A Minima That Is Anything But Minimalistic

Minima Texas by Frederic Boucher

It has been a little while since I played with any of Tye Stahly's Minima creations designed by the incredible Frederic Boucher and subsequently additions to the series by a bunch of other amazing designers. I reviewed the first 6 in the original series of 12 way back here and loved them but had to move on to something else for variety and also because I have got quite badly stuck on solving Minima number 8. For some reason I have a bit of a mental block about it - I've been trying, on and off, for many weeks and keep having to put it down.

Mrs S needed to refill the paper tray of the printer in my shithole of a study and had to move a rather embarrassingly large number of unsolved puzzles to get at it and that included a bunch of the latest Minima puzzles that were released after the IPP in Texas last year. In a fit of pique she left them on and in front of my computer keyboard in the hope of shaming me into tidying up. Well, that didn't work! 😈

All that it did was motivate me to play with a few of them and put the rest back where she plucked them from. I'll tidy up when (if) I'm good and ready!!! Whack! Ouch! Ok I’ll do it soon, sorry dear. 😇

What I couldn't resist was the Minima Texas produced by Steve Smith as an exchange gift at the IPP and distributed by Tye until the stock ran out. I, of course, couldn't resist it at all. It wasn't a cheap one but in retrospect was well worth the money. 

The instructions are to retrieve a barrel of oil, find the puzzle number and then reset it all. Poking and prodding in the delivery position reveals that nothing can move at all and the only option is to unscrew the bolt from the back of the puzzle. After this, some movement is possible but there's something rather odd about that movement. You can't see enough of what's going on to tell why, all you know is that it's odd. I undid that move and redid it several times before getting a vague understanding of what was wrong with it and that gave a rather big indication that some weird stuff might be needed later. Time to move on and see what is possible after the first movement. Initially nothing is possible. It turned out that the tolerances are rather fine and every move needs to be done just right and all the way to the end to make space for the next one. Once realised, a rather pleasant sequence of 3 moves makes lots of space inside and a hint of the puzzle number comes out a well as the reason for the first move oddity. 

I guess that’s my number? Out are there more digits to come?

At this point, realising that all the pieces are L shaped triominos, it becomes impossible to go any further. Thinking that some weird and wonderful rotation might be needed, I tried lots of shaking, gravity tricks, poking with fingers and with the bolt all with no success. Time to think©. Having some experience with Frederic's previous designs I eventually decided to try something improbable and, of course, it worked perfectly. Steve had put it all together beautifully disguised and only logical thought (plus some desperation) made it possible. I had now opened up more possibilities. My fancy move had altered things inside and made other stuff possible and the first thing that occurred to me was to go back to the beginning after that change. Maybe something entirely new was possible from the beginning? Erm.....nope!

Luckily I had a decent muscle memory of the path I had followed and backtracked to the point where I'd made my fancy move and again needed to think©! Looking at it for a bit, by sheer chance, I made a move that revealed something special which led to my puzzle number being fully revealed. That's great, but where is my barrel of oil? There's no sign of it so far and I thought I'd run out of options. There's a lot more space inside now and whilst exploring it I felt something land in my lap. Ooh! A metal cylinder. Hooray, this must be my barrel of oil - I fully congratulated myself for being a genius and took my photo of puzzle with number and oil. 

Is this my barrel of oil? It’s sort of the right shape but…
Something’s not right

At this point I had a little panic because I really had no idea where my “mini barrel” had come from. A quick fiddle about showed me that there had been a hidden hole which had lined up with an external hole and it had fallen out. I put it all back together thinking I had joined the ranks of Derek, Juno, Big Steve, Volker et al but something was nagging at me as not quite right. Surely Frederic would have made the oil barrel a bit more obvious? Time to look again...

Back to the place where I found my "false barrel" and look for more clues. There seemed to be a potential move that looked very inviting and I tried to make it happen for absolutely ages. It wouldn't go and even now I can't say why - something unseen was blocking it. More desperation led me to look elsewhere and right in front of me was something new. I've no idea how I missed it but there it was looking at me. It wasn't accessible to fingers but I realised that there was a hole in the box that hasn't been used before and it invited me to poke the bolt in - off course, this did absolutely nothing at all. I then tried something daring and discovered that it was a one-way dare. Gulp, had I been really stupid?

AHA!!!

Now I'd had to combine two things I'd found and finally I had my real barrel - photo fully taken, and the reset was not too much trouble. This was most likely because I'd spent so much time hunting for correct moves and backtracking so often. 

Now I knew I’d found the oil barrel

This puzzle is yet another example of the genius of Frederic. How did he get so much puzzling in such a small space? It's not impossibly tough to solve. It's just right for a nice morning of play and is beautifully clever as I’d expect from Frederic. 

It's not for sale in any of the stores, unfortunately, presumably as a deal for Steve's exchange puzzle. If you see it on any auction sites then just get it - straight away - just buy the damn thing. You won't regret it!

Thank you Tye for the opportunity to get this it is fabulous