...Cluebox: Shrodinger's Cat


 Gateway drugs. 

This is the one that started it all for me. 
I had bought puzzles before, a traditional Japanese box back in two-thousand-and-something, a couple of Constantins from an ace wee toy shop in Glasgow, but none of them had led me into Narnia. It was stumbling across this and ordering it online that made the advertising algorithms kick into gear. Suddenly I was seeing videos by Mr. Puzzle and Chris Ramsey, which led me to blogs more established and far better than this one. I drooled over the gallery pages of Pelikan, Wood Wonders and Cubicdissection. Eventually, I found some spare cash behind the proverbial sofa-cushions (this was mid 2020, the early days of the pandemic, and my industry was completely shut down) and put in my first CD order (for Pin Block Case). 
I'll never forget the email Eric Fuller sent along with my order confirmation. Ordinarily, I would never dream of replying to such an email, but there was something so personable, warm and inviting to it that I fired off a quick 'thank you, love your work.' He replied again, because CD's customer service was second-to-none and because he cared. 
It came with a link to the MPD Discord group, and that's when things really started to go wrong. 

Clueboxes (or their many imitators) and Hanayamas seem to be where most people start their descent into this madness, but even when you're dropping thousands on StickPoppSoundsAkuri they can still hold plenty challenge and enjoyment for experienced puzzlers. 
The steps here are by now well worn tropes. There's the combination lock, the symbol matching, the cypher de-coding. There are funky mechanical gears and sliders and moving bits. All have become more complex and detailed in future iterations. This now has an almost quaint simplicity to it


Can an idiot solve Cluebox: Shrodinger's Cat? 

Weirdly, I think I'm going to have to say no

I don't know whether you've noticed by now, in the early days/weeks of this blog, but I have laid down some criteria for what an idiot can or can't solve that are disconnected from my own success or, often, failure. My theory is that some puzzles are solved by the hands and some by the brain. 

At one extreme, you have things like dexterity challenges. Perplexus mazes are probably 90% hands, 10% brain
Some trick boxes with no external clues, most Karakuri, are solved by exploring, probing, prodding until something gives way. The brain isn't needed much, but can help. 
Disassembly burrs are mostly hands. 
Assembly burrs are mostly brain. 
Clueboxes, all escape-room-in-a-box variants, are heavily weighted to the brain, with all all the codes and symbols. 
Pencil puzzles, like sudoku, are almost 100% brain. 

Does this make sense to anyone else? 

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