How much time does it take to solve a 15$ puzzle?
5 minutes? 30? 2 hours? 5 hours?
Well usually that’s the case.
But how about never? Or after years?
Enter Hanayama Cast Helix. What a wonderful name for a wonderful star.
This wonderful star gave me nightmares. Is it because it’s hard? Maybe I’m just bad at this?
I don’t know which of those are right. But the fact it went unsolved for YEARS on my shelf is disturbing.
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Where Should I Start?
As you can probably see, Helix is a metal star. But not just one star – it’s made of two star plates held together by a pin.
These plates can spin freely, each on their own.
Or I should say, could spin freely, if it wasn’t for that wire stuck inside.
It’s simple – remove the wire, spin the star!
Yeah, spin it!
Spin it.
Spin it.
Nope?
Well, maybe not.
Hanayama Cast Helix In a Nutshell
| Characteristic | Details |
|---|---|
| Puzzle Type | Take-Apart – Disentanglement |
| Designer | Akio Yamamoto |
| Manufacturer | Hanayama |
| Budget | Low |
| Difficulty | Medium to Hard |
| Material | Metal |
| Quality for Price | Great |
| Time for Price | From good to crazy |
| Best for | *Wanderers |
| Warnings | None |
Wanderers, in writing the next paragraphs, I keep y’all in mind – it will be particularly useful to you. Hunters can skip this whole section by clicking here, While Champions may want to skip to here.
Dear Wanderer.
Helix is a challenging puzzle even among Champions. It can be fun, but if you’re not mentally prepared, it can be also quite gruelling.
Hanayama has a metric for difficulty levels, ranging from 1 to 6. Their level 1 puzzles are relatively easy and great as the first steps of a Wanderer. Their level 6 puzzles are sometimes frantically HARD.
Helix’s difficulty according to Hanayama is 5. This means Helix is pretty hard.
I must confess, there’s actually something certainly strange about Helix. I’ve never solved it for years, and every now and then I gave it a try, couple days at a time. And still couldn’t solve it.
A Mystarious Occurance
When I lent it to a non-puzzling friend of mine, something really ridiculous happened – he solved it in one evening, around 2 hours. I was extremely perplexed. Imagine how I felt!
That may have been pure luck, so I didn’t let that event define the difficulty of Helix. I’m sure I was also unmoved because of something that I learned in a Statistics course once – one event doesn’t mean anything for the bigger picture.
Until he gave it to his father, a non-puzzler as well.
Who solved it in under an HOUR.
And to his sister, who did so in around an hour as well.
And this, my fellow Wanderers and Champions, was absolutely surprising.
So we tried to understand how that happened. Why haven’t I been able to solve it for years while he and all his family members could in 2 hours max.
And we realized something.
While Helix is indeed a challenging puzzle, it is not that hard to non-puzzlers. For me, a Champion (Trying to be humble will be hard with these names), it was super hard (and maybe I’m not so good at wire puzzles).
What is the difference between non-puzzlers and Champions? What is it in the solution that helped them solve it relatively easily while I couldn’t for my life do it myself?
I want to keep this post as spoiler free as possible (be careful with solution videos!). I’ll only tell you this – when I heard my friend and all his family solved it really fast, something switched in my head completely.
When he returned Helix to me, I solved it in 10 minutes.
Yeah, you heard it – for years it was sitting on the shelf, then solved in 10 more minutes.
And this is what makes Helix unique.
The Verdict
Hanayama Cast Helix can be hit-or-miss.
It’s a good puzzle for sure, but not my cup of tea.
Hunters – Helix is not a collectible puzzle. It’s not rare at all. If you aren’t a Hanayama Hunter, the value in this one is mainly from it’s special solution.
Champions might be truly challenged by this one.
But why is Helix awesome for Wanderers?
In my opinion, Wanderers need to get the best puzzling value for their money and Helix can provide that. Its unique solution and potential insane solve time is worth every penny, while its high quality for the price is a great bonus.
While not genre – defining per-se, it is one of the favorite Hanayamas according to a poll in the Mechanical Puzzles discord survey, and I can see why.