Puzzle board
The puzzle question is always: "can you cover all the blank squares with marker tiles?" Each tile covers two adjacent squares and cannot overlap another tile. This first board is not much of a puzzle; Please use it to get to know how this implementation of the puzzles works:
- Click or tap a blank square to add a marker tile
- Click a marker tile to rotate it
- Click the same marked square several times to rotate the tile through its valid positions and then remove it
Do please have a good go at each puzzle before going on to the next.
If after trying puzzles 1 to 6 you haven't understood then you can go on to a page that gives you a hint.
If that hint is not enough then you can ask for more clues. Those clues are given one at a time. To get each one you have to answer a question. Feel free to use your favorite search engine or other reference materials, but well done if you can get the answer without.
Trying to answer is enough to get you the question for the next clue, but getting the answer right will give you more help.
As you answer these questions please think about the stories behind them and about how you would categorize the thinking involved.
By the way, where the answer is a person, the answer is usually their surname. The answer, being a name starts with a capital letter.
If your answer is not the one I wanted then you will see a scrambled version of the answer. Try again.
Puzzle No 1
Can you cover all the blank squares with marker tiles?
As you see two squares have been blocked off leaving you to try covering the rest.
Is this any harder than the completely blank board? Why?
Puzzle No 2
Can you cover all the blank squares with marker tiles?
As you see two squares have been blocked off leaving you to try covering the rest.
Is this any harder than the completely blank board or than Puzzle No 1? Why?
Puzzle No 3
Can you cover all the blank squares with marker tiles?
Again two squares have been blocked off leaving you to try covering the rest.
Is this any harder than the previous puzzle? Why?
Puzzle No 4
Can you cover all the blank squares with marker tiles?
A different two squares have been blocked off this time. Some people find this puzzle easier to understand than No 3
How do you find this compares with puzzles 1, 2 and 3? Please explain?
Puzzle No 5
Can you cover all the blank squares with marker tiles?
There are more squares blocked off this time, but the aim is the same.
How do you find this compares with puzzles 1 to 4?
Puzzle No 6
Can you cover all the blank squares with marker tiles?
Here is another with more squares blocked off.
How do you find this compares with puzzle 5? Please explain?
If you haven't got it then try the Hint and see if that helps.
A Mathematical Hint
Can you cover all the blank squares with marker tiles?
Here, by way of a hint is a puzzle where the board has been reduced.
This puzzle has a mathematical explanation. When you have worked it out, look back at the previous puzzles and find their explanation too.
The explanations are not the same, but they involve the same sort of reasoning.