Monday, 8 May 2023

bakpao

Last time I posted a puzzle, I mentioned participating in the 24HPC. I did, and it was a ton of fun! Unfortunately my results weren't great, but I at least take some pride in having managed to stay awake for the entire thing. I like to think it's all thanks to your good luck messages keeping me motivated, so thank you all!

As for today, we've got a good old baklog puzzle. Today's GAPP is Raneko! This is an old Nikoli genre, first published in Puzzle Communication 166. Its full name is Raneko Map and the original presentation uses cat faces instead of circles, with the lore being that the black clues are food bowls, containing just enough food to feed all the cats in the grid.

Rules: Divide the grid into regions of orthogonally connected cells. Each region must contain exactly one circle. A number in a circle represents how many cells are in the region the circle belongs to. Shaded cells are not part of any region, and indicate how many different regions share an edge with that cell.

Example (penpa): https://tinyurl.com/2e6um5ky (The example is a bit on the tricky side today)
Puzzle (penpa): https://tinyurl.com/2g3peu7j

Note that I've left auxiliary marking visible in the example solution. I highly recommend making use of this marking - you can place markings by dragging from one cell's center to a neighboring cell's center. Also, don't worry about accidentally drawing edges on the grid border or on the black clues - answer check will ignore them.

For a Speedy Sloth 🦥 solve in 3:30 or less!
For a Quick Crab 🦀 solve in 7:00 or less!
And all who finish get a Classy Catbird 🐦!