simon puts the puzzle through a solver first, he says he's not really going to spend much time doing his normal pencil marking.
@@nickcranston5292 😄
Appreciate the full disclosure on these vids, a lesser channel would have edited out the phone call, but confirming the puzzle is correct was part of the solve so it stayed in. That's integrity, pure and simple.
I don't have a hope of solving these, but that's the kind of stuff that keeps me coming back.
Integrity is the hallmark of the world of Simarkism and the Great Arcana that is its halo.
The phone call was the best part 😜
The break-in trick feels like one of those little fidget puzzle toys where it seems like there's no way to make the rings unlink from the cord or whatever until you figure it out and then the solution seems obvious
Exactly what I was thinking.
I'm honestly glad the call was left in, it feels like part of the solving process in a way.
I've probably watched 50 videos on this channel, and this is the first puzzle to make Simon make a phone call saying it's broken. Take a bow Prutsbeest.
Simon, A couple days ago you mentioned those who find calm in these videos. I want to say thank you for this. I suffer from depression from losing my daughter at 35 weeks back in 2012 and not a day goes by that I don't think of what might have been. Your videos give me 30 to 60 minutes to forget about the world and look for patterns. Thanks for all you do and I look forward to supporting this channel for many days and months to come.
Dear Shane, I cannot imagine what pain you must feel from this loss. Something like this is just wrong. A mistake in the universe. I too suffer from depression. I comes and goes and it didn't stop when my son was born in 2019. It is a burden you have to carry, I wish I could say something else or give you the key to a magical healing. Don't give up. You are not alone, even in having lost something so precious. While we listen to Simon and his joy while cracking I'll be thinking of you tonight and hoping, that you will get through this.
@@caro.s. thanks you for the kind words. Like any other journey it's one day at a time.
Even thou I don't think I have any shot in solving this one, I really want thank you for including colourblind friendly versions of these puzzles!
Now if only he'd include them on the videos... To me the ones he called pink and the one he called blue are all the same light blue....
That phone call to Mark is one of my favourite ever moments on the channel! Also very chuffed that I managed to solve this one before watching the video.
Simon: I myself am also a little colourblind
Also Simon: Routinely colours the entire grid
Colourblindness is different for everyone and it can be more it less severe for certain people
He also calls the purple "pink" ;)
(to be fair I know that different monitors etc will have the colours look slightly different. But to me that's definitely crossed the line from pink to lavendar)
@@heatherfyffe3618 he often confuses red and orange too
Simon calls Mark: "I think there's something wrong with this puzzle"
Mark: "git gud"
Thug life music plays
Omg best comment.
Not just any Thug Life music. Specifically P.I.M.P by 50 Cent
I gave up after 5 minutes of trying to not-cross thermos in the middle, decided it's broken. Went to watch the video, saw you calling Mark about it and felt so satisfied that I caught the same thing! Then we got hit with a "think harder", you got your Ereka moment and I had to pick my jaw up from the floor. The rest of the puzzle was fun and approachable, but that start hit me harder than the crazy SETs. At least with SETs I can nod my head like "Yep, wouldn't see that no matter what, thanks for the start Simon", but this thing had me actually disappointed that I didn't try harder myself.
Amazing logic - love the comparison someone made between this and puzzle toys, it felt exactly like that!
I agree. I was annoyed that I missed it, but it is very difficult to see. It's most likely one of those things where kids can 'see' the pattern better than adults (as some studies of complex puzzles/patterns show). This is also most likely why it felt more like a puzzle toy than a serious game (though, I guess it's both).
can u tell me why blue thermometer cant be 5 cells long? still red and greeen can reach diogonally to their own colour
Rules: 03:11
Let's get cracking: 06:06
And how about this video's Simarkisms?!
By sudoku: 9x (15:31, 27:28, 32:33, 34:02, 38:49, 39:17, 39:20, 44:58, 45:02)
Beautiful: 8x (00:24, 13:07, 13:10, 26:36, 26:36, 26:36, 29:00, 37:18)
The Answer is: 5x (14:44, 29:14, 38:42, 40:09, 43:12)
Sorry: 4x (14:21, 28:17, 40:53, 41:04)
Clever: 4x (12:53, 14:04, 14:05, 29:47)
Hang On: 4x (14:16, 14:16, 14:16, 41:43)
What on Earth: 3x (08:15, 20:49, 22:56)
Useless: 3x (21:00, 21:33, 32:39)
Lovely: 3x (19:11, 37:32, 37:32)
Surely: 3x (07:19, 19:19, 40:58)
Naked Single: 2x (37:05, 42:40)
Brilliant: 2x (12:59, 16:09)
Ridiculous: 2x (31:40, 35:22)
Oh It Can!: 2x (18:46, 39:48)
Take a Bow: 2x (13:00, 46:28)
Bobbins: 1x (31:30)
Good Grief: 1x (32:26)
Knowledge Bomb: 1x (19:33)
You Rotten Thing: 1x (24:09)
Break the Puzzle: 1x (10:27)
Fascinating: 1x (41:06)
Incredible: 1x (00:21)
Extraordinary: 1x (46:08)
Syzygy: 1x (06:21)
Shouting: 1x (12:15)
Magnificent: 1x (02:14)
Alacrity: 1x (13:18)
FAQ:
Q1: What is a Simarkism?
A1: A Simarkism is something that Simon and Mark typically or frequently say.
Q2: How do you do this so fast?
A2: I'm not made of flesh and blood, but of sand ...
Q3: Why don't you include 'XX' and 'YY'?
A3: Probably it's already on the list ('Scooby-Doo' for example), but not mentioned in this video. But if you think it's not, tell me what you'd like me to include and there's a good chance I'll add it!
Q4: You missed 'XX' at 'YY:ZZ'!
A4: That could very well be the case! Human speech is hard to understand for computers like me, especially British sometimes! Point out the ones that I missed and maybe I'll learn!
Q5: Could you turn these statistics into videos?
A5: I've been playing around with the idea and I'm open to input as to what people would like to see. Let me know if you are interested in this and/or have suggestions.
thank you for your service
This is the first time I'm reading the FAQ and I only now realise you're using some sort of program to scan the video for specific phrases. For the longest time I thought you were some kind of superhuman madman
You should be pinned by default...
Friend Fall Of A Roof is a one off.
Mea Culpa
Absolutely loved that you left the call to Mark in!
I love the relationship you and Mark have. Also, bit late, but it was great to see Mark in Tom Scott's card game video! Hope to see you or him in more like that, you guys are great in all that you do 👍
agreed, Tom Scott videos are always fun, but it's even more fun when I see a crossover I recognize pop up in his videos
A puzzle so perplexing, even Maverick stayed on the ground!
Mark opted to stay at home, expecting a call from Simon, knowing exactly what he was going to say, and so looking forward to it, grinning smugly to himself all day.
Are you the true Maverick!?!
@@prahas777 I was on my way to Mark's to complain about the broken puzzle.
@@herecomesmaverick3129 Aghhhh!!! Two Maverick's!!!! LOL Which is the true "buzzer."?!?
Maverick was also "thinking harder". lol
I wonder how Mark would cope with all those thermometers he couldn't fill with pencil marks
By giving it to Simon
This really complements the Goodliffe puzzle uploaded today, doesn't it?
How do you goodliffe invisible thermo’s?
@@derekjc777 From Sudoku to metaphysics...
Give it to simon and tell him to think harder
This reminds me of the Miracle Sudoku when Simon was convinced that Mark was trolling him but then had that Eureka moment. Lovely puzzle and lovely solve. Thanks Simon and Prutsbeest!
That sounds fun. Do you remember which Miracle Sudoku?
I don't know when exactly it happened, but recently I've transitioned from usually going "I probably can't solve this" to usually "I probably can solve this" on CtC-featured puzzles! And I loved this one.
I didn't catch it until halfway through the solve either, but the reason the symmetry of the puzzle is broken is the black and grey squares. In order for a thermo sudoku to be rotationally symmetrical with d mapping to 10-d, the bulb of a thermo has to rotate onto a tip and vice versa, and the grey and black thermos are both tips.
Is there a stellated hexahedron? I think that according to Schläfli/Coxeter such a beast cannot exist. Am I missing something?
@@amoswittenbergsmusingsin ordinary Euclidean space that's correct. However, Wenninger (and also me in high school when I needed a new username) proposed that, since in projective space parallel lines meet at infinity, the cube might be "stellated to infinity". The resulting shape is known more commonly in the literature as a tetrahemihexacron.
@@stellatedhexahedron6985 Fascinating! Coxeter's Polytopes is one of my all-time favourites. I don't recall him mentioning Wenninger. I need to read up on this. As projective space is in many respects much more general than affine space, perhaps this perspective (no pun intended) enables a more general classification than the usual Schläfli/Coxeter/Dynkin one..
Thanks for your reply!
Simon: *calls mark* I think this puzzle is broken
Mark: just think better lmao
The opening trick only stumped me for a moment, since I have a background in graph theory, but I'd still call it a eureka moment. I absolutely LOVE how the symmetry breaks down in this puzzle, I can say from experience that it's very very difficult to set something that has so much symmetry and then diverges at the last second.
Yes, that was lovely indeed.
can u tell me why blue isnt 5 cells long? red and green still could eaach other..
It was very clever. The symmetry operation is a 180 degree rotation followed by replacing every number x by 10-x. This sends increasing ordered numbers to decreasing ordered ones so to preserve the properties of a thermo, the 180 degree rotation needs to send bulbs of thermos to tips. The puzzle does this for every bulb and tip except the grey and black ones. Since those tips are there primarily as late puzzle disambiguation, it allows the puzzle to retain a lot of symmetry till right at the end.
This might be my favorite puzzle in ctc history. Amazing
... until the next miracle.
I admire Simon's confidence in his logic. As soon as I got my first asymmetrical digit, I was just ready to restart the whole puzzle from scratch and had to pause and think for quite a while before pushing forward
What a great beginning. Love how well Simon owns what he does. Could have edited it out, but so much better with it in.
I immediately gave up because it also seemed impossible to me. I thought I had misunderstood the "no crossing" rule and that it actually meant that thermos can't cross *themselves*. Then I started the video and had the pleasure of seeing Simon as baffled as me, only to get told it was indeed possible. And it's really clever, I'm just sad I didn't think of that.
Wow! This is the coolest puzzle I've ever solved from this channel. I started the video with just a few minutes left at work, couldn't see how the middle area was possible, then had my own eureka moment as I was driving home and imagining thermometers bending around one another. Got home to play with it and found the solution in about 50 minutes. Now to watch the video.
I actually clapped out loud at the brilliance of this puzzle Prutsbeest:) I assume you must be lurking on this comment chain.
I would love to see a setter's video for how you went about this. Specifically I would be curious about the mental gymnastics
you went through with the symmetry of the puzzle. I suspect you wanted the puzzle to remain symmetrical and couldn't find
a way out of the corner you had boxed yourself into. To be honest though I believe the puzzle works better with the asymmetry
towards the end, as it stopped Simon from automatically assuming symmetry. Again Kudos to you Prutsbeest, a fantastic debut on the channel!
Enjoyed the dramatic call for assistance. I was as perplexed as Simon. What a puzzle! CTC showcases such clever and original sudokus time after time.
That blue thermometer stumped me, and I literally laughed out loud when I saw the solution.
Have you considered doing any videos with the app in dark mode? I think it would be great for the bedtime viewers out there.
I was stuck with the same barrier thoughts as you when you called Mark. Had to watch your video until the Eureka moment and then finished the rest myself with very similar amazement and joy as you. Great puzzle, Prutsbeest is certainly no Prutser. Best hour of my day ^^
Niet een prutser maar zeker een beest...
Well, when Mark said "think harder", i paused video and spent about 10 more minutes thinking. And I did found that zig-zag blue pattern myself, which made very excited)))
I felt really smart when I saw the snake configuration at the beginning before Simon. Then he pointed out 4 more consequences that I missed right away, and put me in my place :-)
I did have the same moment at the start, but it was fleeting and I didn't need to use my "phone a friend" lifeline. I had a chuckle imagining you on Who Wants to be a Millionaire, and phoning Mark, only to be told "think harder".
I think my experience thinking topologically helped me at the start. Imagining the red & green lines offset vertically does not change the topology, and it reveals how the blue might be able to get through with an S or Z shape. Rotating this shape to create the space on the diagonals revealed the solution.
I had a moment of panic later on when I thought I'd broken it once the symmetry broke down. What a fantastic puzzle.
I did try to use the line drawing, but alas it won't do diagonals, and you can't change the colour so it doesn't obscure pencil-marks. Something for Sven to ponder?
The symmetry breaking by those two dots was the first thing I noticed.
This is the first puzzle I was able to solve without watching Simon solve it. I've learned so much from you guys and I'm incredibly proud of myself for solving this one! Thank you for the great content!!!
"Beautiful chromatic festival..." So love your expressions, Simon!
Simon's chromatophilia is remarkable, given that he revealed his _slight_ colour blindness today.
I'm stoked I found the Eureka moment first, but hadn't realised it could go either way. I did happen to pick the right path to begin with, but chose to restart. One of the few puzzles I've solved by myself (pausing the video several times to get ahead).
SPOILER: This may be the first time on the channel that the puzzle is solved with something still unsolved! The grey/black thermos have finally created SCHRODINGER CELLS
Don't think of the gray/black cells as a thermometer. Rather, it's a restriction that states that one of its neighbors must be lower than it and neither it nor that neighbor may be part of a thermometer.
@@hhaavvvvii it's fine to think of it as a thermometer. You just need to realise that although there are multiple possible thermo combinations, there is only one correct set of digits. And that is ultimately the target of the puzzle
This is the biggest shock I have ever had solving any puzzle ever. I did not even start it because I was so fanatically convinced it was broken. I am not as open-minded as I thought. This sudoku is a true masterpiece.
Why do I watch these videos at 930pm in the U.K.? Because they are astonishing and unbelievable time after time! Can you think of anything better?
I too gave up immediately because it was "clearly impossible". Sort of thing I might have seen easily while sketching on a whiteboard, but highlighting squares makes it seem like you've built an impenetrable barrier! Still a cool puzzle, but it truly defeated me. :D
Although my assumption wasn't that it was broken, but that the very subtle wording of the rules has a reading that I assumed away. It says "thermometers cannot cross and *different* thermometers cannot share a cell". The fact that *different* is only called out once suggested to me that *maybe* it was supposed to be read as "thermometers cannot cross (themselves) and different thermometers cannot share a cell". That is, perhaps the rules actually allowed *different* thermos to cross.
So I hoped over to the video to more carefully listen to the rules, and then immediately found Simon also giving up lol.
How could any thermometer ever cross itself when the digits on it have to be strictly increasing? Thinking of it, even a "slow thermo" can't cross itself as that would require 4 consecutive digits on it to be the same, of which at least 2 would share a row, and 2 others would share a column. The rules here would still be unambiguous when they would've only said that different thermos cannot share a cell.
@@hugobouma a thermo can cross itself diagonally without any issues
The clues aren’t symmetrical because the black and silver are both tips. To be perfectly symmetrical one of them would have had to have been a bulb.
Do you think it would have been solvable if one HAD been a bulb?
@@reina4969 no, it would have had two solutions, one being the other with each number replaced by 10 minus that number.
@@reina4969 I just tried it and it broke the puzzle. For some reason it forced me to put multiple 2s and 8s in the same rows and columns.
@@nickellis999 the direction of the thermos would prevent you from being able to swap the numbers around in this puzzle. It didn’t solve when I treated the silver tip as a bulb instead, but for different reasons.
@@reina4969 With this particular construction then no, it probably wouldn't work, but I'm sure it's possible to create a similar setup that has a unique solution where the unmatched ends are a bulb and a tip.
I managed to zero in on the center thermo pretty quickly, and ended up with a 28:17 time! Very happy with myself on this one :)
11:30 The hazards of live streaming. But we are all impressed by Simon's honesty.
12:20 No, Simon, there is a very non-obvious way of connecting the middle 3 thermometers. But it is the key to the break-in.
I actually broke into this puzzle incredibly fast and completed without any hints or tips! I love thermo sudokus and thoroughly enjoyed the aspect of hidden thermos! A great puzzle with excellent logic along the way!
I started by thinking THIS CANNOT WORK! Then I got drawn into Simons solving and didn't even try it myself even after the break in. It was such a delight to watch.
I'd love to have heard Mark's side of the call as well as his reaction afterwards :D
31:50 for me. The video title perfectly describes my thought process with this puzzle. Such a great idea, I loved it so much. Another awesome puzzle to add to the list of my favourite ones.
Use the Force Luke - Star Wars
Think harder Simon - Cracking the Cryptik
I've had the same moment as in the video title =D And it took me about 3 minutes of unsuccessful search and then 4 minutes of Simon struggling with the puzzle start to actually realize how does that work. That's just mindblowing. Great break in, if it is one, it's awesome!
I loved that it tricked us into thinking it was going to be symmetry and therefore easy, but it was sneaky with the just off perfect symmetrical grid which made it really interesting! Loved this puzzle and solve, Fantastic!
Interestingly, I knew the approach from the outset, due to playing Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, which included this exact problem in one of its puzzles. How to get something North to South, whilst creating to East to West side bridges.
Granted it's tighter here, due to the grids limitations :D
That said, it didn't mean the sudoku side of this puzzle was at all straight forward for me, hah.
Glad to see you conquer it, Simon!
Yay! No idea how, but I’ve done it in about 1.5 hours. The hint that it’s possible is actually kept me going, and after you get the thermo positions it’s pretty manageable. Thank you for a great puzzle!
WOW the break-in is WAY WAY too clever. Absolutely wonderful. I’ve never seen a thermometer like that in my life. Wow.
Yes Simon, you are correct. I immediately thought it was broken and started to play the video, and stopped once you showed the example puzzle with the diagonal thermos, and I also had an instant Eureka moment that it might be possible and went back. Didn't spot it immediately after that, but a little bit in I did, and found it absolutely brilliant. I loved this!
I was gasping and cheering the whole way through this puzzle like I was watching a sports game, that's absolutely brilliant
I hope Mark makes use of that call in his intro. That's what friends are for after all.
While it would be extremely hilarious I really doubt Mark was recording at that time :c
I loved this one! I was stuck the same way you were, Simon, but once you resolved that I was actually (for once!) able to slowly get to the end of the puzzle on my own! I really feel like watching these videos is teaching me all sorts of new ways of looking at how the numbers align themselves, and where to look to rule out possibilities. Thank you for bringing this one to us!
*Edit:* now that I've resumed watching your solve, you got to the (4) tip of the darker hidden thermo _far_ more quickly than I did! I genuinely did forget about those two thermo tips until very late in the puzzle, at which point it did exactly as you speculated-I had been left with (14), and suddenly realized it couldn't be a 1!
Wow that was a beautiful puzzle. I thought I was stuck after getting the blues figured out at first, but the puzzle solved very nicely afterwards. I did have a Simon moment twice where I was making great moves seeing elusive logic, but then completely missed obvious numbers looking into boxes forcing the remaining options.
Doing puzzles like Flow Free makes the pathing pretty straightforward. It was a joy to see Simon struggle and solve this. But I do wonder if all their phone calls are that terse. Very British, indeed.
I understand the logic of the break-in, but I think it would be easier to understand visually with the pen tool, rather than coloring, so that one can view the path of the blue thermometer. The problem is, I can't seem to make the pen tool draw a diagonal line.
as soon as Simon pulled the puzzle up and i saw all those colors, i thought, "boy that'd be rough for colorblind people"... and then before he even began, he said "i'll make a colorblind friendly version"
you, sir, are a class act
I managed to crack in by myself and am absolutely stunned by the sheer beauty of it!
Don't feel too bad. I had the same problem, staring at the grid for a good five or six minutes. I came to the video to watch how you'd probably solve it in like five seconds, and the very second you said "AH!", I said it, too. Something about watching you hit the same wall I did made me realise how it worked.
After watching all the weaving around objects in The Witness, I spotted the path style needed for that centre section right away. Epic puzzle
The only thing I don’t like about the puzzle is the black thermometer doesn’t have a fixed solution. Absolute 10/10 besides thay
The grey thermo could be removed entirely, but it would draw too much attention to the grey dot to remove another Eureka! movement from the solve.
Yeah for a moment I was thinking that must be the way forward is ruling out any arrangement of digits that made those thermos ambiguous.
Given that the solution makes it possible for both gray and black to be four cells long, I'm wondering if the 'two cells length' clue was meant to read two cells beside bulb and tip.
@@Leartin the rules dont say they must be two cells.. it says AT LEAST two cells, which 4 is part of that.
@@apet1572 Never said otherwise. If you think about it, it's redundant anyway, since the last two cells of a longer thermo would always form a valid two cell thermo, and there is no rule that thermos must be as long as possible.
The point is that the puzzle as is isn't uniquely solvable if you consider painting the thermos part of the solution, as you can paint them various ways. Or rather: If you consider painting them in to be part of the solution and use uniqueness for the solve, you'd think that grey could never be a 9 unless all but one of the surrounding cells are part of another thermo, which isn't possible and breaks the puzzle.
I mean, there could also be sudokus which ask "what digit has the marked cell" and somehow are not uniquely solvable, but the marked cell would always contain the same digit - would finding out that digit mean the entire puzzle is solved, or is it unsolvable?
Absolutely stunning puzzle! The break-in was brilliant, but the last minute symmetry break was truly the icing on the cake.
There are *two* symmetries broken: the obvious 1/9 2/8 etc symmetry, known in Jewish mystical combinatorics as Atbash (אתב"ש) *and* the chirality of the central thermometer.
@@amoswittenbergsmusings “chirality”?
I was on the edge of my seat the entire time.
I was also sure it was broken in the beginning and would have never spotted the trick.
What a great puzzle!!
This easily makes it into my top 5 puzzles on CTC! Amazing setting!
First time I got the break in a little quicker than Simon... I am so proud of myself! In the end it took me way longer to solve the whole puzzle. Really nice break in, many thanks to the setter!
Finished in ~85 minutes. Spotted the opening trick fairly quickly, but worked it backwards (red going up) at first and had to double-back. Then I somehow overlooked the singleton 4 on the black tip and burned a bunch of time Goodliffing futilely before giving up at about the hour mark and starting to watch the video. As soon as Simon reached that point, I realized my oversight and was able to press on to finish. Great puzzle!
it's so satisfying to watch you, so much joy when you get a new idea in your eyes and voice and face, it's crazy how much fun it is
Puzzles with geometric breakins are awesome. I hope Simon is maintaining a collection of these.
I was amazed at myself for immediately seeing how to draw the blue thermo, incredible puzzle already!
This was delightful to solve and I’m glad the video gave it just as much respect as it deserves! I might have judged the starting configuration to be impossible myself if it weren’t for the video’s title giving me an extra hint. In the end, this masterpiece gets to join the (rather sparse) list of puzzles I’ve completed for myself.
Having watched this channel, I genuinely think a puzzle which breaks symmetry in an unexpected fashion is more impressive than a puzzle where symmetry is maintained for the entire solve. It’s like the puzzle creator is using a symmetric configuration to get you started with the tricky deductions, and as soon as you find that single in box 1, the puzzle drops that crutch since it’s no longer necessary. Bravo, Prutsbeest.
If you dig deeper into this, eg. by switching the grey dot to a bulb, you find that the symmetry of the puzzle has already been broken, even without the black/grey dots. I don't know why.
That was a great puzzle. Leaving the call to Mark in the video was quite humble of you, and quite entertaining ;)
Thank you for the colorblind assistance. Colorblindness can be brutal when dealing with some of these puzzles.
Wow what a great puzzle. My complement to the constructor. Brilliant. I hope their will be more puzzles like these. ☀️👍🏻😁 It makes me smile. Thanks for that.
I too thought the puzzle was impossible at first. But as soon as I watched Simon explain the rules and realized “Oh right, thermos can move diagonally” the solution was obvious.
That was, probably, the greatest moment in this channel’s history. Had me laughing. I wonder if it was truly spontaneous.
I wonder that aswell because saying "yes it is Simon" makes absolutely no sense so I think it was staged. But still it was a good addition, I like the show.
The telos of a thermometer tip! Aristotle meets sudoku. Love it.
I thought exactly the same thing about the opening. 🤣 Also I loved that you phoned Mark during the video. Excellent variety. Reminded me of one of those game shows with “life lines” or some such things.
The title is accurate, the two realizations came for me at roughly 30 seconds and 5 minutes too!
I needed just a bit of a hint from the start of the video, then I easily deduced the break-in from there. But then I went through a couple of false starts as I jumped the gun on how the numbers resolved. Once I got around that, it was a messy, but fairly direct, solve.
Like Simon, I was a bit taken aback when I came across the broken symmetry. I was really afraid I'd royally screwed it up. But it did resolve, so whew!
My final time on the last run was 79 minutes, and add another 20 or so for the false starts. So well under two hours for me, and not as bad as the last couple of evil slogs I've had to suffer through. A very interesting puzzle, all told.
Hey that's my thermo! Great example =D
This puzzle tickles my sense of aesthetics in all the right ways.
What an absolutely rocksolid amazing puzzle. beautiful! loved every second of it 💖💖💖
I think this is one of my favourite videos on this channel
I was first stuck with the same problem, checked your rules and realized that thermos can cross the corners. Then I quite quickly realized how to do it.... but I had the advantage of knowing it would be possible, since otherwise there wouldn't have been a video :P.
The way I discovered the orientation of the blue thermo is similar, but felt quite differently:
- Look at the grid at 22:00
- If the 2, 3, 4 in the blue thermo is on the right-hand side, then in box 5 col 6 we get a run of 249. Since this run repeats in Box 2 col 5, it would also have to repeat in Box 8 Col 4.
- This is broken because neither 2, 4 or 9 can connect the yellow bulb to the yellow end.
this was one of the most fun to think alongside with
Very clever disguising of the broken symmetry. Bulbs reflect into tips except for the black/grey pair.
I had done some pen and paper puzzle earlier in my life which had this same setup. Three pairs of dots in this formation and you need to connect them without lines crossing. After figuring it out back then, it was quite intuitive what these thermos need to do.
The “utilities puzzle”? That one is impossible to solve in the plane, you need at least a genus 1 surface to solve it.
@@ragnkja The Three utilities problem is unsolvable for sure, it's well-known: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_utilities_problem. I referred to a similar type of puzzle which was unsolvable only at first glance. Its' solution was basically the same as the key point of this sudoku puzzle.
That final twist in the symmetry breaking was great!
I think this is the only time I will ever see something before Simon. Just before he made the call I thought ohh that's how you do that, its not impossible. Once in a lifetime event :)
I solved this puzzle with a different solution than what you got. Interesting!
can u tell me why blue thermometer cant be 5 cells long? still red and greeen can reach diogonally to their own colour
Apart from the gorgeous break in, very lovely slow symmetry breaking, caused by the black and grey dots both being tips.
Brilliant puzzle with a mind boggling break in yet cannot be categorized as monstrously hard!
One of the great puzzles. So fun all the way. Not too hard. And after solving the puzzle watching Simon solve a puzzle I had so much joy in and having almost as much joy as I did was super fun to watch.
57:22. Ridiculously clever break-in, and that alone is worth the puzzle, but the logic past it is delightful. One of the best thermo puzzles in recent memory. And yes, I did just the same mistake as Simon at the start, it was only the benefit that knowing this was solvable because there's a video that didn't stop me right there.
Wow, what a puzzle.