The Basic Tips For Hard Sudokus

You can try today's elegant puzzle (from New Zealand) here:

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▶ABOUT US◀
Hi! We're Simon Anthony and Mark Goodliffe, two of the UK's most enthusiastic puzzle solvers. We have both represented the UK at the World Sudoku Championships and the World Puzzle Championships. We're also "cryptic crossword" aficionados. Mark is the eleven-time winner of The Times championship and Simon is the former record holder for most consecutive correct solutions to The Listener crossword. We hope we can help your puzzle solving while also introducing you to some of the world's best puzzles.

Thank you for watching!
Simon and Mark

[mccloysong]

I'm always so impressed with your logic. Your ability to wiggle out of spots where I reach a dead end is inspiring.

[lakarto]

Managed to solve in 10:28 // Used both of the uniqueness tricks mentioned in the video, but the trick with the 1's was very elegant, and basically what opened up the puzzle. Thank you for another nice video!

[grenvillephillips]

These videos are great for offering much-needed encouragement when I've managed to fail on hard puzzles three times in a row.

[arimyllyniemi]

The sound is now more full and 'human and comfortable' than before. Thank You for the lessons and improvements and greetings from Finland !

[shahinulkhan]

Loved watching this.

Can you guys do a few more of these short hard puzzles as a little bonus maybe once a week in addition to the fabulous variant Sudoku’s that you do.

[lvjoe]

This video is a must watch for somebody going from intermediate level to advanced

[iam]

I did it! First one of these I've been able to solve. Took me an hour.

[ValeriePallaoro]

This is excellent (looks down at other commenters *vigorously nods agreement*) so many tips. Much help. Many thanks.

[infphreak]

Solved it in 13m25s with pretty much the same start as Simon using that x-wing on 1s. Though I did manage to fill in the 3 in the middle right box as a naked single right away (not that it really helped much initially).

[xykontyrox]

16:13 for me, I think I'm getting better already, thanks to this channel

[brendabalzan]

After 2 days of trying, doing half, doing stuff wrong, I restarted it this morning with a fresh mind, and determination to finish it. Finished in 18 min but already knew the 9s had fixed places and some numbers had certain logics. So I think, if I hadn't been trying the past 2 days, I would have probably took 2 hours.

[piantedbirds]

The microphone had way more background noise than usual, so I liked the other one better..
Nice little puzzle though!

[paintingwithnoise]

first time I completed one of these completely on my own! Took just under 12 minutes. I saw that x-wing with the 1s pretty quickly. The rest was just a lot of re-evaluating columns and rows.

[Smileyyn]

Still some echo-y bits but without proper sound isolation such as acoustic plates or something like that, I think this is nearly as good as it can get! And saying this, I think it sounds great!

[scottaberc]

Your sound is usually fine to me but Mark's always sounds like he's recording in a tiled bathroom.

[topilinkala]

Did this also with no uniqueness problems. Didn't even saw them as there were other ways to solve this. But I must say that when I spot one I always use it right away because why not when not making videos.

[wrathfeeling]

Thanks, this time I could see no error. Yes it can be useful to stick to 2 pencil markings of numbers. Instead of all possibilities, and clutter the box.
I go and look around when I can find a tutorial of the various methods to solve the sudoku on your channel :)

[danybanana]

Solved in 31:35! Though I know I can do better after watching how you did it, lol. At one point I think I used a finned x-wing, despite not really knowing how they work

[Tahgtahv]

Mic is way worse. I never noticed anything wrong with the old one.

[LarLakFarStrider]

A suggestion for the channel, weekly puzzle recommendations that you don't solve on the channel? Or possibly release a puzzle in the description and then later that week have the solve to help people identify where they are having issues with difficult puzzles? It would boost community interaction for the channel. Just a suggestion if you and Mark are still looking for them!