Shikaku
Japanese Logic Puzzles #2
Mcreaser is a big fan of geocaching. He's also a fan of
Japanese-style logic puzzles, and so, he thought, why not put them
together?
Everyone knows about the archetypal Japanese logic puzzle,
Sudoku. Less well known, but equally rewarding, are some of the
other puzzles made popular in Japan, particularly in the puzzle
magazine, Nikoli. To find this cache, you must solve the
following moderately difficult Shikaku puzzle.
Like all such puzzles, there is software available to
automatically solve Shikaku.
Please do not use a computer
program to solve this puzzle. The goal of this series is
to introduce geocachers to other logic challenges, and using
computer software defeats that purpose. The above puzzle is not
overly difficult and can be solved inside of 15 minutes once you've
learned the rules.
You can learn more about Shikaku from
Nikoli.
Once you have completed the puzzle, you may find the coordinates
using the following formula. Consider the rows and columns to
number from 1 - 15, starting in the upper-left corner. To get the
number for each clue, count the number of boxes that partially or
completely lie along that row or column in the completed
puzzle.
N 44 40.ABC W 63 40.DEF
- A = (# of boxes in column 5)
- B = (# of boxes in row 1) - (# of boxes in row 10)
- C = (# of boxes in column 3)
- D = (# of boxes in column 7)
- E = (# of boxes in column 5) - (# of boxes in column 13)
- F = (# of boxes in column 6)
The cache is a small camoed lock-n-lock (suitable for small
trade items) and should be a pretty easy find once the coordinates
are in hand. It should be winter friendly, but the hiding spot may
be a little hard to identify in deep snow. Please close the lid
tightly and replace the cache exactly as found.
You can check your answers for this puzzle on
Geochecker.com.