This was how your intrepid puzzler and his feline overlord left it last
week
At the end of
last week's blog, myself and Mazikeen had managed to randomly move everything we could find in
every possible position we could think of and luckily, due to the extreme
flexibility of the cat, we were able to remove two panels from the Gravity cube
by Alex Owens.
After this we were both rather badly stuck. Interestingly, i was unable to put
the panels that I had removed back on to the cube - I/we literally had managed
this by chance with minimal understanding of what we had achieved. My usual to
and fro approach really wasn't working here as I achieved things without knowing
what I had done. Was I enjoying the puzzle? I don't know. It was interesting and
obviously very clever but the lack of understanding was decreasing my enjoyment.
Also, the inability to progress any further at all despite a good few hours of
play was making the puzzle lose its shine.
After writing things up last week, I was determined to continue and the cat
and I continued to swear and fiddle. Actually, I did all the swearing and she
seemed to sleep a lot. I took it to work and carried on playing (no, the cat
did not accompany me to work - for some reason, surgeons aren't too enamoured
with the idea of a cat wandering around the operating theatre!) I was forced
to work on it alone. Somehow I made more progress. I have no idea how! Are you
getting a theme here? After a further couple of days another 2 panels had been
removed and yet again, I could not put them back. Nothing for it other than to
try to move onward. With the two panels left, I found a few more possible
moves and thought I was making progress. After another 3 days of doing the
same thing back and forth multiple times, I was able to do and undo those
things consistently and almost understood what I was doing but could go no
further. Now what?
After last week's blog post,
Goetz contacted
me to offer help if I needed it. He had apparently received a copy of this
puzzle quite a long time ago and had solved and reassembled it many times. It
had been his EPP recommendation as top mass produced puzzle for 2025. I
admitted that I had progressed to 2 remaining panels and Goetz offered a hint
which included finding and using an L-shaped piece from inside. I didn't have
an L-shaped piece and could not make the move that he had used to get it.
Apparently Alex had improved the design since Goetz received his version. OMG!
Was I doomed to be stuck at this point. After a bit of to-ing and fro-ing we
established that I had everything that I needed and I was encouraged to do
something that I had toyed with trying for a while but had been too frightened
that I would lose the only tool I had. There are lots of horror stories about
puzzlers inserting things into holes and not being able to remove them! 😱
I worked with Mazikeen to screw our courage to the sticking point and used the
tool. There was a click and suddenly a whole new direction of panel movement
was possible. A 5th panel came off - hooray. we were ecstatic. One last panel
to go and I now had a new tool that had been released by that panel. The next
steps were actually fun - it was almost obvious what I had to do and after
another 5 minutes we had the inner cube released to explore:
She looks delighted!
This inner cube seems to have a single sliding lid but it is locked in place.
With the tools I had, there was only so much to try and there was a delightful
Aha! moment and the lid was open revealing yet another cube inside. Was this it?
Mazikken thought there would be more:
A new cube? Hooray!
Still more to be done...
That innermost cube did not seem to be the final step and I was encouraged to
play further - luckily the final mechanism was not too troublesome - even fun!
Alex has put a rather pretty fidget toy inside for you to play with when you
eventually get in. I didn't dare leave the cat to play with that or it might
have ended up inside the cat.
All rings can spin
Can I eat it?
I was so delighted to have solved it eventually but now petrified. Almost all of
the mechanisms were navigated without really knowing what I was doing and now I
am thinking that there is no way I will be able to reassemble this incredibly
complex puzzle. There are quite a lot of pieces here (hidden behind a spoiler
button:
OMG! Now what?
I am hoping that now that I can see what I am doing, I will be able to
backtrack my way through the assembly and then see whether I understand it
enough to redo the whole thing without too many random movements in the
process.
So, the title of the blog post mentions a dilemma... I need to think about
whether this is a candidate for my top ten(ish) of 2026. Whilst this is an
incredibly ingenious design and the manufacture is unbelievably good, I am
currently left feeling that I solved it with a whole lot of random moves and
no understanding at all apart form the final moves. I also have the worry
that it will be left in pieces forever more. Over the years, quite a few of
my puzzles have been solved by random moves and that has not detracted from
them as I eventually did understand the pathway through the puzzle solution.
I think that if I manage to reassemble it and that process helps me with a
proper understanding of the mechanisms involved then not only will it be in
my top ten, then it may head towards the top! I'll keep you all informed.
Overdrive assembled
Thank you to George who recognised the Stewart Coffin puzzle as Overdrive in my recent post about what I brought back from the MPP. I had received this last year from Steve and was aware that it was a six piece coordinate motion puzzle. I had been trying for many hours to get it together in the correct assembly and had given up. George mentioned that there is an easier assembly which involves a minor CoMo move of 3 pieces to create 2 halves which slide together. It was with much relief that I assembled the above (less than attractive) assembly and could put it away finally. Thanks George!
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