Free the Key

Puzzle: Free the Key
Brand: Puzzlemaster
Inventor: Oscar van Deventer

ST: ~15 min

Been quiet around here recently - I do apologize for this, and I hope to improve my posting rate from now on. Well, here is a post to change the situation.

Free the Key

Free the key was a puzzle that came with several others from Puzzlemaster back when I first started puzzling, but haven't decided to write about it until now. It came simply in a blue plastic package that tells you the name, it's difficulty rating, and (helpfully) states that the objective is to remove the disk from the aluminum key. Taking it out you can see some marks on the parts that gives hints about the building quality - but isn't too troubling considering the cheap price. The thing felt quite sturdy, and would've done some damage if it had an encounter with one's foot!

This puzzle is another well known Oscar design, and as with quite a large portion of his designs this is a maze puzzle. It was in my opinion quite something unique, taking keys to be the theme. As you can see there's several notches on the disks which interacts with the key to create a fairly complicated maze, containing several dead-ends along the way to trip you up.

Job done!

So taking the puzzle you start manipulating the disk and in minutes was close to the end-only to be stopped in your tracks two-thirds from the end. Trying again only results being stuck in the same place. Time to explore a bit! After a while you'd find some more avenues to get into, enabling more fiddling - Suffice to say the solution wasn't trivial, requires you a bit logical thinking and planning before getting the job done. A neat little puzzle that would keep you thinking for a while.

Again a great design by Oscar-and I think I have an idea of why both reviews on it's puzzlemaster page gave it a five-star rating. You can get a copy of the puzzle from either Puzzlemaster, or Sloyd for a reasonable price.

Alcatraz the Puzzle

Puzzle: Alcatraz
Brand: Puzzlemaster
Inventor: Brian McDermott
ST: N/A

Alcatraz Puzzle

Every puzzler now and then would probably get to the Alcatraz Puzzle after a bit of surfing on the web. It is a fairly intriguing puzzle with a ball trapped inside a square cage with bars on both the front and the back blocking any possible means for the ball the escape. It lively represents the real-life Alcatraz Prison, as from what I've heard that's about how big the cells are in there to their prisoners. Quite something curious enough to be picked up on first sight.

The inventor was a magician, and was greatly interested by puzzles too. When he discovered that there's no puzzle in the world that satisfied him, he decided to design a good puzzle that he'd never met. And so the Alcatraz was born. It was originally used for his magic shows, but then developed to be the well-known puzzle. You can read the full story here.

I've got the puzzle from quite an earlier order from Puzzlemaster along with a few others, but haven't decided to review it until now-I do have a reason which I'll explain more later. So fiddling with the puzzle the ball would move a couple of millimeters and except from that the brass bars rotate freely and move up and down a bit, there's seemingly no possible movement whatsoever. I think that it is actually pretty obvious how the ball comes out-the challenge lies in working out how. I must've spent rather a good hour on this one without having the slightest progress-the puzzle gives absolutely no feedback!

Jailbreak!

Finally I gave it up and looked at the solution. Have to say it surprised me! I would say that the solution of Alcatraz is very hard to find, but that's not because it was designed well. It's because no good-seasoned puzzler would ever do that to their puzzle! I'd say that Alcatraz is a good idea with a great appearance but poorly designed. No one would consider a puzzle box as a good puzzle if it has been glued together and the solution was to hit it with a hammer... Get the idea? (do not get the wrong idea-you do not break Alcatraz to solve it but it does require some serious force.)

Not quite a good experience this time and although as stated on the website most people give it a very high rating I'd be hesitant to recommend it to others. And although with time it does became easier to open without that much force I still have pain (yes pain!) opening it. It's hard to write a negative review but I feel the need to state my thoughts about that puzzle as people would be taking review into account before buying puzzles. I am sorry if I offended anyone.

The Alcatraz puzzle is for sale here.

Brass Pyramid

Puzzle: Brass Pyramid

Inventor: Doug Engel

ST: ~10 s

The pyramid... Mysterious?

Finally something other than the Hanayamas huh? Although I believe the Hanayama series were a star in the puzzling world, I think it's time to change the topic.


This is the Brass Pyramid from Puzzle Master, in my most recent order. It certainly looks nice on your shelf with nice gold polished sides, and a unique pyramid look.

Mysterious-No! Solved.

But yes-I am sure you have noticed this-my solve time isn’t a typo. While I spent a whole paragraph praising it, the puzzle was actually poor. Basically it went like this-I opened the package, holding it in my hand to examine, falls apart.

In the beginning I have brought it for its look and it’s rating (6 on the Puzzlemaster scale which run from 5 to 10)-I am not someone who was easily encouraged, and believed the solving of Enigma to be pure luck. So there I have thought this pyramid to be at least taking me a good fifteen minutes or so. It didn’t last a full minute! The puzzle had a simple mechanism that can be VERY easily bypassed by chance. The idea could be used better and be improved-sadly it wasn’t. There was a twist added to the idea, but not a good one-and it too can be bypassed.

In my opinion it wasn’t worth it’s price, and even rookies (like me) could have it dissected in a matter of seconds. Not recommended-My first (and hopefully last) negative post.

But still if you are a collector and REALLY SERIOUSLY felt that you need to have one-here’s the link. EDIT: Puzzlemaster seemed to be no longer selling this item as it is removed from their page.