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The Rubik's Cube is the original and best known of the three-dimensional sequential move puzzles. There have been many virtual implementations of this puzzle in software. It is a natural extension to create sequential move puzzles in more than three dimensions. Although no such puzzle could ever be physically constructed, the rules of how they operate are quite rigorously defined mathematically and are analogous to the rules found in three-dimensional geometry. Hence, they can be simulated by software. As with the mechanical sequential move puzzles, there are records for solvers, although not yet the same degree of competitive organisation.
For comparison purposes, the data relating to the standard 33 Rubik's cube is as follows;
Piece count | |||
Number of vertices (V) | 8 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 8 |
Number of edges (E) | 12 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 12 |
Number of faces (F) | 6 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 6 |
Number of cells (C) | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 1 |
Number of coloured pieces (P) | 26 | ||
Number of stickers | 54 |
Number of achievable combinations
There is some debate over whether the face-centre cubies should be counted as separate pieces as they cannot be moved relative to each other. A different number of pieces may be given in different sources. In this article the face-centre cubies are counted as this makes the arithmetical sequences more consistent and they can certainly be rotated, a solution of which requires algorithms. However, the cubie right in the middle is not counted because it has no visible stickers and hence requires no solution. Arithmetically we should have
But P is always one short of this (or the n-dimensional extension of this formula) in the figures given in this article because C (or the corresponding highest-dimension polytope, for higher dimensions) is not being counted.
The Superliminal MagicCube4D software implements many twisty puzzle versions of 4D polytopes including N4 cubes. The UI allows for 4D twists and rotations plus control of 4D viewing parameters such as the projection into 3D, cubie size and spacing, and sticker size.
Superliminal Software maintains a Hall of Fame for record breaking solvers of this puzzle.
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 16 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 16 |
Number of edges | 32 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 32 |
Number of faces | 24 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 24 |
Number of cells | 8 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 8 |
Number of 4-cubes | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 1 |
Number of coloured pieces | 80 | ||
Number of stickers | 216 |
Achievable combinations: [2]
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 16 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 16 |
Number of edges | 32 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 0 |
Number of faces | 24 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 0 |
Number of cells | 8 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 0 |
Number of 4-cubes | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 0 |
Number of coloured pieces | 16 | ||
Number of stickers | 64 |
Achievable combinations: [2]
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 16 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 16 |
Number of edges | 32 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 64 |
Number of faces | 24 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 96 |
Number of cells | 8 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 64 |
Number of 4-cubes | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 16 |
Number of coloured pieces | 240 | ||
Number of stickers | 512 |
Achievable combinations: [2]
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 16 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 16 |
Number of edges | 32 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 96 |
Number of faces | 24 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 216 |
Number of cells | 8 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 216 |
Number of 4-cubes | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 81 |
Number of coloured pieces | 544 | ||
Number of stickers | 1000 |
Achievable combinations: [2]
Magic Cube 5D by Roice Nelson is capable of rendering 5-cube puzzles in six sizes from 25 to 75. Allows 5D twists and controls for rotating the cube in multiple dimensions, 4-D and 5-D perspective controls, cubie and sticker spacing and size controls, similar to Magiccube4D.
However, a 5-D puzzle is much more difficult to comprehend than a 4-D puzzle. An essential feature of the Roice's implementation is the ability to turn off or highlight chosen cubies and stickers. Even so, the complexities of the images produced are still quite severe, as can be seen from the screenshots.
Roice maintains a Hall of Insanity for record breaking solvers of this puzzle. As of 6 January 2011, there have been two successful solutions for the 75 size of 5-cube. [3]
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 32 | Number of 5-colour pieces | 32 |
Number of edges | 80 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 80 |
Number of faces | 80 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 80 |
Number of cells | 40 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 40 |
Number of 4-cubes | 10 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 10 |
Number of 5-cubes | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 1 |
Number of coloured pieces | 242 | ||
Number of stickers | 810 |
Achievable combinations: [4]
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 32 | Number of 5-colour pieces | 32 |
Number of edges | 80 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 0 |
Number of faces | 80 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 0 |
Number of cells | 40 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 0 |
Number of 4-cubes | 10 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 0 |
Number of 5-cubes | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 0 |
Number of coloured pieces | 32 | ||
Number of stickers | 160 |
Achievable combinations: [4]
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 32 | Number of 5-colour pieces | 32 |
Number of edges | 80 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 160 |
Number of faces | 80 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 320 |
Number of cells | 40 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 320 |
Number of 4-cubes | 10 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 160 |
Number of 5-cubes | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 32 |
Number of coloured pieces | 992 | ||
Number of stickers | 2,560 |
Achievable combinations: [4]
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 32 | Number of 5-colour pieces | 32 |
Number of edges | 80 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 240 |
Number of faces | 80 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 720 |
Number of cells | 40 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 1,080 |
Number of 4-cubes | 10 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 810 |
Number of 5-cubes | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 243 |
Number of coloured pieces | 2,882 | ||
Number of stickers | 6,250 |
Achievable combinations: [4]
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 32 | Number of 5-colour pieces | 32 |
Number of edges | 80 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 320 |
Number of faces | 80 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 1,280 |
Number of cells | 40 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 2,560 |
Number of 4-cubes | 10 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 2,560 |
Number of 5-cubes | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 1,024 |
Number of coloured pieces | 6,752 | ||
Number of stickers | 12,960 |
Achievable combinations: [4]
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 32 | Number of 5-colour pieces | 32 |
Number of edges | 80 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 400 |
Number of faces | 80 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 2,000 |
Number of cells | 40 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 5,000 |
Number of 4-cubes | 10 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 6,250 |
Number of 5-cubes | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 3,125 |
Number of coloured pieces | 13,682 | ||
Number of stickers | 24,010 |
Achievable combinations: [4]
Andrey Astrelin's Magic Cube 7D software is capable of rendering puzzles of up to 7 dimensions in twelve sizes from 34 to 57.
As of November 2023, in terms of puzzles exclusive to Magic Cube 7D, only the 36, 37, 46, and 56 puzzles have been solved. [5]
The 120-cell is a 4-D geometric figure (4-polytope) composed of 120 dodecahedra, which in turn is a 3-D figure composed of 12 pentagons. The 120-cell is the 4-D analogue of the dodecahedron in the same way that the tesseract (4-cube) is the 4-D analogue of the cube. The 4-D 120-cell software sequential move puzzle from Gravitation3d is therefore the 4-D analogue of the Megaminx, 3-D puzzle, which has the shape of a dodecahedron.
The puzzle is rendered in only one size, that is three cubies on a side, but in six colouring schemes of varying difficulty. The full puzzle requires a different colour for each cell, that is 120 colours. This large number of colours adds to the difficulty of the puzzle in that some shades are quite difficult to tell apart. The easiest form is two interlocking tori, each torus forming a ring of cubies in different dimensions. The full list of colouring schemes is as follows;
The controls are very similar to the 4-D Magic Cube with controls for 4-D perspective, cell size, sticker size and distance and the usual zoom and rotation. Additionally, there is the ability to completely turn off groups of cells based on selection of tori, 4-cube cells, layers or rings.
Gravitation3d has created a "Hall of Fame" for solvers, who must provide a log file for their solution. As of April 2017, the puzzle has been solved twelve times. [6]
Piece count [7] | |||
Number of vertices | 600 | Number of 4-colour pieces | 600 |
Number of edges | 1,200 | Number of 3-colour pieces | 1,200 |
Number of faces | 720 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 720 |
Number of cells | 120 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 120 |
Number of 4-cells | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 1 |
Number of coloured pieces | 2,640 | ||
Number of stickers | 7,560 |
Achievable combinations: [7]
This calculation of achievable combinations has not been mathematically proven and can only be considered an upper bound. Its derivation assumes the existence of the set of algorithms needed to make all the "minimal change" combinations. There is no reason to suppose that these algorithms will not be found since puzzle solvers have succeeded in finding them on all similar puzzles that have so far been solved.
A 2-D Rubik type puzzle can no more be physically constructed than a 4-D one can. [8] A 3-D puzzle could be constructed with no stickers on the third dimension which would then behave as a 2-D puzzle but the true implementation of the puzzle remains in the virtual world. The implementation shown here is from Superliminal who call it the 2D Magic Cube.
The puzzle is not of any great interest to solvers as its solution is quite trivial. In large part this is because it is not possible to put a piece in position with a twist. Some of the most difficult algorithms on the standard Rubik's Cube are to deal with such twists where a piece is in its correct position but not in the correct orientation. With higher-dimension puzzles this twisting can take on the rather disconcerting form of a piece being apparently inside out. One has only to compare the difficulty of the 2×2×2 puzzle with the 3×3 (which has the same number of pieces) to see that this ability to cause twists in higher dimensions has much to do with difficulty, and hence satisfaction with solving, the ever popular Rubik's Cube.
Piece count [1] | |||
Number of vertices | 4 | Number of 2-colour pieces | 4 |
Number of edges | 4 | Number of 1-colour pieces | 4 |
Number of faces | 1 | Number of 0-colour pieces | 1 |
Number of coloured pieces | 8 | ||
Number of stickers | 12 |
Achievable combinations:
The centre pieces are in a fixed orientation relative to each other (in exactly the same way as the centre pieces on the standard 3×3×3 cube) and hence do not figure in the calculation of combinations.
This puzzle is not really a true 2-dimensional analogue of the Rubik's Cube. If the group of operations on a single polytope of an n-dimensional puzzle is defined as any rotation of an (n – 1)-dimensional polytope in (n – 1)-dimensional space then the size of the group,
In other words, the 2D puzzle cannot be scrambled at all if the same restrictions are placed on the moves as for the real 3D puzzle. The moves actually given to the 2D Magic Cube are the operations of reflection. This reflection operation can be extended to higher-dimension puzzles. For the 3D cube the analogous operation would be removing a face and replacing it with the stickers facing into the cube. For the 4-cube, the analogous operation is removing a cube and replacing it inside-out.
Another alternate-dimension puzzle is a view achievable in David Vanderschel's Magic Cube 3D. A 4-cube projected on to a 2D computer screen is an example of a general type of an n-dimensional puzzle projected on to a (n – 2)-dimensional space. The 3D analogue of this is to project the cube on to a 1-dimensional representation, which is what Vanderschel's program is capable of doing.
Vanderschel bewails that nobody has claimed to have solved the 1D projection of this puzzle. [9] However, since records are not being kept for this puzzle it might not actually be the case that it is unsolved.
In geometry, a tetrahedron, also known as a triangular pyramid, is a polyhedron composed of four triangular faces, six straight edges, and four vertices. The tetrahedron is the simplest of all the ordinary convex polyhedra.
In geometry, a hypercube is an n-dimensional analogue of a square and a cube. It is a closed, compact, convex figure whose 1-skeleton consists of groups of opposite parallel line segments aligned in each of the space's dimensions, perpendicular to each other and of the same length. A unit hypercube's longest diagonal in n dimensions is equal to .
The Rubik's Revenge is a 4×4×4 version of the Rubik's Cube. It was released in 1981. Invented by Péter Sebestény, the cube was nearly called the Sebestény Cube until a somewhat last-minute decision changed the puzzle's name to attract fans of the original Rubik's Cube. Unlike the original puzzle, it has no fixed faces: the center faces are free to move to different positions.
In number theory, a Heegner number is a square-free positive integer d such that the imaginary quadratic field has class number 1. Equivalently, the ring of algebraic integers of has unique factorization.
The Professor's Cube is a 5×5×5 version of the original Rubik's Cube. It has qualities in common with both the 3×3×3 Rubik's Cube and the 4×4×4 Rubik's Revenge, and solution strategies for both can be applied.
The Dogic is an icosahedron-shaped puzzle like the Rubik's Cube. The 5 triangles meeting at its tips may be rotated, or 5 entire faces around the tip may be rotated. It has a total of 80 movable pieces to rearrange, compared to the 20 pieces in the Rubik's Cube.
In five-dimensional geometry, a 5-cube is a name for a five-dimensional hypercube with 32 vertices, 80 edges, 80 square faces, 40 cubic cells, and 10 tesseract 4-faces.
In geometry, a complex polytope is a generalization of a polytope in real space to an analogous structure in a complex Hilbert space, where each real dimension is accompanied by an imaginary one.
In geometry, a 6-cube is a six-dimensional hypercube with 64 vertices, 192 edges, 240 square faces, 160 cubic cells, 60 tesseract 4-faces, and 12 5-cube 5-faces.
In geometry, a 6-orthoplex, or 6-cross polytope, is a regular 6-polytope with 12 vertices, 60 edges, 160 triangle faces, 240 tetrahedron cells, 192 5-cell 4-faces, and 64 5-faces.
In geometry, a 7-cube is a seven-dimensional hypercube with 128 vertices, 448 edges, 672 square faces, 560 cubic cells, 280 tesseract 4-faces, 84 penteract 5-faces, and 14 hexeract 6-faces.
In geometry, an 8-cube is an eight-dimensional hypercube. It has 256 vertices, 1024 edges, 1792 square faces, 1792 cubic cells, 1120 tesseract 4-faces, 448 5-cube 5-faces, 112 6-cube 6-faces, and 16 7-cube 7-faces.
In geometry, an 8-orthoplex or 8-cross polytope is a regular 8-polytope with 16 vertices, 112 edges, 448 triangle faces, 1120 tetrahedron cells, 1792 5-cells 4-faces, 1792 5-faces, 1024 6-faces, and 256 7-faces.
The Pyramorphix, also called Pyramorphinx, is a tetrahedral puzzle similar to the Rubik's Cube. It has a total of 8 movable pieces to rearrange, compared to the 20 of the Rubik's Cube. Although it looks like a trivially simple version of the Pyraminx, it is an edge-turning puzzle with the mechanism identical to that of the Pocket Cube.
A combination puzzle, also known as a sequential move puzzle, is a puzzle which consists of a set of pieces which can be manipulated into different combinations by a group of operations. Many such puzzles are mechanical puzzles of polyhedral shape, consisting of multiple layers of pieces along each axis which can rotate independently of each other. Collectively known as twisty puzzles, the archetype of this kind of puzzle is the Rubik's Cube. Each rotating side is usually marked with different colours, intended to be scrambled, then solved by a sequence of moves that sort the facets by colour. As a generalisation, combination puzzles also include mathematically defined examples that have not been, or are impossible to, physically construct.
The V-Cube 7 is a combination puzzle in the form of a 7×7×7 cube. The first mass-produced 7×7×7 was invented by Panagiotis Verdes and is produced by the Greek company Verdes Innovations SA. Other such puzzles have since been introduced by a number of Chinese companies, some of which have mechanisms which improve on the original. Like the 5×5×5, the V-Cube 7 has both fixed and movable center facets.
Alexander's Star is a puzzle similar to the Rubik's Cube, in the shape of a great dodecahedron.
In five-dimensional geometry, a runcinated 5-orthoplex is a convex uniform 5-polytope with 3rd order truncation (runcination) of the regular 5-orthoplex.
The Nine-Colour Cube is a cubic twisty puzzle. It was invented in 2005 by Milan Vodicka and mass-produced by Meffert's seven years later. Mechanically, the puzzle is identical to the Rubik's Cube; however, unlike the 3×3×3 Rubik's Cube, which only has 6 different colours, the Nine-Colour Cube has 9 colours, with the individual pieces having one colour each.
The Dino Cube is a cubic twisty puzzle in the style of the Rubik's Cube. It was invented in 1985 by Robert Webb, though it was not mass-produced until ten years later. It has a total of 12 external movable pieces to rearrange, compared to 20 movable pieces on the Rubik's Cube.