Snakes in a Cage
(Published on 25. February 2023, 02:06 by brennan77)
Normal Sudoku rules apply.
Construct a snake of orthogonally connected cells that doesn't touch itself (even diagonally), the head of which is at the given 1, and that visits every box exactly once. Also, for any given box, the number of snake cells in that box tells you how many boxes have the same number of snake cells, e.g. if box 5 has 2 snake cells, then exactly 2 boxes have exactly 2 snake cells each. All of the snake cells in a box form a single cage with no non-snake cells.
Every cell in the grid belongs to a killer cage; cages must be discovered by the solver. Digits in cages must sum to the number in the clue, if given. The cage clue is in the left-most, highest cell of that cage. All cage-clue locations are given.
Digits separated by a white dot are consecutive. Not all dots are given.
CTC: https://tinyurl.com/33pvee2e
Solution code: Row 7
Comments
on 13. May 2024, 12:58 by QuiltyAsCharged
Wow! This is truly excellent, and a hidden gem that it seems few solvers have discovered. And it's a more approachable puzzle than it first appears.
I found the rules to be clear, but here are a couple important points if anyone is confused. One, the cage total always appears in the leftmost cell of the topmost row of the cage. Two, cages can extend across box boundaries, except for those cages which are part of the snake. The snake is comprised of nine cages, with one cage in each box.
Updated link with embedded solution: https://sudokupad.app/4d7w7dw23x
on 25. May 2023, 13:47 by Paquet Voleur
For more than a week now I was stuck with no idea on where to go next. Then came Code Wizard who hinted in their comment that perhaps rules would be worth a revisit to see if I had missed something... And indeed!! Thanks Brennan for this beautiful puzzle! And thanks Code Wizard to make me see through it!
on 24. May 2023, 16:12 by codewizard
Lovely puzzle. I thought it quite hard though. Perhaps mostly because I didn't want to commit a certain interpretation of the rules, regarding how the snake and cages worked (like if the cage could "escape" the snake at a box boundary). In the end there is probably only one reasonable rule :)
on 6. April 2023, 01:03 by mishaaku
Can I have some clarity on "left-most, highest cell" of the cage? Does one of these take priority? Or is either highest left or left-most highest allowed?
Brennan: normal cage clue placement, i.e., the left most cage cell in the highest row the cage reaches.
on 5. March 2023, 01:55 by syyyth
This was super approachable but not too easy! Thought I was gonna get stuck a few times but I had just forgotten some killer cage logic lol. Great puzzle, I enjoyed it!
on 25. February 2023, 16:37 by Al Fresco
Lovely puzzle and quite approachable for a cageless killer. Thank you
on 25. February 2023, 02:06 by brennan77
Set difficulty
