How To Ace The New York Times Hard Sudoku
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- Опубликовано: 22 авг 2024
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Hi! We're Simon Anthony and Mark Goodliffe, two of the UK's most enthusiastic puzzle solvers. We have both represented the UK at the World Sudoku Championships and the World Puzzle Championships. We're also "cryptic crossword" aficionados. Mark is the twelve-time winner of The Times championship and Simon is the former record holder for most consecutive correct solutions to The Listener crossword. We hope we can help your puzzle solving while also introducing you to some of the world's best puzzles.
Thank you for watching!
Simon and Mark
26 minutes. Normally I read comment and people are doing the puzzles in a 3rd of the time I finish. I didn’t realize how many people in my skill range are here. It’s good to see the amount of people that are benefiting from these learner videos. :)
I mean, the solve was great, but I was really blown away by the use of "Recalcitrant" at 8:26
Not a word you hear much on RUclips!!
I thought the same thing. It made me chuckle. Simon has some great words in his vocabulary.
@@ThatGuy-dj3qr That's probably their experience with cryptic crosswords
stubborn
At 10:53 I started shouting, “Wrong, wrong, wrong.” I never would have recovered from that.
You were not alone. ☺
One thing I think bears mentioning is that the trick described is actually twice as powerful as you describe it. Taking 4:10's example, the 259 triple forces the remaining 3 digits in the row (1, 3, and 4) into the empty rank in the center box. But that ALSO means that the 6, 7, and 8 in column 4 fill the remaining squares in the center box. That's enough to give you the center box's 7 without any prior information, as opposed to waiting until 10:21 to deduce it as you did.
35:36 - first solve without having to get any tips from the video, after following for a few months... o o f - may not be the fastest but that is a great feeling!
I stupidly had two 5s in the same row, but for once didn’t consult the video neither. Go us!
I know how you feel - 32 mins.
Same here, Matt!
Same here! It gives me a smile.
13:26 - Considering I completly gave up on doing anything near this difficulty 3-4 months ago when i started watching this channel, I must say I'm pleased with myself. Thanks for the fun, entertaining and educational videos.
Ah, one I could solve on my own in under 20, this is an accomplishment I will cherish for at least the next 30 seconds
Me too man! 15:28!
I have been watching this channel for almost 3 weeks now, and I was FINALLY able to solve one of these without giving up 🤦🏻♀️ Took 32 minutes, but that's HUGE, considering I normally would have given up by the end.
I had no idea about the first triple hint, so it took some weird logic, but he made it lol
39:25 was my time and I had to fight for every number in the grid! Looking forward to seeing all the beautiful logic I missed
Wow, that took me ages - 1 hour and 12 mins, but I'm delighted to do it without needing clues from the video.
Great solve! Interestingly, that particular hidden triple _is_ findable with standard notation: the 6s and 8s in row 4 and column 4 force a 68 pair into the bottom right corner of box 5, then the 7 in column 4 puts a 7 in r4c5, after which you get the 134 triple in the middle of row 4, revealing the 259 triple outside it. Probably harder than just spotting it the normal way if you're used to that approach, though!
woah, I watch your vids too. Small world.
... and after that, there is a 79 pair in box 6. Its a nice puzzle.
I'm glad this popped up. Classics are quite challenging enough for me, without puzzles with arrows and no digits.
ABSOLUTELY I did Snyder, the checked for hidden singles and was dead...as soon as I remembered your empty lane with 6 used digits I repaused you and finished in 6 mins! SPECTACULAR!
20:06 for me, the closest I've ever gotten to Simon's speed! This channel has really helped me improve!
Missed the hidden triple at the start, although it "unhid" itself after finding the 1-4 pair in the center box. Still a useful tip
Fantastic video with a lot of useful tips!
Oddly enough, I have started checking out the geometry of puzzles before I start notation, I learned that from you. I spotted that right off. A couple of others helped but didn't provide the success of the middlebox. As I was making notations, I did find a bent triple, which eliminated a 6 from a cell and I just continued through to the solution. Thanks for confirming what I did. I'm not fast, but I do much better than I ever have before. You and Mark continue to improve my playing.
Thank you.
Gene
This one took me way too long just because I kept missing hidden and naked singles, bleh.
Nice sudoku, it felt as thrilling as a game of poker with all those pairs paving the way. Also many thanks to Mark and Simon, I would never be able to solve this puzzle in 12 minutes, without watching their videos regularly.
Much fun and could not have spotted the 25/14 pairs in column 4 so easily without previous instruction from this channel. Took me 25-30 minutes not counting a long interruption that did throw me off a bit. I like these types of puzzles.
Hi. Recently discovered your channel after starting to do sudokus during the lockdown. I did this in 49 minutes using nothing fancy. I really appreciate your channel. I was pleased with my time. I will watch now to see how you did it. thanks for providing this outlet. mart.
This was super helpful, thank you! I've been working on my technique, and these videos have been very valuable. It's also helped me in my job as a programmer, so I'm going to count the time I watch these videos as on the job training. :)
24:53 My first result under 30 minutes in these videos with no hints! I've been following this channel for a week now and I'm definitely improving.
I can't believe I just did this in 35 minutes on my own. Only a month ago I would have never attempted it. This channel has taught me a lot.
Nice trick to break in! On this puzzle it wasn't strictly necessary, but makes it MUCH easier
29:37, without help. This was the first puzzle I was able to complete on this channel after following for a month or so. This channel has such difficult puzzles (for me) and I usually cave in after trying them. I'm able to follow the logic, but to do it on my own is another story. I feel like after going through the usual regimen of puzzles on this channel, this "hard" NYT sudoku was just a nice workout. :)
that trick helps so much almost everything he said about the beginning 3 would have lowered my time drastically
I'm getting better at hard sudokus thanks to this channel.
Thanks for the contribution to the community! I fallen in love solving these puzzles, and the enthusiasm I see on you makes my evenings every time. I really appreciate you guys uploading new puzzles every day!
18:54 for me before watching the video. good notation got me there! thanks to watching this channel I improved in that
Readily found the start, thanks to your tutelage. For some reason NYT releases new puzzles at 10:00pm Eastern on the previous day. Hence this puzzle will be gone today at that time. NYTs new GUI is nice on an iPad and the puzzle is no longer reset if you have to leave it for a while.
It only took me 4 years and 6 months!!!
Good puzzle nice solve another top video
Thank you so much for that triple suggestion. I was really struggling with this puzzle, but with the clue, it went fairly quickly. Again, thanks and hopefully I can remember that clue.
I actually went and did this, took a bit to get used to your program. I got really far with the Snyder notations, eventually hit a wall where I had a lot of boxes limited to two options. I tested one out and found a naked single in r3c8 that if I noticed before would have cracked it open for me without taking a guess and brute forcing my way through. Before I hit my wall my game board looked a lot like yours at 15:04 mark, but with a few more corner marks. It was a fun solve.
24:20, this type of puzzle feels easy now after doing so many of the harder variants! Fun puzzle.
this was the first time I finished a sudoku presented on this channel by myself, with no peeking at all! Took me way, wayyy longer you of course but I'm still kinda proud! :)
Originally I got stuck after 50 mins, but with the initial trick Simon mentioned I had another go and got it done in 23:51. Nice puzzle!
How to ace the NYT hard sudoku: don't mis-pencilmark. Now I know! XD
Late to the party, but I felt the same :P
47:05 on my sixth attempt! I worked it out under normal rules and this time I wasn't as exhausted from work that I normally am.
I think watching these videos has really improved my solving abilities. This one only took me just over 30 minutes with no help. I had to reread the title to make sure it said "hard sudoku" because I was rarely able to do them before!
@10:52 uhhhh I cringed there when you wrote 6 and 8 instead of 5 and 8
I was screaming at the screen.
37:31 Pretty good for a classic, for me at least. Nice puzzle
Simon, I think it would be an interesting video for you to really drive this point home whenever you do another NYT Hard puzzle with this trick in it to intentionally not "spot" this bit of logic. So, you'd start the puzzle and take it forward until you reach the point where the basic marking technique you use runs out of runway, all without using the quirk of the hidden triples that this particular puzzle algorithm loves so much. Then stop and restart the puzzle, but this time finding the hidden triple at the very start. That would very graphically show what a huge difference it makes in the solve.
Finally cracked one of these without any trouble. It did sort of help that the key triple was staring me in the face in the middle cell. I suspect if it was less clear (the blank row or column central, for instance) I might struggle. If it wasn't a NY Times one, I might not think of this first.
19:16 was my time, I got stuck for about ten mins looking for the 14 pair in row 3, after I spotted that the house of cards came tumbling down for me
I had it almost solved last night and I accidentally hit the refresh button on my phone and erased all my progress, but I am happy to say I finished it today with a lot less difficulty!
At 10:41 there is the start of a unique rectangle with three 68s, resulting in a 1 in r1c5. A curious thing I've noticed about the NYT hard is that there is almost never an x-wing spanning 4 boxes.
That opening triple makes things so much easier.
I didn't use any fancy technique, I just use simple logic and solved it. I am very proud of myself :)
It took me 40 minutes to get to where this video is at the 15 min mark, but after that I got stuck and had to check the video for help.
@cracking the cryptic, is there any chance of editing puzzles in your webapp? to recreate the puzzles in older episodes
Yay, a puzzle that only made me feel slightly stupid and inadequate. Took almost an hour and a half, but I got it. A huge improvement over yesterday's super evil one.
I solved the puzzle today on the NYT web site with some effort. Then I did it again later with your software. It was so much easier with your dual pencil marking feature! On the NYT it is hard to keep track of what pencil marks are what. Also, possibly one should abandon Snyder notation altogether with NYT? Since it depends so heavily on hidden doubles and triples one should reserve the notation to keep track of those.
First time solving a video puzzle by myself. Several interruptions and breaks, so my guesstimate is somewhere between 1 and 2 hours. Not a quick solve, but a successful one. :)
Enormously helpful.
Webapp didn't work for me just now, wrote the thing out on paper.
Didn't watch any hints, but I overlooked the crucial "New York Times" step on paper while immediately spotting it in the video.
Probably because the grid looks cleaner in your app. It also takes way less time to fill in digits and pencilmarks.
So I can confidently say that your Sudoku Webapp is a major quality-of-life improvement over pen and pencil. And you haven't even hit perfection yet: With automatic pencilmark removal, number highlighting, and (hopefully) the ability to enter our own grids, the app wouldn't just be better than most alternatives, it would be _unbeatable._
I really need to stress the hidden triple the beginning because it has an associative property that you don't utilize. In this puzzle, the numbers 2, 5, and 9 cannot go into rows 4, 5, and 6 in column 4, but you miss the fact that in the center 3x3 block, numbers 6, 7, and 8 are FORCED into a hidden triple as well - into row 4, column 5, and row 6, columns 5 and 6.
As you say, these are both things one can spot without ANY filling in of the puzzle whatsoever, and should be done FIRST.
I hope this makes sense, because I always employ the "block" version of hidden triples, while you tend to lean towards the column or row version.
12:40, but I will admit I listened to the remind of the '3 numbers in a box' (and just the reminder part) to help me kickstart the puzzle. :) Still a nice one!
I have a suggestion for your web app. Control clicking on a cell to add to the selection does not work correctly on a Mac since Control-click is a synonym for right-click. Perhaps you could add shift-click as another way to add to a selection?
Aargh. I screwed up somewhere along the way, _twice_ . I finally solved it in 22m on the third try, but it took about 90 overall.
Rediscovered this one, and failed to notice I'd done it before. That's what happens when you follow recommendation links.
This time I solved it easily in 16:43, and I think this is the first time I've ever completed a puzzle in a shorter time than the video. Of course, half the video was Simon explaining technique, but I'm happy knowing I've improved a bit.
I actually didn't notice the 259 triple based on the center box. I ended up getting it based on the 68 pair in row 6 that's available at the start. That pair means a 7 is forced into r4c5, which then forces a 3 into r4c4, which reveals a 14 pair to finish the box. That leaves a 259 triple on column 4 (and r2 is resolved)
Finally the explanation for the NYT bent triples sank in. Thank you!
26 minutes flat. Felt really good about solving it
I want to thank you. Your strategies have taken my logical abilities to a higher level. I was good before watching your videos but I would say I'm a very good solver now because of what you have taught me. Really I'm extremely appreciative of your videos and I want to thank you. One thing I would like for you to show me is how to create a sudoku puzzle.
Managed to solve in 4:45
Simple enough classic sudoku, I don't even think the initial trick with the 2/5/9 was even absolutely necessary; I managed to solve this one just using the 1/4 and 6/8 hidden pairs.
30:23 including nap. Fairly straightforward once i woke up a little.
how did he know that i almost exclusively do these puzzles in the office when the boss isn't looking lol
Right at the start the six seven eight in column four match the same numbers in the middle left square. It forces a six eight pair, forcing a seven in the top middle of the centre square.
He's seen it.
52:50. I kept missing obvious things.
Then I ran it through Andrew Stuart's solver, which finished it off without any fancy techniques, so I feel even worse about all that I missed.
10:40; I didn't find this one very difficult. Classic Sudoku seems to be the only variant I am fast at.
15:39 i lacked that logic during solving and because of that it took me 1m longer than it should :/ im gonna have to look around for that next time as well :D
26:20! i'm not disappointed, it only took me a longer moment to spot that single 1 in box 3
23:59, hit the same snag.
1:16:01 including cooking and eating breakfast and coffee and visiting the lavatory.
Sub 1:00:00 soon!
26:31 - Wow, I got stuck at a dumb spot. When I finally figured out what I was doing, I was so mad at myself.
I also got stuck in a silly way. For me it was not seeing that i could resolve the 2 in row 1, once I saw it (thanks to Simon) I completed it relatively easily (for me as a total newbie to Soduko).
23:26 I thought I had it way earlier, and I was just going to finish up about 10 minutes earlier, and then it just didn't yield the way I expected it to
Needed so many hints, and took 1:20:00 but still, first ever hard sudoku solve, so, still something... 😅
Weird thing is, I do all 3 nyt puzzles every day, I start with a warm-up easy usually finished in 4-6 minutes, follow with the medium usually finished between 16 and 30 minutes an then the hard, which i almost always finish quicker then the medium, in other words, i find the hard one easier than the medium - usually.
The first thing I saw was the 259 hidden triple in column 4 given by the 2 5 and 9 in box 5. Then I saw r2c4 saw 5 and 2 making it a 9
22:21. Very proud of that time. Now to watch the video.
Should have been a 22 min solve for me, got stuck until I found a naked single at the end. Unfortunately made a mistake somewhere in the solve. 😭
I was stuck for 5 minutes, before finding that naked single at 15:02, but after that an easy finish
31:10 the ending part was quite tricky but it was beautiful
20:04, definitely some room for improvement but I'm proud of my time.
18:42 for me, watching CTC all the time is finally paying off!
very easy if you know box\line reduction with empty lines; 25 minutes whereas generally it takes 40-60
Did it in 29:44, slowly getting better...
30:58 for me, NYT sudoku are a lot harder when you can't click a button to find all the naked/hidden singles lol
23:38 without any help, I'm a beginner, so I am happy
So I am pretty new to this channel. I have about 50/50 success with the NYT Medium puzzles and about 10% completion rate with the Hard puzzles. So I was interested when I saw this video about the NYT puzzles especially. Watching about 2:30 seconds in where he is describing the trick. So I'm still confused as to how it was determined which exposed side to look at to use for the column. Why wasn't he able to use the 1st 3x3 block from row 4, 5, 6 ? How was it determined to use the 2nd 3X3 block in row 4,5,6 to fill out the numbers in column 4?
Came back to visit and see how I've improved- A clean 10:23 !
12.03 ! great puzzle
18:36 Fairly stoked!
Sorry to ignore your lessons, although they are excellent and clever. But I do enjoy tackling a NY Times puzzle slowly, without using pencil marks. 35 minutes of fun.
I tried this right after trying an Evil sudoku from puzzles-sudoku, so it seemed easy by comparison even though I still spent 27min on it, haha
Found the singles and some doubles. Got it done in 17:06
@11:12 can we not use uniqueness with cells r1c6, r1c5, r6c5, r6r6 and get 1 in r1c5? but then again Simon doesn't like uniqueness??
This took me 50 minutes because I didn't notice the eventual naked single in Box 3 Cell 8.
A computer generates a puzzle with a proclivity? Hmm... so an algorithm can provide clues to identify the programmer... hmm. I do believe I feel the faint stirrings of the plot for detective story.
I'm normally able to get the NYT Hard puzzle given your coaching (but not as fast as you). However, I'm stuck on the Feb 25, 2022 puzzle - I've solved it (cheating), reset it 3 times to try and find the logic, and still can't spot the trick. Have you all tried it? I took a screenshot if useful but not sure how to post it.
1:04 not to bad for a beginner!