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I& #39;m now playing a few suggestions from @evidentlycube. Here& #39;s #klocki in which you, uh, fix the lines and shapes to look, uh, right. You use tile swapping, rotation, or sliding, depending on the particular level. I don& #39;t like the sliding so much but the rest so far is easygoing.
And now here& #39;s #push in which you must push all the buttons. They won& #39;t stay down unless you push them in the order they want. Whole game seems to be about figuring out the rules although occasionally the game is quite sneaky. Casual fun.
And #Scalak - either a shape-matching game or a 3D jigsaw depending on your point of view - put the pieces together to complete the shape. Sometimes with constraints on piece movement.
I blew through the early levels at speed but these later levels are a little intense.
I blew through the early levels at speed but these later levels are a little intense.
indeed
There is also #Unpuzzle where you take apart a puzzle; reminds me of mahjong games and how you have to slide out tiles. Not as enamored with this one so far but it& #39;s fine.
Well that& #39;s #klocki done. Sliding tile bits weren& #39;t my favourite - a bit laborious - but they didn& #39;t overwhelm. Relaxing game all round.
Now back on #PUSH - I do like where these puzzles have ended up. "Just push the next button" has ended up much more testing than I was expecting. Clever stuff.
I put #Scalak on hold because I found these frame puzzles irritating. You& #39;re dragging tiny thin lines to tiny thin lines. It& #39;s not fun for the eyes or the fingers on my phone.
But they do lead to interesting puzzles where you need to rotate and translate shapes to create matches. So IDK maybe it& #39;s alright and I forgive you #Scalak.
Okay #PUSH is getting genuinely stressful now. Juggling a lot of permutations in my head. There& #39;s a little bit of Monte Carlo here but in the end you need to know where all the buttons are.
There is no escape.
There is no escape.
And #Scalak is done. I like the final "victory run" levels, where the difficulty dials down, a little celebration of the collaboration between the player and developer over the life of the game instead of Final Boss.
"You remember the good times we shared?"
"Sure I do."
"You remember the good times we shared?"
"Sure I do."
Trying to remember where these sneaky hidden buttons are in #PUSH will be my undoing.
That one tucked away at the back is only visible with the correct switch configuration and you can& #39;t complete the level without pushing everything...
That one tucked away at the back is only visible with the correct switch configuration and you can& #39;t complete the level without pushing everything...
But then #PUSH did this
And then I did "wut"
There are four sets of letters. I was expecting something relaxing and kind.
And then I did "wut"
There are four sets of letters. I was expecting something relaxing and kind.
OK. It done now.
This be #Zenge. Looks nice, not particularly taxing - I& #39;ll be finished soon. But I& #39;m not sure I dig it: the puzzles generally feel like Towers of Hanoi, where you are moving pieces around so that other pieces can fit in first. Pretty though, looks like electrical schematics.
That& #39;s #Zenge all wrapped up - started it just a couple of days ago but it was only 59p so not quibbling about that.
You have to reverse engineer a shape from a pair of silhouettes (two perpendicular projections).
Not played too much yet but most of the levels so far do not have a unique solution.
And it turns out that #.projekt knows all about the non-uniqueness of solution. Later it introduces min and max cube conditions which are much more interesting.
Not too keen on the #.projekt level select. Diabolically confusing. Each big dot at the bottom represents two levels which are then selected from the above projections. Tiny dots above each big dot represent min and max achievements. This is criminal.
Another @Lady_Hazy suggestion - although I found a Google doc full of suggestions from years ago - is #Hook. Pull all the lines in the right order. I& #39;m up to about level 30 and starting to get complicated. A bit Minesweeper - find the next move.
One wrong move resets the level.
One wrong move resets the level.
Again taken by a puzzle game with a schematic look. #Hook has not won me over yet, but the puzzle games I& #39;ve been fiddling with recently all move quite slowly.
I think the Minesweeper comparison may be misguided. Mahjongg concept of seeking tiles you can move is closer but...
I think the Minesweeper comparison may be misguided. Mahjongg concept of seeking tiles you can move is closer but...
And yet another @Lady_Hazy suggestion: #Colorzzle. Which at first appears to be a puzzle on which you must put the right colours adjacent to an empty tree plot to grow the tree.
However, later #Colorzzle switches heavily into a beam puzzle complete with colour combination and mirror reflection.
I& #39;m not wholly sold on #Colorzzle. It& #39;s generally easy... but I don& #39;t feel much satisfaction with this one partially because the colour combos are a little confusing. Blue + Yellow = Green fine but combining shades doesn& #39;t feel natural (RYB by @FLEBpuzzles avoided this issue.)
That& #39;s #Colorzzle done. Some tougher challenges right at the end but had to get through 90 puzzles to get to the interesting handful. A bit too susceptible to brute force if you "didn& #39;t get it" most of the time. Definitely not for you if you have any kind of colour deficiency.
So the really interesting thing about #Hook after you& #39;ve got through a lot of levels - it feels like bomb defusal. Are you pulling in the right wire? Have you done enough preparatory work?
Thankfully, it gives you "3 lives" at this point but I have occasionally exhausted them...
Thankfully, it gives you "3 lives" at this point but I have occasionally exhausted them...
And that& #39;s all fifty levels of #Hook completed. I thought it a little too simple at the outset but it won me over in the end.
You know I& #39;m still plugging away at #Unpuzzle. Another one I misjudged at the start. Once all the rules have been established, it becomes a pleasant timekiller. It& #39;s never *difficult* but it often takes time to find an open move. 150 levels. I& #39;m 100 in. So many hours of play.
I doubt I& #39;ll persist with .projekt. I usually do the min cube solution followed by the max cube one. But I find poking around the interface, especially to see if there& #39;s a cube you need to insert behind the ones you& #39;ve already added, not fun, frustrating. Not really a zen game.
I think this thread will soon come to an end as I only have #Unpuzzle left. Am planning to leave the phone empty awhile as I& #39;ve been commute gaming a lot and frankly I think it& #39;s time to take a break.
So, a criticism of #Unpuzzle! it disables any music/podcast on listening to.
So, a criticism of #Unpuzzle! it disables any music/podcast on listening to.
An #Unpuzzle surprise. I& #39;m pretty sure I ended up in an unsolvable state.
Details: I needed to get the green locks into a certain orientation while moving the lock control out the way of a piece I needed to slide off. But I& #39;d already removed a vital piece needed to fix that up.
Details: I needed to get the green locks into a certain orientation while moving the lock control out the way of a piece I needed to slide off. But I& #39;d already removed a vital piece needed to fix that up.
This reflects an unfortunate trend towards the end of #Unpuzzle - I& #39;m increasingly required to keep moving mobile pieces back about leading to annoying Hanoi-like piece manipulation. It seems like unnecessary busywork at times.
And that completes #Unpuzzle and this very long thread of more gentle puzzle games. Thanks for playing :)
