Wednesday, 24 August 2022

Freddie Hand

Congratulations to @Shogia, @scor, @Lesewesen, @Engy, @Karen Carpenter, @Kittiphon, and @AloneZeether for correctly guessing today's genre! Here are your otters - 🦦 🦦🦦🦦🦦🦦🦦. Come back tomorrow for another chance to win an otter!

By the way, you can now request otters from YAGPAO! Simply type "one otter please" and you will immediately be awarded with a seafaring mustelid.

Today's puzzle is one of Eric's newest genre inventions, whose portfolio now stands at an impressive 16 genres! Today's puzzle is someone who likes 0's and x's a Xerophile!

🚨WARNING🚨 Today's puzzle has a negative constraint!

Rules: Shade some cells to form a non-intersecting loop (i.e a 'snake' whose head and tail are the same) which does not touch itself orthogonally (but may touch itself diagonally). Every cell which is orthogonally adjacent to exactly one shaded cell is marked with a circle, i.e if a cell is not marked with a circle, it is not orthogonally adjacent to exactly one shaded cell.

Important hint: Note that every cell in the loop is adjacent to exactly two shaded cells. As a consequence, circles cannot be shaded.

Penpa Corner - you can check what the answer checkers looks for by clicking on "Solver Mode (Answer Checking Enabled) at the top left! For today's puzzle, only shading will be checked.

Example, by Eric Fox, the inventor of the genre (Penpa+): https://tinyurl.com/2ogv726o

Acquire a Speedy Sloth 🦥 by solving the puzzle in 3:30 or less!
Obtain a Quick Crab 🦀 by solving the puzzle in 7:30 or less!
And all solvers who complete the puzzle will be rewarded with a Xerophilic Xavier's Greenbul 🐦

Puzzle (Penpa+): https://tinyurl.com/2q95z7qj