This is a Sum Fillomino puzzle. The grid contains some cages. The number at the top left of each cage gives the sum of all numbers that appear inside of it. Numbers may be repeated in cages.
Puzzle 324
(Click for larger size)
Part 3 of 4 in the Fillomino-fillia preview series. See mathgrant’s blog for the other half.
Answer Entry: Enter the units digits of each square in the marked rows and columns, from left to right for rows and from top to bottom for columns.
Highlight to see answer: 1712312154, 2338442919
I made this puzzle partially to poke fun at motris, actually. We all know he loves it when nikoli.com releases a puzzle like this one, no matter how vehemently he denies it.
Melon's Puzzles 
June 2, 2011 at 4:26 am |
Applying a particular kind of solving theme/progression in a new setting would be a new experience and interesting. Applying the same theme in the same setting over and over is not. Particularly when it is an overly forced construction that itself is not doing much for the puzzle, even diminishes it. I feel the same way about pangrams in crosswords, and wished the quadruple pangram NYT puzzle put that canard to bed for good but nothing really can.
This was acceptably interesting and fun. Looking forward to the test, but not sure I’ll have time to compete.
June 2, 2011 at 6:15 am |
Very very fun puzzle. I was half expecting larger numbers since this puzzle doesn’t have the number cap that Killer Sudoku does, but I guess we might see something like that in the competition.
June 2, 2011 at 12:10 pm |
Very fun, and a nicely hidden theme.
I must be slow on the uptake this morning, because I got all the way around to filling in the two-square “9” box just NE of center before the theme (and Motris reference) dope-slapped me.
Also, with respect to Scott’s comment, I thought about Killer Sudoku when starting the puzzle, and quickly thought “OK, the 3 really does have to be a 1/2, but the 17 doesn’t have to be 8/9 because two-digit numbers are fair game”. So at the point when the theme hit me, and the 17 attained a certain teleological inevitability, I grinned.
If these are the puzzles that got cut from the test, I’m really curious to see the test itself. Also this one is a particularly nice example of why hand-constructed puzzles can be way more entertaining than computer-generated puzzles. This puzzle construction is like telling a good joke, and computers are really really bad at that.
June 2, 2011 at 10:27 pm |
Excellent!
I learnt so many things about the type, and i learnt how much easy to make any mistake.
Until now i solved all practice puzzles (yours and Grant’s), and i should notice that all answer arrows are deponds on last solving movement, at least in mine. So it seems that you are very carefull about this, although they are only practice puzzles. Thank you very much for your great effort!
June 2, 2011 at 10:32 pm |
The main reason for being careful even for the previews is that virtually every puzzle in the preview series was a candidate to go on the test. We basically made sure we had three of every variation to give ourselves some room to choose, and no construction was considered complete without picking the answer entry.
As for choosing the arrow positions well in the first place, most of that is our shared tendency to lay out a trail for a solver to follow, and marking the places where the trail ends is pretty easy.
June 3, 2011 at 5:42 am |
This was tough! I thoroughly enjoyed it though, and I expect this variant to destroy me on the test tomorrow.
Also, I may have solved it in the wrong order based on Jack’s comment. I hit the 9 well after the 17 on the right.
Also also, I didn’t get the joke, and I’m feeling rather dense as a result 😛
June 3, 2011 at 7:53 am |
If it helps, I didn’t get it either.
June 3, 2011 at 2:56 pm |
The basic gist of the joke is that whoever lines up the puzzles on nikoli.com is obsessed with easy Sudokus themed around a 1 to 9 solve to the point that over half of the easy Sudoku puzzles are like that. motris is highly unamused by this state of affairs and leaves an unsatisfied comment every time. Not that anyone else approves, but he’s definitely the most vocal.
June 3, 2011 at 3:35 pm
I DEFINITELY solved it in the wrong order then. I can see where that joke would come into play though.