There’s a few puzzle games that become very popular, but they get a lot of press anyway. This article isn’t about those. What follows are some of my favourite obscure puzzle games, in ascending levels of obscurity.
None of the games featured are currently on sale. For the games that used to cost money, you can download them as abandonware. However for God knows what reason, this is probably illegal in your country. If you want to stay the right side of the law, all the affected games have a demo version available, for which links are provided.
Before we start, it’s worth noting that you’re not a techie you are going to have a little bit of difficulty finding a way to play four of these games. You can still play the first one (Heartlight) easily though. If you are a techie, most of these games are cross platform thanks to most of them being DOS games, and thus require the highly cross platform DOSBox to play. If you’ve never used DOSBox and know some basic DOS commands - don’t worry, it’s easy.
There’s been a lot of Boulderdash clones over the years, however this is one of the better ones. Boulderdash was a game which required you to collect diamonds and exit a level. You played a levitating, tunnelling man that has to avoid monsters and getting hit by non-levitating rocks.
To some this might sound like heresy, but I think Heartlight is better than the original. My main reason for thinking this is it does not contain enemies. Enemies in a lot of games like this feel like they behave unpredictably. Yes, you could work out what’s going to happen in your head, but it would probably be faster to just experiment by playing until you stumble on the solution. Heartlight isn’t like that. You can almost always plan out how you’re going to attack a level from the very start. And although a degree of dexterity is required in parts, there is a lot more emphasis on stopping to think about what you’re doing.
There are 70 levels, not all of them are brilliant. A few of them do require a fair degree of experimentation as there’s no way you could possibly work out how things are going to go down in your head. That said, there are some brilliant puzzles in there, and the whole thing really is worth a look.
This game is here partly because I enjoyed it as a child. It does have a lot of problems. However it’s got some great puzzles. You are given a partially filled grid with walls and blocks. You are able to move blocks left and right. Blocks are also affected by gravity, so you can drop them off platforms. If any two or more blocks become adjacent they are eliminated from the grid. The objective is to get rid of all the blocks.
So you might have heard of this one, but if you have I’m counting on you having forgotten forg about it. It is 20 years ago. Rescue Rover is a Sokoban style game with a twist I’ve not seen anywhere else. There are impassible death lasers and movable mirrors and laser blocking boxes. There are far more elements, but those are the most interesting. It all combines to make some quite neat puzzles. Unfortunately the emphasis is on the “some”. There are only 30 levels and not all of them are winners. The less inventive levels are essentially just Sokoban. Not that, Sokoban is a bad thing, but if they were all like that it wouldn’t be on this list.
Until now I’ve only written about games made by large game companies a long time ago. These next two however are standout solo projects from a long time ago.
Cyberbox is another Sokoban style puzzle game, though now the boxes have different properties, such as can be pulled from certain sides or can only be pushed in certain directions. However instead of getting all the boxes to certain positions, you just need to get your man to an exit. Sound easy? It's not.
There are 150 puzzles. Some of them are really, really nice and well worth your time. Some are less nice, well, depending on how much you enjoy mazes. Thankfully you can skip any levels you can’t be bothered with, and even look at the solution. There’s not much else to be said for it, but if you enjoy a good puzzle game and haven’t played it, you should.
So we finish with the best, most recent and most difficult to run. Diamonds is a fairly old Macintosh game, which although I’ve never played I feel deserves the credit here. I discovered it through the much better Crystalex. Crystalex was a puzzle game offered for free by a member of the Something Awful forums (Orzo).
Many puzzle games are in some way derivative, hence the popular term “clone”. It may come as a refreshing surprise to hear that Diamonds was entirely unique. Bar Crystalex I have not played anything even remotely similar, and what with not exactly being a hit no one has copied it since.
Crystalex consists of three different types of level: Puzzle levels, where you have to destroy all the blocks; time limit levels, where you have to destroy all the blocks within a time limit; and finally target score levels, where you need to achieve combos by quickly destroying blocks to gain a higher score.
When you first start playing you wonder how on Earth this could ever contain difficult puzzles, but stick it out to the hard set for your first few thinkers.
Often you need to plan out exactly what you’re going to do well before you do it. Because you go up and down at a set speed, the speed you can do something really depends entirely on where you bounce, which blocks you destroy and when. As a result the time limited levels cause you the continuously look over your route and see where you can cut a few seconds before trying again. It’s quite a fun and unique puzzle experience.
There is a draw back to all this; the game does require some dexterity. Normally if you’re finding a portion of the level too difficult it’s because you haven’t really solved the puzzle yet. There are certain portions though, such as “Monostroke II” in the third set of hard levels which even when you know the solution is really hard. Thankfully these are modern times and if you don’t like something you can cheat.
You’d probably be crazy to install a copy of XP separately just to play a game. Personally I found a virtual machine worked fine. If you’re unfamiliar with virtual machines, they emulate another operating system for you to run whatever you like in. If you want to do this you can download a copy of either VMWare (faster) or VirtualBox (open source) which will allow you to emulate practically any OS. All you need to do then is install Windows XP, the visual basic run time libraries and finally Crystalex. Worth it? Definitely.
If it comes to it, and there’s a point where you can’t find Crystalex on the Internet anymore let me know and I’ll see if I can upload a version somewhere and link it here.
That about raps it up. There are better puzzle games, some of these are perhaps obscure for a reason, but in all of them there are nice ideas and all of them are worth your time. If I was to pick one you should definitely try though, it would be Cyberbox.
None of the games featured are currently on sale. For the games that used to cost money, you can download them as abandonware. However for God knows what reason, this is probably illegal in your country. If you want to stay the right side of the law, all the affected games have a demo version available, for which links are provided.
Before we start, it’s worth noting that you’re not a techie you are going to have a little bit of difficulty finding a way to play four of these games. You can still play the first one (Heartlight) easily though. If you are a techie, most of these games are cross platform thanks to most of them being DOS games, and thus require the highly cross platform DOSBox to play. If you’ve never used DOSBox and know some basic DOS commands - don’t worry, it’s easy.
5. Heartlight
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| Percival balancing a rock on his head |
To some this might sound like heresy, but I think Heartlight is better than the original. My main reason for thinking this is it does not contain enemies. Enemies in a lot of games like this feel like they behave unpredictably. Yes, you could work out what’s going to happen in your head, but it would probably be faster to just experiment by playing until you stumble on the solution. Heartlight isn’t like that. You can almost always plan out how you’re going to attack a level from the very start. And although a degree of dexterity is required in parts, there is a lot more emphasis on stopping to think about what you’re doing.
There are 70 levels, not all of them are brilliant. A few of them do require a fair degree of experimentation as there’s no way you could possibly work out how things are going to go down in your head. That said, there are some brilliant puzzles in there, and the whole thing really is worth a look.
There are certainly more obscure Boulderdash clones I could have put here instead. So if you’re a big fan of Boulderdash clones and like them with monsters I can recommend RoX. Careful though, you need at least Microsoft Windows 98/ME/2000.
Where to get it
Heartlight has been ported to Android, and someone has also made a Java port. Epic Megagames no longer sell Heartlight. but if you have a copy you can also play the Epic Megagames version on DOSBox.4. Brix
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| A rather tricky level |
Given the limited (and clunky) controls, many of the levels require a surprising degree of dexterity, indeed some levels don’t have any form of puzzle and are just tests of timing and dexterity. It also has an unnecessary timer and scoring system. Regardless, the puzzle elements can get quite difficult, and it has some nice ideas in there. Even if you have stupid fingers like me it’s still worth a look, as you can find levels codes for everything online. For example here’s a good puzzle I got stuck on: ALELNQHQRR.
Where to get it
I can’t find it for sale anywhere, but there is a very playable demo available here. You’ll need DOSBox to play it.3. Rescue Rover
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| Roger getting ready to destroy a laser |
Where to get it
It’s really old and runs on DOS. That normally doesn’t stop id Software - they’re still selling the original Doom. That said, I’ve looked and can’t find it for sale anywhere. Your best bet is probably either a time machine to 1991 where you’ll have to find yourself a house and then send off for the game by mail, or abandonware. You can still legally download and play the demo, which has the first 10 levels.2. The Continuing Adventures of Cyberbox
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| Just try and tell me this isn't cooler than Sokoban |
Cyberbox is another Sokoban style puzzle game, though now the boxes have different properties, such as can be pulled from certain sides or can only be pushed in certain directions. However instead of getting all the boxes to certain positions, you just need to get your man to an exit. Sound easy? It's not.
There are 150 puzzles. Some of them are really, really nice and well worth your time. Some are less nice, well, depending on how much you enjoy mazes. Thankfully you can skip any levels you can’t be bothered with, and even look at the solution. There’s not much else to be said for it, but if you enjoy a good puzzle game and haven’t played it, you should.
Where to get it
Here! This is probably the easiest of all of the games to play because it has been released as freeware. All you’ll need is a copy of DOSBox and you’re good to go!1. Diamonds/Crystalex
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| You'll need to really optimise the speed you get through this chamber to win |
Many puzzle games are in some way derivative, hence the popular term “clone”. It may come as a refreshing surprise to hear that Diamonds was entirely unique. Bar Crystalex I have not played anything even remotely similar, and what with not exactly being a hit no one has copied it since.
Crystalex consists of three different types of level: Puzzle levels, where you have to destroy all the blocks; time limit levels, where you have to destroy all the blocks within a time limit; and finally target score levels, where you need to achieve combos by quickly destroying blocks to gain a higher score.
When you first start playing you wonder how on Earth this could ever contain difficult puzzles, but stick it out to the hard set for your first few thinkers.
Often you need to plan out exactly what you’re going to do well before you do it. Because you go up and down at a set speed, the speed you can do something really depends entirely on where you bounce, which blocks you destroy and when. As a result the time limited levels cause you the continuously look over your route and see where you can cut a few seconds before trying again. It’s quite a fun and unique puzzle experience.
There is a draw back to all this; the game does require some dexterity. Normally if you’re finding a portion of the level too difficult it’s because you haven’t really solved the puzzle yet. There are certain portions though, such as “Monostroke II” in the third set of hard levels which even when you know the solution is really hard. Thankfully these are modern times and if you don’t like something you can cheat.
Where to get it
Generally I have no idea. Most links I’ve tried have gone down. If you Google it, you’ll probably find one somewhere. Finding it is the least of your problems though; once you’ve got it, you need to try and get it running. I’ve tried on my (generally unused) Windows 7 install, and ended up in DLL hell. The problem is Crystalex was written with the mighty power of (drum roll) Visual Basic. Whatever gets the job done, I guess.You’d probably be crazy to install a copy of XP separately just to play a game. Personally I found a virtual machine worked fine. If you’re unfamiliar with virtual machines, they emulate another operating system for you to run whatever you like in. If you want to do this you can download a copy of either VMWare (faster) or VirtualBox (open source) which will allow you to emulate practically any OS. All you need to do then is install Windows XP, the visual basic run time libraries and finally Crystalex. Worth it? Definitely.
If it comes to it, and there’s a point where you can’t find Crystalex on the Internet anymore let me know and I’ll see if I can upload a version somewhere and link it here.
That about raps it up. There are better puzzle games, some of these are perhaps obscure for a reason, but in all of them there are nice ideas and all of them are worth your time. If I was to pick one you should definitely try though, it would be Cyberbox.
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