Hat trick

Hat trick is a new creation from the genius Laszlo Molnar, who is famous for his unconventional packing puzzles (I reviewed several in the past, have a look!) and crafted by the talented Brian Menold.

I think you already noticed that but I feel this has to be mentioned: in my opinion Brian is the guy who crafts puzzles with the most beautiful wood species. His woods are wonderful and he don't use the same wood again and again as some other wood puzzle craftmen do...
So if you want beautiful puzzle this is the man you have to buy puzzles from !!

OK let's go back to the puzzle. It was awarded with a prize at past puzzle competition and when playing with it then it becomes obvious why.
The puzzle is composed of a cage and 6 "L-shaped" pieces to pack. I am pretty reluctuant to play with puzzles when your finger moves are restricted because it makes it very difficult to manipulate the pieces. But with this one, this is very fine and you should not have these kind of difficulties.

As you may asume, if it got a prize and if it's a Laszlo's, then you imagine that this puzzle has something extra and well it has. It not just a basic packing puzzle. If you're aware of Laszlo's puzzle, then you know which twists it must have :)

I always repeat my technique with packing puzzles: solve the puzzle outside of the box and then see if you can make it inside. It always works! I ended up with several ways of making the shape to pack. For several that was an impossible shape because you could not have extracted any pieces from the cage. But I ended up with one possible shape. Hard to not spoil.....but I won't spoil, no worries :)

Some pieces were easy to pack (and thus to remove) but I was stuck with how you could pack some. It gave me pain and all of sudden I managed to pack them. Then the remaining pieces were a piece of cake! I was curious about how I packed those pieces and tried to remove them from the box to understand better. And guess what: I could not! Well at one point I could and I took care to take pictures of all the solving process.

Wonderful contrast with corners, cage and pieces!

This is a puzzle with a big "ah-ha" moment and I am sure you will like it a lot.
Definitely a nice and challenging puzzle you should get !!

Finally a puzzle for blind people!!!

This post is pretty much similar from an old one because the mechanism and the appearance of the puzzle is the same. But this time it's very suitable for blind people.

Obvisouly blind people won't look at my blog but if you know any blind people around you, this is the opportunity to get them this puzzle!

So here we are with the looly IQ puzzle designed by Patrick Chan, a Hongkonger who claims that he is always inspired by young people.

For the previous review of the IQ puzzle see HERE 

The puzzle is similar compared to the other IQ puzzle: you can push and pull the central rod and well as turning it. Of course the easter eggs are still here as well :)
The puzzle is very smooth, there are no issues with it. Sometimes when a puzzle is 3D-printed you can expect to have frictions (which is usually the case and happened for some other puzzles that I have) or moves that are made difficult. Trust me: with this puzzle nothing of that !

Like the rubix's cube there are algorithms to solve the puzzle depending on where the pieces are, but even if you don't know them (don't worry, they are provided by Patrick) it's very pleasant to play with this puzzle.

And even if you're not blind, you can play with the puzzle. You just have to learn the numbers from 1 to 5 to check if you have solved the puzzle or no, which adds another challenge.

Patrick made a nice website to explain the moves with a video and the features of the puzzle, you should check it out: HERE


For the moment I don't have his speed ;)

To get it or the normal version you can contact Patrick and you can choose the color of the puzzle!

Cast slider

Vesa Timonen did it again !!

Here we are with a new Vesa's design which obviously has been produced by Hanayama company.

I think you can only agree that msot Vesa's puzzles have a difficulty of around 3-4 but are way more difficult than what you should expect, all are good and devilish and all are very rewarding when you finally solve them :)

Cast Slider is composed of 3 parts, 2 being identical. OK easy? Well not that much. When you play with it you will soon notice there is an obstacle, which is easy to identify: it's the protubing part of the middle piece. Without it, it wuld be quick to solve that puzzle. But the genius of Vesa is to have added that part, which will stump you I am sure!

I thought it would be not difficult to solve, but it still took me several minutes (honestly I did not time it, but for sure less than 1 hours). I analyzed it and still I could not figure out how to solve it, but with an unexpected unintentionally move (or maybe I did it on purpose without paying too much attention too it), I finally solve it. Very rewarding puzzle. I cannot solve more without spoiling, but maybe the reassembly process will be a little bit more difficult? Once you know how to solve it then it's quick and easy.

This is the perfect puzzle to bring with you as it can also be used as a fidget toy :)
And it will puzzle your friends as well.

Yes, fidget toy!!! :)

Challenging without being frustratingly difficult, this puzzles really embodies for me what a perfect cast puzzle is and should be. It's a level 3/6 but don't get fool by the rating, it will surprise you!

Congrats Vesa!

You can buy this puzzles at this puzzle webshop.

They even have other nice puzzles to sell as well as other things, check it out.
 

Solution here!