Sometime last January, there was one day where I bit off more than I could chew. I didn’t know what kind of trouble I had gotten myself into that day when I clicked on the finalize button for eBay and ordered another puzzle. This time, the puzzle in question is called a Square 1. It also goes by other names, such as Cube 21 and Irregular IQ Cube (link to ThinkGeek.com). However, I have another name for it: Geometric Mindbender!

As you can see in the first two pictures, it looks like a normal cube puzzle… except for the angular cuts. Quite different from the garden-variety Rubik’s-type cube. It even has less pieces than that famous puzzle, which is very misleading as one may calculate that less pieces equals less combinations equals easier-to-solve, right? Wrong! Just try mixing it up, and this is what you may end up with:

Whereas a Rubik’s cube is more of an exercise in recreational mathematics, the Square 1 throws in a good dose of geometry! It’s very true that there’s less combinations of permutations in the puzzle, but that is not to say that it’s any easier to solve. Indeed, after watching various videos of seasoned cubers messing around with one of these, I’ve come to the conclusion that any puzzlemeister will have a harder time with this cube than any regular NxNxN cube. Even browsing the puzzle forums, most people on them agreed that this is one of the hardest ones to solve.

After mastering the 2×2, 3×3, 4×4 and 5×5 cubes, not to mention solving a 7×7x7 cube and also solving a Megaminx with little effort and no help, I thought I was ready for this. Boy, was I wrong! After a couple of days of working out most of the puzzle, I got stuck on how to do some of the switching of corners and edges, so I sought help online. Getting the Square 1 back into cube shape, and then having the top and bottom showing the same colors took some time, but I got those parts done without help. However, putting the final pieces in place is a great challenge, not made any easier by the fact that you may encounter parity issues which require “polarization” of the puzzle (BTW, that involves a complete shape morph!!).

All in all, if you love puzzles and you feel the need for a new challenge, Square 1 will not disappoint when it comes to brain-wracking aggravation and satisfaction!

Cheers… and happy puzzling!

Update!: More fooling around with the Square 1 today yielded some amusing results. I managed to make a couple of animal shapes; one bears a passing resemblance to a rhino! I’ll post a pic in my Hobbies album in the Photo Gallery, ASAP!

Well, today wasn’t too eventful, but I had a couple of picture-worthy moments. As per usual, click the thumbnails to embiggen…

Usually, on a Saturday, Christine cleans the bird cages while I watch over the birds. Since that alone doesn’t really occupy me that much, I end up blog writing, surfing the ‘net… or playing with puzzles. Well, I wasn’t watching what I was doing with my 5×5x5 cube and you can see the result of my carelessness. Too bad there was no one to take a picture of my expression at the moment of discombobulation. They aren’t kidding when they say these cubes aren’t made for speedsolving! As you can see, I was already mixing it up when this happened, so I couldn’t exactly place the cubies where they were supposed to go; If you place them wrong, the puzzle is rendered unsolvable. I did manage to get it back together, after disassembling the rest of it and starting from scratch!

Later, I decided to make some brownies that Christine was oh-so-pining for. However, I was sitting on an idea for my next batch. Why not make them into… S’more brownies!? I think this experiment may be a success; it sure looks to be that way! Tomorrow, we’ll do a taste test just to be sure they’ve cooled and turned out OK. Anyone wanna come over and help?

Cheers!

P.S.: I did end up getting the Polysics’ album today… and it’s pretty good! Review to come after reviews for Lunatica and a few others that came before this one.

Hello to all of you and I hope you had a great New Year’s celebration!

For this first blog entry of 2008, I (surprisingly) do not have any new games. Well, aside from a Sonic the Hedgehog iPod game. It’s not worth really going in great detail about; I just got it for the nostalgia. However, I did get a new puzzle from the mail yesterday. I had to order it through eBay from PuzzlePros. Take a look at the pictures below:

It’s a Megaminx! This puzzle comes in a couple different color schemes and variations, along with different kinds of tiles depending on when it was manufactured. I must say that whoever manufactured this one did a decent job. It is lightweight, but it feels sturdy (and a little stiff) when turning the faces. The pieces come together almost seamlessly, with very little gapping in some areas. The tiles seem permanent enough, but only time and good use will tell just how good the quality is. It’s certainly different, and bigger (!), than the Mefferts version (I know the Mefferts version is smaller from watching YouTube’s vids on them).

This thing looks like a monster to solve, doesn’t it? My wife even said that it looks evil, due to it’s pentagram-ic stylings! It’s a 12-sided dodecahedron that is layered in such a way that any of the faces can turn freely. Due to the way it turns, the cuts form a star pattern, with which only the center piece is stationary (similar to the Rubik’s Cube’s centers). Because of this, it is possible to use the techniques learned in solving the Rubik’s Cube and adapt them for use in solving the Megaminx. Be ware of thinking that it’s really simple; compared to the Cube, the extra side on each face can really make things confusing. However, I did solve it this morning after mixing it up last night. The only help I had was advice, found on the web, on starting points and finishing points and nothing else…

… so I kinda ruined my fun in solving it so soon. However… that does not mean that the Megaminx is easy! This is a real brainbuster that any twisty-puzzle fan will get a kick out of, even solving it repeated times like I will.

I’ll update this entry If I find any really glaring flaws in the construction, but so far it twists and turns like a champ. I’ll need to see about lubing it to make it turn better. I also want to work with it more to come up with a good beginner’s solution, just to help out other people who may need advice. Everywhere I went on the internet, I only found sites that essentially said “work it like a regular 3×3 cube” and complicated algorithms for every single last-layer permutation case, none of which I’ve used in solving it! I want to, someday soon, help others by showing how to solve it without learning algs for every case. It can be done and I know I can find the optimal beginner’s solution.

All in all this is a gem in my puzzle collection. At least until I get the real Mefferts version! (supposedly the best one)

This year was better for the family get-togethers than last year was. Last Christmas, more than half of the family got really sick from one of the earlier family gatherings. They encouraged us to stay home and keep well. Well, this year we definitely made up for that, at least on Christine’s side. The downside to all this is that I couldn’t see anyone on my side of the family. I’m thankful for phone conversations, but I do miss everyone that I couldn’t see this year. Also, I’m thankful that this year’s holiday didn’t have any bad surprises (ie. deaths) to mar future memories. This seems to happen to more families than I care to think about. All in all, I’m just thankful, and that is one of the main points of the holiday, as it is a gift in itself.

Now that I’ve said that, it’s time to bring up the gift bag so I can talk about the cool stuff I received! Just to let you all know, the order that I’m going in does not dictate most favorite or anything like that.

First, I got a neat little toy called a Rubik’s Revolution. I say “toy”, instead of “puzzle”, because that’s really what it is. At first glance, it looks like a super-sized Rubik’s Cube, but the centers are hollowed out and have lights in them. Plus, the layers really don’t move. What is cool about it is that it is an electronic game device with six games built-in. Most of these games are themed on turning off multicolored lights within a time limit. However one game, “Pattern Panic” is fashioned like the classic Simon game where you repeat a growing pattern from memory. Another game, “Code Cracker”, has the player figure out a hidden pattern in the fewest turns possible. While this is a fun little thing, I only have two small caveats about it. One, you can reduce the volume, but there’s no way to mute it. For that reason, it stays downstairs per the wife. Two, I don’t like the fact that Rubik’s name is being used for a mere toy when that name has been synonymous with brain-busting puzzles. Still, I’ll be enjoying it for a long while.

Next, I was given an awesome box set of the second season of Doctor Who . I can’t tell you how pleased I am to have this, and it’s also a gift for both me and Christine because she loves the show, too. We have seen some of the episodes on it, but not all of them, so we’re going to have a fun time watching the unknown ones. The extras on some of the discs, I can tell, are going to be awesome. I’ve already watched the out-takes, because I really love blooper reels. There’s just something about watching your favorite actors flubbing up lines or breaking out in lunacy. Maybe after we watch all the episodes, I’ll make some episode reviews.

Also of note, I was given a CD of Lunatica’s “Fables & Dreams”. I just recently heard a few songs of theirs and I got hooked on their smoother form of Symphonic Metal. So far, the whole CD is just great and I’ll do a review of it on this site soon. Speaking of new music, we just received a late-arrival gift today for Christine: Din Fiv’s “Escape To Reality”.

We also got the usual assortment of clothing and gift cards, which are equally appreciated. However, I figured that the above mentioned items were most interesting and worth talking about in detail. I will say that the only bad thing about the DVD box set is that I’ll be tempted to get the other two season box sets later this coming year!

Cheers!

After reading this, click the thumbnail picture to embiggen to 640×480 goodness.

After endlessly practicing and finding ways to solve the Rubik’s 3×3, 4×4, and 5×5 cubes in less time and/or more efficiently, it’s good to look up, experiment with and practice some neat patterns. The regular 3×3 on the right is sporting a checkerboard pattern on all sides. That’s the easiest pattern. The 4×4 Revenge on the left is done up in a center-dot pattern, again on all sides. Slightly less easy. The 5×5 Professor cube in the center is lookin’ mindbogglin’ with a curious cube-in-cube-in-cube pattern. That one, of course took me the most time. I’m familiar with the algorithm to make that pattern on a regular Rubik’s Cube, but it took some experimentation and trial/error to modify the alg for what I did with the 5×5.

The pic may seem like showboating, but I was just extremely happy with the results of this kind of noodling around and I wanted to share with all. Cheers!

Update 12/14/07: I managed to create this little gem today… a cube-in-a-cube-in-a-cube-in-a-cube! (Say that really fast several times; it kinda has a groove to it!)