Einstein Puzzle 2.0 by Flowix Games

[Ruffnekk]

Basic Info

App Name	Einstein Puzzle
App URL	http://games.flowix.com/en/index.html
App Version Reviewed	2.0
Test System Specs	Windows XP Pro SP2 on Intel Pentium 4
Supported OSes	Windows, Linux, MacOS
Support Methods	Website
Upgrade Policy	N/A
Trial Version Available?	N/A
Pricing Scheme	$ 0.00 (€ 0.00)
Reviewer Donation Link	Donate to Ruffnekk the Author
Relationship btwn. Reviewer and Product	I, the reviewer, am in no way affiliated with this game or its creators.

Intro:

Einstein Puzzle is a neat little game created by Flowix Games for people who like challenging puzzles. I have played it for a long time already and have solved it on several occasions, but definitely not every time I play it.


Website quote:

Einstein puzzle is a free cross-platform open source remake of old DOS game Sherlock which was inspired by Albert Einstein's puzzle. Einstein said that only those with an intelligence quotient of 98 percentile and higher should be able to solve it.

Einstein Puzzle 2.0 by Flowix Games

Please note that the text "Happy birthday, Ann!" appeared after a certain date, most probably Ann's birthday, but never disappeared after that

Gameplay

The game is a puzzle in which you must determine the value of each card in a 6 x 6 grid. Each card can have one of six values to start with. To help you a bit, there are hints given on the screen. It's your job to use these hints and solve the entire puzzle. It's not as easy as it sounds though, the hints often seem to be of little help.

There four types of hints:

1. Vertical hint


In this hint, the + sign must be in the same column as the B.

2. Neighbour hint


In this hint, the domino 6 must be in a column neighbouring the column of the = sign, but it may be on the left or right side.

3. Left hint


In this hint, the domino 3 must be in a column left of the column with the II roman numeral 2.

4. In Between hint


In this hint, the square must be in a column that is in between the columns of the = sign and the number 5. It does not mean that the number 5 is on the left or the right side however.

Here's another shot of the game in action:

Einstein Puzzle 2.0 by Flowix Games

Who is this game designed for:

People seeking a challenging puzzle to relax for a while.

The Good

Intuitive interface, great replayability value and very challenging. The game is open source, so you can port it to your favourite platform if you like.

The needs improvement section

It think the author(s) is/are Russian, and spelling errors in the help sections reflect that. But it's not disturbing in any way during gameplay.

Conclusions

All in all, it's a great game, well worth the time, and terrific for those times you need some distraction from work

[cthorpe]

Wow, that game can be tough.  I may be missing something in the logic, but I've run into a couple of occasions that there doesn't seem to be a way to progress other than guessing between two possible choices for a space.

[Ruffnekk]

Wow, that game can be tough.  I may be missing something in the logic, but I've run into a couple of occasions that there doesn't seem to be a way to progress other than guessing between two possible choices for a space.

-cthorpe (March 12, 2007, 03:21 AM)

I know! It can be frustrating at times, but I usually just save the game and check back an hour later or so to see if I missed something and usually I did The trick is to combine hints about the same symbol into another hint...

[mirke]

I have solved it many times, and I cannot solve it only late at night when I'm too tired to think. It is not easy, but it is not impossible to solve too. 

[steeladept]

Agreed.  It is a great game that I got my wife addicted to and now I have to fight for the computer 

[Grig_A]

I Love this game! My best result is 1 min 24 sec, the worst (of the top 10) is 1 min 35 sec.

[J-Mac]

This looked like fun, but the first time I tried to run it after installing it had problems.  When I started it my display blacked out - I figured it was trying to use full screen mode - but it just quit and exited quickly.  Error message I found in its log said that it encountered a "DDraw" error because it is too large for my display.

That's really odd since I have a 21.3" LCD monitor running at 1600 X 1200 resolution.  Virtually anything can fit on this monitor.  So I guess it is configured for older monitors or graphics cards?

Jim

[booksbuggy]

Loved this game even though i die

[booksbuggy]

die = lose a lot