Think Diagonally and Other Directions

Diagonal Twins by Yasuhiro Hashimoto produced by Mine
Note that this photo only shows the pieces as previously displayed by Mine

When the Diagonal Twins by Yasuriro-san was awarded the Puzzler's award AND a Jury honourable mention award at the IPP design competition last year, many of us waited with baited breath for Mine to complete his production run and post them out. It took him quite a while but we were all happy to wait to get hold of something truly special. I haven't had much time to play with it until fairly recently but have taken it to work a few times and let some colleagues loose on it.

There must be something quite compelling about such a simple puzzle because everyone I showed it to was unable to resist playing with it. Having 2 pairs of identical twin pieces made from lovely wood and a simple box with a slightly restricted opening makes it look like it should be an easy thing to solve. I watched everyone play and fail over many many attempts and was delighted by their frustration. Despite watching them play, I only had a little time to try myself. 

The puzzle is very reminiscent of the Pin Block Case by Hajime Katsumoto (produced by Eric Fuller) which I reviewed way back in 2018. It also has 4 pieces to be inserted into a simple cubic box through a restricted opening and requires a very beautiful sequence of moves to solve.

Pin Block Case by Hajime Katsumoto

Over the last week I have been working on this myself and trying my usual attempts outside the box. The pieces fit together in only a linmtied number of ways and so the issue is getting the conformation to go inside. This is much easier to talk about than actually do. I tried to be systematic and find an assembly that I would be able to disassemble through a limited opening and that is where I got stuck. There seem to be a lot of ways it should be possible but the curved sides of the opening prevent almost everything that i wanted to do. Damn! I really struggled. 

I even continued in desperation this morning to try and solve it. If I wasn't successful then I would have nothing interesting to write about for the blog. The pressure was on! Man! This one was tough. After about 1½ hours of muttering to myself (luckily Mrs S was elsewhere) I finally had my Aha! moment and the pieces finally slid home. I can now see why this won the prize - it is such a simple idea and yet so tremendously beautiful in its execution. I cannot show you the packed puzzle as it would give too much away but I have to agree with the Jury and all the puzzlers at last years IPP - it's amazing. If you get a chance to buy a copy or even just play with a copy then you should definitely jump at it. I will be bringing this and the Pin Block Case to work for a while to torture my friends with.

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Jigsaw P4z by Mine
Same photo as released by Mine himself so as not to give too much away

I also challenged my work colleagues with another lovely little simple design by Mine. This is a simple 4 piece jigsaw with a square framed tray to assemble them inside. It arrives with the Jigsaw already pre-assembled so what is the challenge? Take the puzzle pieces and assemble them so that all the nobbles and holes are paired but make it so that the puzzle cannot move in the tray. It's really not terribly tough but needs a little thought and leaves both beginners and experienced puzzlers with a satisfied Aha! moment when they work it out. Everyone I gave it to solved it in about 5-10 minutes and they were all very pleased with themselves. 

Thank you Mine, for the opportunity to play with these. I still have a whole bunch of extras that I haven't gotten around to yet. Most are tray type packing puzzles so I expect them to take me many years!