CONTROLS (All New & Improved even more!) - Click a piece & drag it where you want it to go. The goal is to get the square piece (the king) to the centre of the other four pieces. Can YOU solve it? NEW FEATURE: The [Replay Solve] button appears after a successful solve, and will replay your solve. (Cloud List) shows a list of those who solved it in 43. NOTE: Yes, it is Solvable! Please post any good scores you get in the comments. The least moves solution is 43, which has been proven to be minimal.
Thanks greatly to @nyankatpro for his original code and for making this deceptively simple but surprisingly difficult to solve Puzzle project. Thanks also to @heldlaw for drawing my attention to it. And special thanks to @Legomariobros who unknowingly gave me the idea (from his Solitaire puzzle in his Puzzle Cabinet project) for much more intuitive Controls. But thanks to @donotforgetmycode who took that idea to another level (via a remix) to make the pieces fully draggable & gave me permission to use it here. I originally remixed it because despite solving it twice, I couldn't remember how I did it, so I changed the code to record my moves in a list, so the next time I solved it, I'd at least be able to see how & reproduce it. I also kept a count of the number of moves and added code to detect any valid solution. But then I noticed than someone requested on @nyankatpro's original project, some on screen controls, and since @nyankatpro seemed to be inactive on Scratch, I thought I may as well add some on-screen controls and share it. I had to make significant changes to the original code to support the on-screen controls and record the moves. Then I added a few sound effects and a couple of simple Cloud variables. However I decided the list for recording moves, wasn't particularly useful by itself, so I split it into 2 new lists, and used them to support the cool new Replay Solve feature. Then I decided to make my own costumes for the Shapes. Finally, because of feedback I received complaining about the non-intuitive nature of the Controls, I completely changed them, removing all keys (on or off screen)! Although I was pretty happy with my new Controls, @donotforgetmycode showed me how it make them more intuitive & easy to use. For the record @colinmacc, @heldlaw and @papipupepappa have now all solved it in 43 moves, but @colinmacc was the first to do so. This is the least moves in which the puzzle can be solved. My first solution, which is a little different to @colinmacc's took me 52 moves (then 51 but actually I can now do that one in 45 moves, it has a different first few moves to the 43 move solution). However I too have now finally worked out how to do the 43 move solution too! Turns out the 45 move solution is just a reflection of the 43 move one, with 2 extra moves at the start to move the square piece to the top instead of the bottom. All who've managed to solve it in the minimum of 43 moves can be seen via the (Cloud List) button. @Geotale wrote code to generate all possible solutions, and this confirmed the widely held belief amongst Scratchers who had solved it, that 43 is definitely the least possible moves to solve it in.
