Endless Escapes: 101 (Don't) Fall off the Page Mazes

Hey, check out this book I made! The mazes go right to the edge of paper, so be careful not to fall off page! 🚀

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My maze book story

There's lots of well known maze generation algorithms out there. But their results get repetitive. I had to write my own algorithm! Even then, the computer can't make them as good as a human doing it all. So I ended up using the computer to help fill in details, but I mapped out the major parts myself. For all 101 mazes. You're welcome!

At first, I was using those existing algorithms to create mazes for the book. I thought it'd be a quick, easy project. I was wrong. After a while I realized those mazes were almost always the same thing. A maze that looked good at first glance, but when you actually go to solve it, it's déjà vu. You can aim for the finish, and you'll get there, almost in a straight line. Without even taking many wrong branches or dead ends. They're fine for one or two mazes, but if you're actually wanting to solve a bunch of mazes, they get repetitive.

So I created my own maze-generation algorithm. It includes long tricky branches. When the correct path makes a hard turn, it includes a branch that continues in the wrong direction. It includes fun shapes in the paths now and then, like spirals or back and forth zig-zags. And of course, like anything good, it still requires human input and oversight for each maze.

I tried turning the computer loose and generating completely random mazes. But they were never as good as the ones where I gave the algorithm a lot of input on where the paths should go. And when they should turn. And where the start and finish should be.

I planned things out in a different way for every single one of the 101 mazes in the book. There's four levels: easy, medium, hard, and extra-hard. They're all different, and I hope you'll enjoy them!

—Alex

Check out the book on Amazon!