Toddler Tilt (MIT Mystery Hunt 2020)
| Toddler Tilt | |
|---|---|
| MIT Mystery Hunt 2020 | |
| Storybook Forest | |
| Author(s) | Yar Woo, Todd Etter, Asher Walkover |
| Answer | Click to revealALEUROMANCY |
| Statistics | |
| No. solves | 78 |
| No. total guesses | 229 |
| Links | |
| Puzzle | Link |
| Solution | Link |
Toddler Tilt is an interactive logic puzzle from the Storybook Forest round of the 2020 MIT Mystery Hunt.
Solve Path[edit | edit source]
Puzzle Elements[edit | edit source]
Explicit Instructions - Due to "liability reasons", the rules to the puzzle are given explicitly:
- The puzzle operates on an 8x8 "platform" and four 2x8 "trenches", one on each side.
- Each move consists of "tilting" a single row of the platform left/right or a single column of the platform up/down.
- A tilt in a direction X moves the X-most letter in that row/column of the platform into the X-most open position in that row/column of the corresponding trench, then moves the other letters in that row/column of the platform X-wards as far as they can go without exiting the platform.
- The sequence of letters moved into the trench after each tilt is given.
- The platform state after tilts 10 and 19 are given.
Interactive - The puzzle itself is presented in interactive form, where the solver can click a button along the edge to simulate a tilt along that row/column. The applet also allows the solver to undo tilts and keeps track of which letter is the next to fall into the trench.
Typography - Part of the puzzle relies on the font containing letterforms with ambiguous orientations:
- O can fall into any trough, as can SPACE.
- S is two-fold rotationally symmetric.
- The same letterform can represent E, M, or W depending on rotation.
- The same letterform can represent C, N, or U depending on rotation.
- While H doesn't appear in this puzzle, I and H would share a letterform and also have two-fold rotational symmetry.
- The remaining letters (A, B, D, F, G, K, P, R, T, Y) have a unique orientation.
Deduction - Using these rules, you must deduce the final state of the Toddler Tilt Puzzle. This reveals...
Final Clue Phrase - ...four final clue phrases, which must all be answered...
Rebus - ...and then concatenated for the final answer.
