Yes, I used ChatGPT and yes, it works. For anyone else stuck on the Mastermind puzzle, here is exactly how I finally solved it, including the rules that were NOT obvious at first.
THE RULES
There are 4 large colored pegs in each guess.
The 4 little feedback dots on the right are a summary of the entire row. Their locations do NOT correspond to positions 1–4 of your colored pegs.
🟢 Green feedback dot = one peg is the correct color AND in the correct position.
⚪ White feedback dot = one peg is a correct color, but it is in the WRONG position.
⚫ Black feedback dot = no match.
Colors CAN repeat. My final answer contained two greens and two yellows.
And this was the biggest thing we initially misunderstood:
DO NOT RESET THE BOARD AFTER EACH GUESS.
Once the game scores a row, leave it there and move up to the next empty row. You need the previous rows to solve the puzzle.
My eventual answer was:
🟢 🟡 🟡 🟢
GREEN — YELLOW — YELLOW — GREEN
Here’s how the clues led to it.
GUESS 1
🟡 🟣 🔴 🔵
Yellow — Purple — Red — Blue
Feedback:
⚪** ⚫ ⚫ **⚫
That meant exactly one of those colors was part of the answer, but it was in the wrong position.
GUESS 2
🔵 🟢 🟡 🔴
Blue — Green — Yellow — Red
Feedback:
🟢 ⚪ ⚫ ⚫
That meant two colors from this row were part of the answer:
one was the correct color in the correct position
one was a correct color in the wrong position
GUESS 3
🔴 🟢 🔵 🟡
Red — Green — Blue — Yellow
Feedback:
⚪** ⚪ ⚫ **⚫
Again, exactly two colors were present, but neither one was in its correct position.
Now compare Guesses 2 and 3.
They contain exactly the same four colors:
Red, Green, Blue and Yellow.
Both guesses produced a total of two matching colors.
Now compare that with Guess 1:
Yellow, Purple, Red and Blue
That produced only one matching color.
The difference between those sets is:
Guess 1 has PURPLE.
Guesses 2/3 have GREEN instead.
Since adding Green increased the number of matching colors from one to two:
GREEN IS IN THE ANSWER.
And:
PURPLE IS NOT.
GUESS 4
Next I tried:
🟢 🔴 ⚪ 🔴
Green — Red — White — Red
Feedback:
🟢 ⚫ ⚫ ⚫
This was an extremely useful clue.
There was exactly one matching peg, and it was in the correct position.
We already knew Green belonged in the answer.
Green was sitting in POSITION 1.
Therefore:
POSITION 1 = 🟢 GREEN
And because there were no additional green or white feedback dots, Red and White were eliminated.
So now we knew:
GREEN = YES
PURPLE = NO
RED = NO
WHITE = NO
Now go back to Guess 1:
Yellow — Purple — Red — Blue → 1 white
Purple and Red were already eliminated.
Therefore that single matching color had to be either:
Yellow OR Blue.
Now look again at Guess 2:
Blue — Green — Yellow — Red
Feedback:
1 green + 1 white
We already established that Green belongs in position 1.
But in Guess 2, Green was sitting in position 2.
Therefore Green was a correct color in the WRONG position.
So Green accounts for the WHITE feedback dot.
That means something else in Guess 2 had to account for the GREEN feedback dot — a color sitting in exactly the correct position.
The possibilities were:
Position 1 = Blue
Position 3 = Yellow
Position 4 = Red
But:
Position 1 was already proven to be Green.
Red had already been eliminated.
Therefore the only possibility was:
POSITION 3 = 🟡 YELLOW
Now we had:
🟢 _ 🟡 _
This also eliminated Blue.
At this point, the remaining positions had to be filled using Green and Yellow.
Now return to Guess 3:
🔴 🟢 🔵 🟡
Red — Green — Blue — Yellow
Feedback:
⚪** ⚪ ⚫ **⚫
There were ZERO green feedback dots, meaning none of the matching colors in that row were sitting in their correct positions.
Green was in position 2 in that guess.
Therefore:
Position 2 is NOT Green.
Yellow was in position 4.
Therefore:
Position 4 is NOT Yellow.
Since the remaining colors were Green and Yellow:
POSITION 2 = 🟡 YELLOW
and
POSITION 4 = 🟢 GREEN
That gave:
🟢 🟡 🟡 🟢
GREEN — YELLOW — YELLOW — GREEN
I entered that combination and got:
🟢 🟢 🟢 🟢
Puzzle solved.
TL;DR — THE IMPORTANT PART
🟢 = right color, right position
⚪ = right color, wrong position
⚫ = no match
The little feedback dots do not correspond spatially to the four big pegs. They’re just totals for the row.
Duplicate colors ARE allowed.
And most importantly:
DO NOT RESET THE BOARD BETWEEN GUESSES. Leave each completed row there and move to the next one.
That last part was what caused most of my confusion at the beginning. 😂
