[CV037] Brother and Sister

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036 - Too Many Mice

037 - Brother and Sister

038 - Island Hopping

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Brother and Sister
Game	Professor Layton and the Curious Village
Number	037
Type	Write Answer
Location	Clock Tower
Given by	Lucy
Solved by	Professor Layton
Picarats	40
Mandatory	No
Reward	Strange Gizmo -  Head
In other languages
日本語	姉と弟 ane to otōto
Deutsch	Jahrestausch
Español	Hermano y hermana
Français	Affaires de famille
Italiano	Fratello e sorella
한국의	누나와 동생

Brother and Sister is a puzzle in Professor Layton and the Curious Village.

Puzzle

A boy and his big sister are sitting around the kitchen table chatting.

"You know, Sis, if I took away two years from my age and gave them to you, you'd be twice my age, huh!"

"Well, why don't you just give me one more on top of that? Then I'll be three times your age."

So just how old is each sibling?

Hints

• →
• Hint 1
• Hint 2
• Hint 3

Click a Tab to reveal the Hint.

Let's see if we can't pare this puzzle down a bit.
When you take two years away from the brother's age and add them to the big sister's, she becomes twice his age.
Additionally, when you take three years away from the brother and give them to the sister, she becomes three times older than he is.

You could try and solve this with an algebraic equation, but that's no way to tackle a puzzle! Try to reason your way through this one.
Move two years from the brother's age, and the difference in age becomes four years. Move three years, and the difference widens to six years.
Four years makes the sister twice as old as the boy. Six years makes her three times as old.

The brother and sister were born in the same year.

Solution

Incorrect

Too bad.

For each year the brother gives to his sister, his age decreases by one.

When he loses two years, the sister becomes twice his age. When he loses three years, his sister becomes three times his age.

If you're feeling stumped, try graphing the information you have out on paper.

Correct

That's right!

The conditions in the puzzle only work out if both the brother and sister are currently six.

The two siblings must have been born within a year of each other.