Lux Forums

Sylocat · Posted: Tue Jun 19, 2007 6:35 pm Post subject: Where are the Cows?

I owe a lot to Robert Abbott.

He is a puzzle master who makes "Logic Mazes," a fancy way of saying "mazes with rules." He made "The Traffic Maze at Floyd's Knob," upon which I based my map (yes, that puzzle is in the public domain, don't worry dustin), and it was his website that pointed me toward Sam Loyd's number maze, "Back from the Klondike," on which I based my most recent map.

In 1966 in Scientific American magazine, he published a logic maze that has been called the hardest logic maze of all time, which he gave the rather bizarre title, "Where are the Cows?"

I have reproduced it in photoshop (I think I got it right) here...

I can't make a Lux map based on this maze since the routes change as you go, but that doesn't mean you can't play online. A man named Luc St-Louis has made a little online game of it at this site, where the markers are highlights and the boxes are called "cells." It keeps track of the rule change in box 60, and everything. It looks a little different but it's an exact reproduction.

I just heard about it a few days ago, and I still haven't managed to solve it. Can you?

Sylocat · Posted: Thu Jul 05, 2007 12:43 pm Post subject:

And YEA!!!

I finally solved it! Very Happy

Mach · Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2007 2:12 pm Post subject:

Erm...mind giving me a hint?

I'm pretty sure that the way to end up in the goal is somehow having one marker on 50 and having the rule change on since I couldn't find a way to either have both markers on box 50 or have one marker on box 50, 1 marker on box 61, and have the rule change off.

Have I missed something?

Sylocat · Posted: Fri Jul 06, 2007 2:53 pm Post subject:

It's not easy... I'll PM you a hint if you like.