Puzzles #735 - #737 - We Are So Back (Double Back Variants)

Continuing my backlog posting of old puzzles I haven't shared, here are the three puzzles I made for Logic Showcase 66. The prompt was to make a puzzle with a Double Back rule, and I took that prompt in three different directions.

The first puzzle I made was a Norinori where the unshaded cells had to be solved as a Double Back. In other words, draw a loop passing through all but 2 cells in every region, that enters and exits every region exactly twice. Cells unused by the loop should be shaded, and each shaded cell should have exactly 1 shaded neighbor. I had a lot of trouble finessing some parts of this to be unique near the end, which was a bit annoying given how nicely the start worked out.

puzz.link interface     penpa interface

The second puzzle I made was an Aquapelago where each region has to have exactly two unshaded components. Originally I dabbled with a fully clueless grid for this but decided a few clues would be an important addition. The first version of this puzzle was also broken, unfortunately, but I was able to fix it.

puzz.link interface      penpa interface

Finally, I knew I wanted to make a proper loop puzzle - not just a Yajilin-style mashup. So I combined Double Back with All or Nothing - solve as an All or Nothing where every region is visited either 0 or 2 times.

puzz.link interface      penpa interface

Puzzles #662 & #663 - 24HPC Loops (Nagare, All or Nothing)

I also contributed several puzzles to the Puzzlers Club rounds at the 2024 24 Hour Puzzle Championship this year. We authored two rounds, each with 24 puzzles. The first round had one puzzle themed on each Greek letter, while the second round was a double zodiac (signs and animals).

I don't remember why Psi got a Nagare puzzle. My notes apparently say it's a play on wind/pressure/Pounds per Square Inch/PSI/psi, but that's a huge stretch. Despite the size, this one is only worth 25 points, because the type is honestly pretty tame and hard to make difficult. Can't really complain too much though, as this was a struggle to make work at all honestly.

puzz.link interface

For Omega, yyao had made a pretty basic Simple Loop with a note to replace the slot in the case of a better puzzle. I thought All or Nothing would be a pretty fitting genre and had even written it down as an idea locally, so as construction was wrapping up and the round was tending a bit easier than desired, I made one to finish off the Greek round. I still have one puzzle left to share from the round, though...

puzz.link interface