Rubik's Cube
Rubik's Cube :
Is there anything more frustrating - and rewarding - in the world of toys than a Rubik's Cube? No, I didn't think so...
Created by Erno Rubik, a Hungarian sculptor and professor of architecture, this timewaster of a 3D toy measuring 2.25inches on each side, consists of a 3x3x3 assortment of 26 coloured squares. The puzzling bit comes when you attempt to unscramble them by twisting the rows of squares around, so you eventually end up with only one colour on each side.
The original Rubik's cube (the called a Magic Cube) first came onto the scene in the mid-70s, but it only became a craze once Ideal released it into American culture. In 1980 it was won the German Game Of The Year award for Best Puzzle. From then on, brows were uniformally furrowed as kids (and big kids) all over spent hours, days, even months trying to crack the code... until they realised the coloured stickers could be peeled off and reassigned by their own fair - if a bit blistered - hands. Cheats!
For those who didn't stoop this low, there were competitions to enter to see who could solve the Rubik's cube the fastest. The Rubik's Cube World Championship was held in 1982 in Budapest, where crowds witnessed a boy of only 16 years' worth of cube cracking under his belt solve the cube in under 23 seconds! Since then, the record has been broken over and over again, currently standing at 7.08 seconds, set in 2008 at the Czech Open. Other crazy cube competitions have featured contestants solving their's underwater, blindfolded and even using only their feet! The year 2008 also saw the Guinness record being set for the most people solving a Rubik's cube at one time - 96 people.
Continuing on from the success of the original Rubik's cube - well there had to be more for those who'd completed it - there were the 2x2x2 Pocket Cube, 4x4x4 Rubik's Revenge, Rubik's snake, Rubik's clock, Rubik's Magic, pocket chains for the hardcore addicts, and more recently Soduku-theme cubes. Other legacy's include a cartoon, an addict's support group and no doubt a fair few cases of RSI (repetitive strain injury). But so worth it, so say the 350 million people who've bought a Rubik's cube to date.
In February 2009 the most exciting update yet was unveiled at the American Toy Fair in New York - The TouchCube. The cube works on the same principle as the original, but is an electronic. light-up, touchscreen version, sure to excite fans of the toy. This time around, moves can be undone and the cube even gives you handy hints, See, things were always harder years ago. Kids don't know how good they've got it today.
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The original fiendishly difficult puzzle,
now with solution guide
The original fiendishly difficult puzzle, invented by Erno Rubik in Hungary and one of the biggest toy crazes ever. In 1982 Hawkin's Bazaar was the first to bring a few cases of the Rubik's Cube to England. Unfortunately 25 years ago we were very small and it wasn't long before a much larger company had the exclusive rights to distribute in the UK. We are very pleased to be offering it again! And now includes a new seven step solution guide.
Features
5.5cm Seven step solution guide
About Hawkin's Bazaar
Hawkin's Bazaar has been providing you with unusual gifts, toys and gadgets since 1973. Originally a local toy shop at the Hawk Inn (hence the name), Hawkin's Bazaar now sells things you thought had gone forever and things you never even knew existed. They bring you Pin Art, Morph, Rubik's Cube, Big Trak, Space Hoppers and much more.
Also remembered...
One of the staples of summer fetes when we were all younger was the bouncy castle, (along with the coconut shy, bowling and a real life buckaroo.) Begging to go on it was also part of the summer festival season. “Pleeeeeaaassseee! Muuuuuummmm” could be heard whenever the bouncy castle was in eye-shot. The castle itself, was characterized by bright colours and kids flying off at different angles. You had to take your shoes off, of course, lest you burst the thing. There was always a pile of hastily removed shoes by the foot of the bouncy castle, along with a rather raggedy looking man, sat down with a thermos of tea, who could command the children at will. “Right, you, off!”, "nope, wait your turn!" The castle itself was also always accompanied by the loudest inflator pump you will ever hear, constantly humming, or chugging away, in the background. I used to think it was the man’s stomach rumbling, but it wasn’t. Goes on the bouncy castle ended in one of 3 ways: 1 – having to be dragged off because you never got long enough on it. And then begging Mum or Dad (whoever was the most likely to give in) to have another go. 2 – Being sick. If you had just eaten, the bouncy castle would usually help you to see your food again. 3 – Tears. With a number of kids flying off in random and unexpected directions, at varying speeds, as your mother would say “It is only a matter of time before someone gets hurt”.
...and do you remember these?
- Teddy Beddy Bear
- Knitting Jenny
- Glamour Gals
- Girl's World
- Zoids
- Lazer Tag
- Tonka Trucks
- Sea Wees
- Streak Around
- Powder Puff Teddy
Comments
There used to be Rubik's Cube competitions where people would race each other to complete the puzzle.
DonnY 26-Feb-2004, 05:42:12 PM
Isn't there a Guiness book of records entry for Rubik's cube
Frank 26-Feb-2004, 05:42:12 PM
Yeah 16.53 seconds!! http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/index.asp?id=53230
WeaselBoy 26-Feb-2004, 05:42:12 PM
Still haven't completed it yet after 15 years....
Karen 17-Mar-2004, 11:44:59 AM
Only ever managed to complete two sides, though did have a Japanese copy which I managed to take to pieces and rebuild correctly. Not quite the same sense of achievement though.
Batman 08-Apr-2004, 05:07:42 PM
I too used to get frustrated with mine, and found that a simply twist of one row against the opposing column, would cause the corner sqaure to fall off, meaning the other pieces would all then slide off their housing and allow you to reassemble it with the colours all being correct. I know it was cheating, but hey, I was a kid :)
Nige 20-Apr-2004, 06:26:08 PM
"You can do the cube" by Patrick Bateman - the first kid to beat it or something...he was the uber-nerd that made Bill Gates look 'rugged'. He went onto program Spectrum games - I have that book too :-)
tim 06-May-2004, 11:20:21 PM
My next door neighbor was one of those people who could solve it in seconds. I have yet to get more than 2 sides and I think that only happened a handfull of times itself. I remember I was in 5th grade when my first boyfriend got me a mini rubix on a keychain. Not sure I know where that is now! lol
ana 26-May-2004, 09:02:58 PM
I could get up to 3 sides and do a cross on the top and bottom, but that was it. This girl, Pam, had read the book on how to solve it so when I got too frustrated, I gave it to her to make whole again. Remember the Triangle one? Actually mastered that one. And the 16-cubed Super Rubik's Cube? I was too afraid to undo it. It stayed solid for the entire time I had it.
David Grodsky 28-May-2004, 03:43:50 PM
I had a boyfriend could do it in about a minute and half ... Rubiks cube too.
Chykie 22-Jun-2004, 08:31:22 PM
The Rubiks Cube was one of the most addictive games of its time. I remember when i was younger, i managed to pull some of the squares apart,as we had a really old one, then click them into the correct slots and my mum thought i was really clever for completing it! she still doesn't know i cheated.one of these days im gonna manage it,thou im still trying.
lisa day 13-Sep-2004, 02:18:02 PM
i first picked up my cube when i was 9 (or 8, i'm not sure). my teacher's husband taught me a simple layer-by-layer method, and since then, the cube has been my addiction.
macky 18-Sep-2004, 03:27:34 AM
I picked up the cube last year. My Friend taught me the cube. I can solve the cube in 40 seconds now!
Joshua Phua 18-Sep-2004, 06:52:35 PM
I could get as close to solving it as two little squares away and then I would get nervous that I'd mess up all that I completed so I stopped. Never did finish it. Didn't use the book, either.
Brenda 29-Oct-2004, 01:31:17 AM
I only ever completed two sides of the cube but I also had a Rubik's Snake, which was easy peasy to do.
Chickin 29-Nov-2004, 10:55:40 PM
used to have a cube when i was 6 or so. could only do one layer. 10 yrs later i revisited the cube, learnt speedcubing and now i can do it in ~30sec. what a cube! definitely a challenging enjoyable toy
john lwin 01-Dec-2004, 03:31:34 AM
Yeah, i'm another who could only complete it by dismantling it first. Was chuffed that i was able to make the football out of the snake tho!
mike 20-Dec-2004, 09:36:11 AM
I started playing with the cube about two months ago and have since solved it over 1000 times. I average about a minute and a half and only hope to further improve. I wish to be a speedcuber one day.
Andrew 08-Jan-2005, 09:50:17 PM
i was taught to solve the cube by a friend at school who was taught by friend also ,i was 15 back in 1982,i've just taught my son who is 13 and hope he teachers his future son!!
steveybabes 14-Feb-2005, 12:01:07 AM
This toy is a headache! I could only get two sides at the most unless I took it apart, and put the pieces back together. ;-)
MLP 24-Mar-2005, 12:45:34 PM
Didn't there used to be a 4x4 Rubik's Cube as well?
Dingo 31-Mar-2005, 04:28:34 PM
yeah i completed it in 15 secs.
bob 05-Apr-2005, 03:32:19 PM
i would if i could find the last corner piece after i took it apart and all the bits went all round the room
shane 12-Apr-2005, 10:53:08 PM
A few years back, around 2000 or so, the Rubik's company officially released a joke Rubik's Cube to buy, where every side was yellow. The fact they put so much effort into producing these still amuses me.
CherryMay 23-Apr-2005, 12:52:55 AM
There's 2 distinct groups starting to take shape here, and I was well and truelly part of the 'take the thing apart and put it back together' crowd
petewalton 24-Jul-2005, 09:31:18 PM
A brilliant puzzle ! Sadly, Rubik himself went penniless as he didn't patent it. There's probably tips on doing it on the web, try Google. Never got past one side myself.
Aidan 05-Aug-2005, 03:19:29 PM
My son did it with no trouble but I never could! Met Mr. Rubic in a store in Sydney Auastralia when he introduced his second version.
Dave 07-Aug-2005, 07:59:32 AM
my son can do it, each colour in 40 seconds but I could never.(even a single colour)
BHARGAV JV 10-Aug-2005, 03:36:48 PM
2-3 yrs ago: ~2.5 minutes, stopped till xmas '04 when i saw a 30 sec solve. now: about 18 sec avg :D thx to john lwin for inspiration and everything!
darren kwong 14-Aug-2005, 12:14:53 PM
I used to take it apart with a little screwdriver and re-assemble it...far more convincing than removing/rejigging the stickers....I also had a mini fully functional rubiks cube on a keyring! How cool was I!
Linds 03-Oct-2005, 11:57:17 PM
Ahh, the Cube. When I was little, My cousin had one, and we were playing with it, and were getting frustrated cos we couldn't solve it. He then proceeded to take the stickers off, but some of them tore and came off in bits. When my aunt came home, he got into trouble for tearing it up. I had a teeny, partly functional, Rubik's Cube necklace that I loved. I have a full-sized Cube, and I'd love to have a fully functional miniature Cube. Last year, my friend taught me how to do one side, and that's as far as I got :( I was always too scared to take it apart, as I thought it would be ruined. Has anyone heard of the Million Dollar Rubik's Cube made by Fred Cuellar for the 15th Anniversary of the Cube? It is made of gold, and the colours are diamonds and other precious gems. It is also fully functional. LOL, Patrick Bateman; that's the American Psycho.
Denise 07-Nov-2005, 08:05:49 AM
I had a cube when it was released, I was 6. I didn't manage to do it and was a little dissillusioned that i couldn't 'see' the process like the kids solving it on John Cravens newsround. So here we are 25 years later and some lunchtime surfing lands me on ebay looking at the 25th anniversary cube. I bought it and for the 1st time I've completed it. I'm no speed cuber but I can plod along and do it stage by stage in about 7 minutes and i'm over the moon!
Rory 09-Dec-2005, 01:27:00 PM
I was useless at this, but there were some people (including my best mate at the time) who disappeared for a couple of days and emerged to demonstrate that they could solve the whole thing in under a minute. I remember you could buy books showing you how to do it. I bought one to try and work it out but I couldn't even follow that. Mind you it didn't help that the book was in black and white. Honest!! There were even competitions to find the fastest. I remember my mate had to get up early one Saturday morning to go to one!! The real McCoy was easy to twist, but you had to beware the imitations out there which wereprone to drop to bits after a while. You could even get mini cubes as key ring attachments. It all went wrong when they tried to introduce different shaped puzzles, and Rubik's "Snake", which was dead easy to do. Even I managed to do that one! Plus, I think as with all things, the next "fad" toy came along. But I don't think there was the furore whivh surrounded the Cube.
Wayne 10-Dec-2005, 09:54:37 AM
Mine used to drop to bits (like the memory below) but it was because the only way I could solve it was to pop it apart and snap it together in the right way. Actually this was quite fun - some dufusses would peel off the stickers instead!
Sam 18-Jan-2006, 07:29:28 PM
brilliant..... i remember owning one of theses blasted things at school in the early eighties. we had competitions to see who could do the whole thing the quickest. i was on to my third cube( brick wall?!!) by the time i could actually compltete it. I have just aquired one last christmas for sentimental reasons, and found myself being wound up and stressed more than ever. ( silly old fool). ...
chris, hartlepool 10-Mar-2006, 04:18:46 PM
i used to pull my one apart and put it back together as i had no paitence with the thing all i could manage was 2 or 3 sides
kerry clarke 25-Mar-2006, 07:47:35 PM
I CAN REMEMBER SWAP SHOP OR SOME OTHER SATURDAY MORNING SHOW ASKING VIEWERS HOW FAST THEY COULD COMPLETE THE CUBE. I THINK THEY HAD SOME SORT OF LEADERBOARD ON THE SHOW AND WOULD INVITE VIEWERS TO PROVE THEMSELVES ON NATIONAL T.V. P.S. CHRIS FROM HARTLEPOOL HAD TROUBLE BECAUSE HE'S COLOUR BLIND.
DYR 19-Apr-2006, 07:51:49 PM
oh my god i hated them i can remember resticking all the colours so it looked like i had done it
laura 29-Apr-2006, 04:46:48 PM
I remember me and my brother having a rubik cube, it was impossible so we used to peel the stickers off and stick them back on to look like we'd completed it
Heidi Allanson 01-May-2006, 10:54:22 AM
We used to just take them apart and stick them back together so it looked like we'd completed it. Only problem was that most of my mates could do it quicker the right way!
Warren 09-May-2006, 03:17:30 PM
I've tried for hours to get this perfect but all I can do is get them all the right sections except for the one in the middle. That one always seems to be a different colour.
Jenny 11-May-2006, 04:54:46 AM
I never solved the wretched thing, even after buying Patrick Bosert's book. Do I care?. I seem to remember that anyone at school who did solve it got beaten up very rapidly. I cheated and peeled the stickers off but then my mum found out and I got walloped for cheating. I now live in Japan and couldn't believe it when I went into a shop last month and saw they were selling anniversary Rubik's Cubes. I was ALMOST tempted!!!
Steve Jablonski 12-May-2006, 05:56:44 AM
I could never complete the Rubiks cube no matter how long and hard I tried. My first was ruined after I tried to remove the stickers and restick them on their proper side. I eventually did it by clicking out the black cubic blocks and clicking them back in the right side...cheating moi ?
Oliver Gamble 22-May-2006, 11:43:07 PM
There were great fun!
Peter Pam 23-May-2006, 04:34:28 PM
pure insanity....
louisa 29-May-2006, 08:06:56 PM
I remember learning it at school.. I still can finish it (:
Suzanne 30-May-2006, 07:06:55 PM
One girl in my class was brilliant at every subject, and of course could solve the cube in a couple of minutes. As a joke, some of us waited till she was out of the room, got hold of her cube and popped out a piece - probably a corner and put it back in the wrong way (or maybe we just switched the stickers, I forget exactly), and then scrambled it. Her face, the next time she tried - and of course failed - to solve it, was a picture. She took it in good humour, though, when we told her what we'd done. I could get one face, plus two rows on 4 of the other faces, but I don't think I ever solved it completely.
Grackle 22-Aug-2006, 03:31:47 AM
Sorry just a couple of corrections here. The cube becomes quite easy once you get used to the fact that you dont need to know how it works only the moves required to achieve step. Rubik did not die pennyless. Tha patent was registered in hungary but they refused to acknowledge the rest of the world - later he managed to make some money from the copyright of "Rubik's". One of the two englishmen that introduced the cube to the rest of the world later bought this. Its owned by Seven Towns Ltd.
Farnsworth 11-Oct-2006, 11:58:54 PM
Both me & my brother tried to solve my Dad's cube but ended up taking it apart to get it back to normal. We knew somone who tried unsticking the squares & totally messed theirs up. I still have my Dad's solving book, which works but understanding the instructions is very tricky. I never helped that the colours were not always the same, especially on the cheaper cubes.
Richard Davies 29-Dec-2006, 07:19:21 PM
that thing is so fustrating. i've got every single color solved but i just can't can't get more then one side at a time. but nobody else i know accept my teacher can do that so i like to show to people who can't, just to make myself feel better lol
12345 07-Jan-2007, 06:45:46 PM
I never got past two sides at once. :(
Heather 30-Jan-2007, 10:45:06 AM
when i was little i made a bet with my mom that i could beat it so i changed the stickers so they were all the same color in the end i didnt take the money and told her
robbie 30-Jan-2007, 10:03:47 PM
i tried....i tried harder....yep still couldnt get it :'(
Micah 20-Feb-2007, 06:57:09 PM
My sister and i were so excited when our dad bought us a cube, Our headmaster could solve it, I remember him telling the shcools creeps how to do it, when i asked he didnt have time. I never did work it out, I still have it now.
RACHEL 11-Mar-2007, 08:55:35 PM
I had a moody miniature keyring one which had round stickers on it. I also had a Rubik's Barrel but never had a rubik's sphere.
Mulletino 13-Mar-2007, 06:24:49 AM
I can do the Rubik's Cube in 55 seconds almost every time.
Aaron Anderson 08-May-2007, 01:52:30 AM
Tryed. Failed. Got bored. xD
Lauren 11-Jun-2007, 12:33:27 PM
WTF!!! pure torture almost as bad as my mum making me play TRIOMINOES, GAME OF LIFE, DINGBATS, DILEMMA, BALDERDASH, GO FOR BROKE and other fun family games that usually involved one or more people ending up in tears. Oh what memories. Monopoly is the ruin of all family occasions. Ha Ha!!
Leanne 19-Jun-2007, 05:23:12 AM
Well the rubiks cube how many of us had one of these as a child, this is the sudoku of the past. Playing for hours on this little cube of bright colours which was almost impossible to do. There was always one child who would show off about doing it but was it even worth bothering. Yes as its a classic
DYR 12-Sep-2007, 12:08:38 PM
My brother had one of these, we tried to solve it, but never could. It would stay on the shelf, in his room, & we would try to solve it every now & then, but we failed, Marg.
mmedcalf1 21-Feb-2009, 07:00:10 AM
On the modern day versions of this classic toy, Drummond Park saw fot to include a quick solve it guide, which seems to make the cube remarkaly easier to solve. I still have the small yellow book by a guy named Patrick from the eighties on my bookshelf. Unfortunately, the book was many more pages than the quick solve guide, much more complex, and it was printed in black and white!
adamccol 10-Mar-2009, 11:13:32 PM
most iv ever managed was two sides! lol
thebhoywonder 09-Apr-2010, 04:07:36 PM