Team - 1 player
Outcome - Escaped
Time Elapsed - About a week of on and off puzzling.
" Team up with world famous private investigator Hartigan Browne and solve 50 fun brain-busting puzzles to reveal clues and uncover the mystery of the missing Dumpleton Diamond "
Overall Thoughts
This puzzle book has you solving 50 individual puzzles with a sprinkling of detective mystery throughout.
From page 1 the storyline was evident, which is something I have found is often lost in other puzzle books. You step into the villa of Dumpleton to join the team of "world renowned detective" Hartigan Browne to uncover the mystery of the missing Dumpleton Diamond. The book is split into 8 cases; each of which with their own set of puzzles, flowing into each other and helping to progress the story along.
There is a huge variety of puzzles within this book ranging from decoding to map reading. Although there is a large amount of puzzles I personally wouldn't say any of the puzzles were particularly difficult, making this a perfect introduction for beginners and newbies to the puzzling world. The puzzles throughout often interlinked and had you searching back through previously mentioned evidence or puzzles to help you progress, these interlinked puzzles are very good at guiding you directly to where you may need to go to find the tools you need to progress.
Throughout each of the puzzles there are also hints on the page should you find yourself struggling, I personally feel the hints should have been in a separate section at the back of the book much like the solutions as I often found myself reading the hints assuming they were an additional piece of the puzzle. Additional to this without checking each solution there is no way to know you are correct when progressing through the book, meaning you have to flick to the back of the book to ensure you're correct every time before moving on. Each case ends with a satisfying conclusion that opens up a new part of the mystery keeping you wanting to solve and figure out more.
Overall this book is an excellent introduction to puzzle books with a large variety of challenges throughout but those more familiar with puzzles may find this a little easy.
Final Review
Difficulty - 2.5 / 5
Puzzles - 4 / 5
Theming - 4 / 5
Creativity - 3 / 5
Enjoyment - 3.5 / 5
Value For Money - 4.5 / 5
Overall Score - 3.5 / 5