I have been intrigued by puzzles of all sorts ever since a young lad over 60 years ago. Since that time I have found many and have several hundred in my collection. I enjoy hand held mechanical puzzles, into which I place this one. I also love puzzle books of all kinds. One of my favorite are mazes. What the Money Maze puzzle does is combine mazes with a hand held box which is to be opened. There is no tricky secret to this puzzle, as is often the case. All it takes is a bit of [Read More...]

This is a standard jumping maze (see Jumping Mazes). The number on each cell tells you how far you can jump horizontally or vertically from that cell.

Start on the 4 in the top left corner, and find the shortest series of jumps that will take you to the finish in the bottom right corner.

Designed by Luke Johnson-Davies. Solution

Click here to display the solution to the Chain Reaction maze after a one-minute delay:

Show solution.

Start in the top left-hand corner and find a route to the bottom right-hand corner. As with the other arrow mazes (see Arrow Mazes) you have to follow the direction of each arrow, but there’s an additional rule that makes this maze considerably harder: you must choose three blue arrows, followed by three red arrows, followed again by three blue arrows, and so on until you reach the goal. Solution

Click here to display the solution to the Trinity maze after a one-minute delay:

Show solution.

Here’s a link maze using playing cards instead of symbols. Start on the ace of spades in the top left-hand corner and find a route to the king of clubs in the bottom right-hand corner using a series of horizontal or vertical jumps.

You start by jumping to a card of the same number, then to a card of the same suit, and so on, alternating between matching numbers and matching suits.

For example, from the ace of spades on the starting square you can jump to the ace of hearts in the top row, or the ace of hearts in [Read More...]

In this calculation maze the aim is to start at the top left corner, and find the shortest route to the bottom right corner ending up with a total of 7.

At each step you obey the instruction in the box. For example, if you take four steps right from the starting position you get the successive totals -1, 0, -1, and +4. If you then take four steps down you get the successive totals +3, +4, +3, and +6. So unfortunately that route doesn’t reach the goal with the correct total of 7.

Start from the knight in the top left corner, and find the shortest route to the bottom right corner by jumping between chess pieces.

Each piece you land on determines where you can move next. As in chess, from a bishop you can move diagonally, and from a castle you can move horizontally or vertically. From a knight you can jump in an L-shaped knight’s move, and only the knight can jump over other pieces.

The pawn is special – it mimics the last piece you were on. So when you land on a pawn, the pawn behaves in the same [Read More...]

Start at the blue arrow in the top left-hand corner, and follow the arrows to find the shortest route to the target in the bottom right-hand corner. From each arrow you can move to one of the arrows it’s pointing to, in the same row, column, or diagonal.

But in this maze there’s an additional restriction: You must take two blue arrows, followed by two red arrows, followed again by two blue arrows, and so on until you reach the target. Solution

Click here to display the solution to the Two Step maze after a five-minute delay:

Show solution.