Bram's Square by OSKAR and BRAM

Oskar · **Joined:** Mon Nov 30, 2009 1:03 pm

Hi Twisty Puzzles fans,

Bram's Square is an idea by Bram Cohen. Take a 3x4 rectangle of which each of the 3x3 sub-squares can be rotated. Well, actually, Bram wanted a 5x6 rectangle, but even a 3x4 would already be extremely difficult to solve. The movement is slide-turn-slide-slide, repeat ...

Watch the YouTube video.
Buy the puzzle from my Shapeways Shop.
Read more at the Shapeways Forum.
Check out the photos below.

Enjoy!

Oskar

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Luke · **Posted:** Sat Oct 23, 2010 6:45 am

Awesome! I've been wanting to see this for a while, even if it's not a 'twisty' twisty puzzle.

gabrielmpf · **Posted:** Sat Oct 23, 2010 6:36 pm

Now that's something new! I love it

Clearly there's a potential to build other sizes. I would like to see the 5x6 rectangle, although I believe that would be a daunting task to solve.
Congratulations on both of you for this great idea.

Kapusta · **Posted:** Sat Oct 23, 2010 6:39 pm

Very nice!

Katniss · **Joined:** Wed Feb 17, 2010 7:33 pm

SEBUVER wrote:

Awesome! I've been wanting to see this for a while, even if it's not a 'twisty' twisty puzzle.

Well that clears it up.

gingervergo · **Joined:** Fri Mar 06, 2009 9:23 pm

Great puzzle as always. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that this puzzle is an incredible challenge to solve.

APJ · **Joined:** Sat Jul 11, 2009 1:09 pm **Location:** My House

gingervergo wrote:

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that this puzzle is an incredible challenge to solve.

It certainly looks it.

I like this even though I normally don't like flat slidy puzzles.

Alex

rakaCN · **Posted:** Sun Oct 24, 2010 8:16 am

Too interesting and nice! I like it
I think if here can move would be better

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KelvinS · **Joined:** Mon Mar 30, 2009 5:13 pm

Very interesting. How long before you design a 3D version? (and don't tell me you haven't already started thinking about this, because I wouldn't believe you! :lol:

)

Bram · **Posted:** Sun Oct 24, 2010 11:07 am

Kelvin Stott wrote:

Very interesting. How long before you design a 3D version?

A 3d version would have the first plunge be able to rotate about a central axis, or plunge far enough to do a second plunge, which would allow rotation about a different axis. And yes, I first thought about that years ago :-P

It's actually easier to solve than the 2d one.

The main notable thing about this puzzle is how ridiculously hard it is, hence my suggestion of making it be a 5x6, because if you're going to be impossibly difficult, might as well go for it.

Making it 3xN for N > 4 makes the puzzle surprisingly similar to Rubik's Cube, because you can use sequences which only affect F and U on two squares which have an overlap of one column. The interesting sequence for flipping a center on the supergroup of F and U is left as an exercise to the reader.

Derek Bosch · **Posted:** Sun Oct 24, 2010 11:57 am

Bram wrote:

[The main notable thing about this puzzle is how ridiculously hard it is, ... , because if you're going to be impossibly difficult, might as well go for it.

words to live by!

Derek

ulmboy556 · **Joined:** Wed Apr 08, 2009 7:46 pm **Location:** PA, USA

Kelvin Stott wrote:

Very interesting. How long before you design a 3D version? (and don't tell me you haven't already started thinking about this, because I wouldn't believe you! :lol:

)

wouldn't that essentially be a sliding babyface cube? still very cool and could be a fairly simple addition to a normal babyface

Bram · **Posted:** Sun Oct 24, 2010 3:13 pm

ulmboy556 wrote:

Kelvin Stott wrote:

Very interesting. How long before you design a 3D version? (and don't tell me you haven't already started thinking about this, because I wouldn't believe you! :lol:

)

wouldn't that essentially be a sliding babyface cube? still very cool and could be a fairly simple addition to a normal babyface

No. A 3d equivalent would be a 2x2x3 where each 2x2x2 could be reoriented across the 24 orientations of a cube.

Bram · **Posted:** Sun Oct 24, 2010 3:14 pm

By the way, as an example of how out of control my backlog is, this was one of the first original mechanism ideas I had, back in 2004!

Bram's Square by OSKAR and BRAM

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