Puzzles of 2019's AoC resided around the Intcode Computer, a software emulation of an actual computer attendees had to create, extend and maintain (a Virtual Machine, if you will). As attendees progressed through the puzzles, the Computer started to communicate in ASCII, organize arrays of itself into a network, play a bunch of games or control a number of peripherals. This, and the way it was presented, resembles the single most memorable AoC experience for me.
As for the whole set, the year of 2019 was very challenging, some advanced math and out of the box thinking was mandatory in more than a handful of puzzles.
After 2018's set, this deserves another standing ovations to the author.
Puzzles with exceptional entertainment value and/or unconventional thinking necessary fit the highlights for me. Usually the most fun/challenging experience is hidden in Part 2 of the puzzle.
- Day 10: Monitoring Station - code - live
- Day 11: Space Police - code - live - Completed Intcode Computer controls its first device - a painting bot
- Day 12: The N-Body Problem - code - live
- Day 13: Care Package - code - live - A game of Arkanoid on the Intcode Computer!
- Day 15: Oxygen System - code - live - A game of Maze on the Intcode Computer!
- Day 18: Many-Worlds Interpretation - code - live
- Day 20: Donut Maze - code - live - Sneaky Plutonians and their recursively-folded space!
- Day 22: Slam Shuffle - code - live - Where out-of-the-box thinking is not enough and one needs to (re-)visit some modulo arithmetics and Euclid's algorithm. Single most difficult AoC puzzle I've encountered so far.
- Day 23: Category Six - code - live - Intcode Computers organized in a network!
- Day 25: Cryostasis - code - live - A freaking text game on the Intcode Computer!
