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 #614 - #617 - Dexter's Island (Aquapelago)

Before WPC 2023, I ran a Puzzle Getchu!, a contest themed on Ape Escape. I had intended to queue these puzzles for posting before WPC, but didn't have the time. Better late than never!

The ninth level in the game is Dexter's Island. I went with Aquapelago over something like Nurikabe (Islands in the Stream) or Shimaguni (Islands) or any other island themed puzzle, partly because I liked the rules, and partly because I wanted to highlight some lesser known types and this creation by Walker Anderson needed a spotlight (I made these before a puzzlink implementation!). As an added bonus, this would let me theme the puzzle in an extra way, by cluing an 11x11 with only 6 clues, for 6/11: the exact requirement.

But first, a simple example.

puzz.link interface

The contest puzzle I went with was the hardest of my three options, considering I also thought it was by far the best. It ended up being worth 15 points, which I think is very fair given how the start of the puzzle plays out.

puzz.link interface

My first other candidate is a fine puzzle, but it lacked anything really special in the layout or theming that made me want to use it. Still, it was good practice and gave me a bit more familiarity with the genre.

puzz.link interface

At some point afterwards, I stumbled into a legit opening deduction that I tried using in a 6 clue puzzle. It was never nice to resolve the rest, unfortunately, so I added a 7th clue in the middle and made it an 11. But that requires counting to 11, which is a pain, so I didn't really want to use this puzzle, either. Another good puzzle, but just not what I was looking for for the contest.

puzz.link interface