Which puzzle in a game did you find was fun while solving it? This can also be a puzzle in a game that you felt was challenging, but in a good way. Or any other metric you may want to use.
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Favorite puzzle in a game
- Thread starter Squarehard
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Fun isn't the right word, but the greatest puzzle in gaming for me is the Hangman's Puzzle in Silent Hill 2. It's simple, yet deeply chilling and fits right into the greatest game of all time.
Runner ups are the Hard mode puzzle of the hospital door combo in Silent Hill 3 and the final puzzle in Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors. Second and third greatest puzzle ever, respectively.
Runner ups are the Hard mode puzzle of the hospital door combo in Silent Hill 3 and the final puzzle in Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors. Second and third greatest puzzle ever, respectively.
Yeah, I pretty much felt this way for the whole game, Baba is You is a special game.
Whenever the first time is that a player experiences "that" puzzle in The Witness that changes the way you look at everything from then onward. Never experienced anything like that in a game before, still an amazing moment.
Edit: sorry, this one is hard to describe without spoiling it, but those that have played the game and know what I'm talking about will get it.
Edit: sorry, this one is hard to describe without spoiling it, but those that have played the game and know what I'm talking about will get it.
Like all of Spacechem. The first time I worked out a solution to a production level was so satisfying.
There's a positively genius puzzle in Dino Crisis that involves figuring out how to match up a scientist's ID number and their actual name. If I recall, you have use the ID number on a phone to send a message to their pager, and then you search for the buzzing scientist corpse to identify them. I thought it was ridiculously clever and neat.
This. The whole damn game!
It makes me sad that after probably a couple of hundred tries, I can't beat the music box. I have made it to the final section a few times.
I have completed almost everything except for the final challenge. Can't beat it for the life of me. Which puzzle are you talking about? PM if you don't want to risk a spoiler.
Silent Hill 3's keypad lock in Brookhaven Hospital, Hard riddle difficulty.
The solution is looking at the keypad as if it were a human face, and press the keys corresponding to the parts the poem author is hurting tasting as he hurts the other person.
Pure eyes, blue like a glassy bead---
You are always looking at me
and I am always looking at you.
Ah, you're too meek---
beautiful, unspoiled:
thus I'm so sad, I suffer---
and so happy, it hurts.
I want to hurt you
and destroy myself
What you would think
if you knew how I felt.
Would you simply smile,
not saying a word?
Even curses from your mouth
would be as beautiful as pearls.
I place my left hand on your
face as though we were to kiss.
Then I suddenly shove my thumb
deep into your eyesocket.
Abruptly, decisively,
like drilling a hole.
And what would it feel like?
Like jelly?
Trembling with ecstasy, I obscenely
mix it around and around: I must
taste the warmth of your blood.
How would you scream?
Would you shriek "It hurts!
It hurts!" as cinnabar-red tears
stream from your crushed eye?
You can't know the maddening
hunger I've felt in the midst of
our kisses, so many of them
I've lost count.
As though drinking in your cries,
I bring my hopes to fruition:
biting your tongue, shredding it,
biting at your lips as if tasting
your lipstick.
Oh, what euphoric heights I would
reach, having my desires fulfilled
like a greedy, gluttonous cur.
I longed, too, for your cherry-tinted
cheeks, tasty enough to bewitch my
tongue.
I would surely be healed,
and would cry like a child.
And how is your tender ear?
It brushes against my cheek;
I want it to creep up to my lips so
I can sink my teeth into its flesh.
Your left ear, always hearing words
whispered sweet as pie---
I want it to hear my true feelings.
I never lied, no...
but I did have my secrets.
Ah, but what must you think of me?
Do you hate me? Are you afraid?
As though inviting you to the agony
at the play's end, if you wish, you
could destroy me---I wouldn't care.
As you wish, you may destroy me
---I wouldn't care.
You are always looking at me
and I am always looking at you.
Ah, you're too meek---
beautiful, unspoiled:
thus I'm so sad, I suffer---
and so happy, it hurts.
I want to hurt you
and destroy myself
What you would think
if you knew how I felt.
Would you simply smile,
not saying a word?
Even curses from your mouth
would be as beautiful as pearls.
I place my left hand on your
face as though we were to kiss.
Then I suddenly shove my thumb
deep into your eyesocket.
Abruptly, decisively,
like drilling a hole.
And what would it feel like?
Like jelly?
Trembling with ecstasy, I obscenely
mix it around and around: I must
taste the warmth of your blood.
How would you scream?
Would you shriek "It hurts!
It hurts!" as cinnabar-red tears
stream from your crushed eye?
You can't know the maddening
hunger I've felt in the midst of
our kisses, so many of them
I've lost count.
As though drinking in your cries,
I bring my hopes to fruition:
biting your tongue, shredding it,
biting at your lips as if tasting
your lipstick.
Oh, what euphoric heights I would
reach, having my desires fulfilled
like a greedy, gluttonous cur.
I longed, too, for your cherry-tinted
cheeks, tasty enough to bewitch my
tongue.
I would surely be healed,
and would cry like a child.
And how is your tender ear?
It brushes against my cheek;
I want it to creep up to my lips so
I can sink my teeth into its flesh.
Your left ear, always hearing words
whispered sweet as pie---
I want it to hear my true feelings.
I never lied, no...
but I did have my secrets.
Ah, but what must you think of me?
Do you hate me? Are you afraid?
As though inviting you to the agony
at the play's end, if you wish, you
could destroy me---I wouldn't care.
As you wish, you may destroy me
---I wouldn't care.
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I enjoy optional puzzles that are about thinking outside the box in games that were already about thinking outside the box.
To me the best puzzle in The witness is the one in which you look down from the tower that combines the four prior grids each with their own puzzle , but now that they are one, the solution is twice as complex. However, nowhere near the most difficult puzzles in that game, just the one that combines at least four rules at once.
Anything that involves RGB colors in the witness was also genius, especially that door you find early on in the village, but can't even begin to solve until way later.
My favorite puzzle from The Talos Principle is the one that has you connect lasers between separate testing sites to get one of the gold stars. Taking the idea of thinking outside of the box to literal lengths.
To me the best puzzle in The witness is the one in which you look down from the tower that combines the four prior grids each with their own puzzle , but now that they are one, the solution is twice as complex. However, nowhere near the most difficult puzzles in that game, just the one that combines at least four rules at once.
Anything that involves RGB colors in the witness was also genius, especially that door you find early on in the village, but can't even begin to solve until way later.
My favorite puzzle from The Talos Principle is the one that has you connect lasers between separate testing sites to get one of the gold stars. Taking the idea of thinking outside of the box to literal lengths.
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The Witness and Braid contain the best puzzles I've seen in a game. The Witness is almost too numerous to mention, but since I recently played Braid, let me point to an amazing one:
There's a level (actually, a few of them) where, when you move to the right, time is allowed to move forward, but when you move left, time reverses itself. Some objects are "impervious" to the flow of time -- meaning, they stand outside it. Most things, though, follow the rules of time. This gets *supremely* interesting when you are tasked with something simple like unlocking a door with a key; the naive solution might appear to just be: grab the key, climb up a ladder with said key, move left and open the door! But what happens when you move left? Suddenly, the key you're holding starts traveling *backward*. At first it feels and looks almost like a glitch in the matrix until you realize what is actually going on, and it becomes a mind-bending puzzle when you finally realize the steps you'll need to take to do something as simple as just opening a door.
There's a level (actually, a few of them) where, when you move to the right, time is allowed to move forward, but when you move left, time reverses itself. Some objects are "impervious" to the flow of time -- meaning, they stand outside it. Most things, though, follow the rules of time. This gets *supremely* interesting when you are tasked with something simple like unlocking a door with a key; the naive solution might appear to just be: grab the key, climb up a ladder with said key, move left and open the door! But what happens when you move left? Suddenly, the key you're holding starts traveling *backward*. At first it feels and looks almost like a glitch in the matrix until you realize what is actually going on, and it becomes a mind-bending puzzle when you finally realize the steps you'll need to take to do something as simple as just opening a door.
Does Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine count?
I'm going to be snarky and say Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine
I'm going to be snarky and say Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine
Glad to see mention of the SH3 Brookhaven Hard Keypad. I was maybe 14 or so when I played it. Stopped me dead in my tracks. Hours spent trying to wrap my head around it before eventually giving up, looking up the solution, and deciding not to keep playing Hard Mode. Have a lot of respect for that puzzle but it beat me.
Outside of Silent Hill games, I really like some of the puzzles in the older Tomb Raiders and Portal has some good ones.
Outside of Silent Hill games, I really like some of the puzzles in the older Tomb Raiders and Portal has some good ones.
The
puzzles in The Witness. First time you discover one of them is just a total revelation unlike anything I've ever had in a game before. It made me go back and rethink everything I'd come to learn about how the puzzles and the game world worked. The whole game is just masterfully designed.
environmental perspective
It's definitely one of two in Baba is you.
It's either the completely empty level with no obstacles between you and the goal,
or one puzzle you won't even realise IS a puzzle,
Abusing LEVEL is THING to turn the level icons in the world map into baba and a flag, solve the "decorative" puzzle condition in the world map and unlock a whole other world.
Edit: added screenshots
It's either the completely empty level with no obstacles between you and the goal,
where the trick is to realise something is up because there aren't any rules in this level, walk away from the goal and break a TEXT is HIDE rule and unlock a secret bonus
or one puzzle you won't even realise IS a puzzle,
Abusing LEVEL is THING to turn the level icons in the world map into baba and a flag, solve the "decorative" puzzle condition in the world map and unlock a whole other world.
Edit: added screenshots
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It's far from the hardest puzzle in the game, but there's a specific one in Talos Principle that opens up an entirely new way of going about doing laser/door puzzles:
Baba is You has some incredible ones, including Chasm Extra 6 - Visiting Baba, and ??? -2: Error, which first introduces you to a pretty mind-blowing concept.
Baba is You has some incredible ones, including Chasm Extra 6 - Visiting Baba, and ??? -2: Error, which first introduces you to a pretty mind-blowing concept.
Metal Gear Solid had a lot of unconventional and memorable puzzle solving:
- Meryls number on the back of the box.
- Switch controller port for Mantis fight.
- Put C4 on the right wall sections.
- Ketchup in the holding cell.
- Hankerchief to decieve wolves.
- Freeze and heat up key card.
- Meryls number on the back of the box.
- Switch controller port for Mantis fight.
- Put C4 on the right wall sections.
- Ketchup in the holding cell.
- Hankerchief to decieve wolves.
- Freeze and heat up key card.
the mine shaft puzzle in Sorcerer (Infocom, 1984)
explanation with spoilers for the whole game and puzzles
explanation with spoilers for the whole game and puzzles
Going back literally to the beginning was a massive "duh" moment. One of my favourite games ever.
I don't really get The Witness environmental puzzle mentions.
The amount of praise they get is way disproportionate to how impressive they actually are. I noticed them like a couple of hours into the game and didn't think much of them. They don't really even do anything, so there's no mindblowing revelation or reward to solving them
Personally I think the reason they are impressive is because of how 1) they're implemented in such a way that they *do* need to be discovered, and 2) once you've discovered them, finding them, and how they "connect" in the world can sometimes be a puzzle in-an-of themselves. Did you know that some of them require you to be in the boat and stretch along the circumference of the island? I agree in principle that they are not as fundamentally involved or as interesting as the better 'base' puzzles in the game, but I can totally understand why some people might find that they are a suitable answer to the question in a meta kind of way.
Portal 2 co-op. You and your partner have to land on a balcony or something that is by itself. My buddy and I are taking turns launching each other from different angles but we keep overshooting it. We could almost hear each other thinking when we both went "OHHHHHHHHH...." simultaneously, recognizing that we had to
.
Will never forget that moment.
launch each other at the same time so that we would collide in mid-air above the balcony and fall down to it
Will never forget that moment.
This puzzle is actually pretty great on its own because it's the one that introduces gray gel and you have to figure out how to get it on the pillars and make your own portal compatible walls.
Cave Johnson's rant is made better by the fact that Glados chimes in and sounds simultaneously excited and aroused by it.
im ashame i had to google it, the only puzzle i've searched online (that and the meteor, couldnt find the crack at first)
I think that the idea that they have been all around you while playing the game without you noticing is a pretty great thing to realise and a mind blowing revelation in itself, and that you're essentially getting a whole other layer of the game to play through with some of the game's most complex puzzles to solve. Also there's the hidden ending.
Also those puzzles and completing them are a reward.
- Silent Hill 3's Brookhaven keypad on Hard was already mentioned, so I'll say the Shakespeare puzzle on Hard.
- Batman: Arkham Asylum's Mad Dog riddle, just because of how cleverly it referenced the character.
- The entirety of Stephen's Sausage Roll.
- Inside's audiovisual experience of a puzzle:
- Batman: Arkham Asylum's Mad Dog riddle, just because of how cleverly it referenced the character.
- The entirety of Stephen's Sausage Roll.
- Inside's audiovisual experience of a puzzle:
This was the one that came immediately to my mind (surely also because I finished it just a month ago). TOW is filled with great puzzles, but this one stood out. I felt really clever when I solved it hah. But can you really solve it without the trials?? I think the hints there are very vague?
My buddy and I could not crack this puzzle - it was the only one we had to look up the solution. It still bothers me to this day because when you know the trick it seems so obvious.
It's when you realise the puzzles
aren't just in the panels. Puzzles can be anywhere.
Broken Sword V's goat puzzle was pretty fun, not to mention really funny to boot (George has a hatred of goats that spans back to a imfamous puzzle in the first game) - in V, he has to get rid of two armed guards to advance, you attempt to strap explosives you have to a goat nearby and Niko chides you for doing so, the solution is creating a fake explosive and strap it to the goat, freaking the guards out forcing them to run away.
So many of the investigation missions in The Secret World had really clever and fun puzzles to solve. One of my favourites isn't that hard compared to some of the others, but it felt really rewarding to complete. You essentially have to reverse-engineer the written language of hell in order to make sense of a ritual that has taken place throughout different places and times over a span of decades. The story throughout the mission itself is interesting on its own, but the real reward is that after you're done you've learned the full demonic alphabet and the rules on how it's written, which means that when you come across stuff written in it later in the game you can translate it by yourself to get more snippets of the overarching story.
Nothing has ever topped the Babel fish puzzle in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. It checks off all of the boxes perfectly:
- It is uniquely challenging to solve,
- The puzzle is 100% fair in how you figure it out,
- Most of all, it is absolutely hilarious from beginning to end.
BTW, if you haven't yet played this amazing game, dive right in for free!
- It is uniquely challenging to solve,
- The puzzle is 100% fair in how you figure it out,
- Most of all, it is absolutely hilarious from beginning to end.
BTW, if you haven't yet played this amazing game, dive right in for free!
Fez: decoding the language. If you played this you'll know what I mean.
The Witness: pretty much the whole game, minus the "logic" panels. While the logic panels are neat, they don't really blow you away (unless the panel needs to be solved "outside the box")
Talos Principle: god, this one's hard since there are lots of good ones. The most satisfying puzzles for me were any that involved fans that shot refractors up high in the air.
Celeste: blue heart for Old Ruins, really clever.
Outer Wilds: everything Quantum Moon. I had to look up how to get to the north pole, but I managed to land on the moon on my own.
The Witness: pretty much the whole game, minus the "logic" panels. While the logic panels are neat, they don't really blow you away (unless the panel needs to be solved "outside the box")
Talos Principle: god, this one's hard since there are lots of good ones. The most satisfying puzzles for me were any that involved fans that shot refractors up high in the air.
Celeste: blue heart for Old Ruins, really clever.
Outer Wilds: everything Quantum Moon. I had to look up how to get to the north pole, but I managed to land on the moon on my own.
It's kind of multiple puzzles in one room, but We Were Here Together has a chapter called "Hidden Answers" where you and your co-op partner are in similar rooms with a few key differences. It's brilliant and encapsulates all the good parts about the series into a single section.
Yes, you can land on it with just the knowledge from the museum. You can't solve it without the trials.