Congratulations M. Paynesdown, for solving yesterday’s puzzle. The answer was, of course, the match. You can’t light any other thing without lighting the match first. As a reward, you get +Internets, whatever that is.

As for the puzzle from two days ago, I didn’t get an answer yet.

The puzzle was:

Ten candles are burning on a candlestick. The wind blows through the window and extinguishes 2 of them. A few minutes later, you notice one more is extinguished and close the window so it doesn’t happen again. Assuming the rest of the candles will be fine, how many will be left in the end?

The answer is, three candles. The ones that stayed lit will burn out and completely melt. Only the ones that went off will remain. Shame on you for not giving me the answer.

OK, time to go play the game again.

Our story so far:

Having finally returned to Reinhold Manor with Claudia in tow, Layton and Luke are horrified to discover that a murder has taken place there during their absence. Waiting for Luke and Layton at the manor is police detective Inspector Chelmey. Upon receiving a report on the murder, he has raced to St. Mystere to conduct an investigation. He has his suspicions about Luke and Layton.

Professor Layton Artwork

Here’s some more beautiful artwork.

As I got out of the manor, I’ve found Claudia with Simon’s glasses. I gave them to the inspector, but he said they weren’t important. I’ve been going around town and asking people about Ramon and everything seems to point to the big tower in the center. Everyone is also saying i should avoid the tower. Passing underneath the clock tower, I encountered a little girl who told me that Ramon has a friend named Jarvis who he hangs out with frequently.

I’ve found Jarvis at the end of a long street up the hill, but he said he hasn’t seen Ramon since the day before. He also said I should talk to Zappone about all this. Some other people told me I should speak to Crouton, the bar owner, as he is usually on top of any potential town rumors.I went to the bar, but Crouton didn’t see Ramon either. He has, however, told me that there is a rumor going around about a strange old man kidnapping people so I should probably look into that. This ended Chapter 3 and Chapter 4 was about to begin.

The night has fallen in St. Mystere and the professor’s investigations were leading nowhere. He needed to observe the night life in the village to try and find more clues. Before I did anything, I used all the gizmos I gathered to assemble a fully functional robotic dog. I decided to name him Garo, as this is the name of my real dog. I went to the puzzle tower to solve the two puzzles i missed in the last chapter and on the way back spoke to Gerard. He said he dropped something somewhere in front of the park and asked me to find it. He isn’t sure where exactly he dropped it or what it is that he actually dropped but I need to find it anyway. Anyway, I decided to save my game and take a break here.

For the commenters, here’s a fun one: You have only one match left. You want to light the room with the oil lamp, start a fire to heat the room and heat your bath water. Which one do you light first? Also, I still didn’t get an answer from the one I wrote yesterday.

The professor and Luke make their way successfully to Reinhold Manor, where they meet Lady Dahlia. But before they start talking, a loud noise startles Lady Dahlia’s cat, Claudia, who runs off. The professor and Luke are now forced to find the missing feline.

Professor Layton Art

I can’t stress enough how much I love the art of Professor Layton.

I’ve solved Simon’s Puzzle, which was pretty easy and involved just some basic geometry. He said I really should find the cat, as Lady Dahlia gets unreasonable when the cat runs off. I went outside the manor and the cat was there, but she instantly ran away again. At the river, Ramon said he saw the cat pass through on the way to town. At the boat, Luke asked the professor to solve another puzzle. A ship with 15 people is sinking and will be down in 20 minutes. There’s only one raft and it can hold 5 people. A round trip to the nearest island and back takes 9 minutes. How mans people will be saved. My first answer was 9. 5 people go on the first trip, one comes back with the boat and get 4 more. It was wrong. What I forgot is that the raft will be back a second time before the ship sinks, so another four people can be saved. The correct answer was 13. In a house in the city, Luke solved another fun puzzle involving candles. Ten candles are burning on a candlestick. The wind blows through the window and extinguishes 2 of them. A few minutes later, you notice one more is extinguished and close the window so it doesn’t happen again. Assuming the rest of the candles will be fine, how many will be left in the end? This is an easy one so I want answers in the comments. There was another puzzle in the store so I went out after solving that one.

At the town square, the man who lowered the bridge for me before told me that the crank used for it was stolen and asked me to find the thief. He also gave me some strange gizmo. Rodney gave me another puzzle at the town hall and this got me another gizmo. Claudio was waiting at the town square so I tried to catch her. She didn’t like that and scratched Luke’s face before running away again. She ran to the west, but I went south first to try and find more puzzles. I solved one in the streets and then I went to the inn where I booked us rooms and found a secret puzzle involving a painting. I went out and to the bridge, where another puzzle was easily solved.

It was time to go after the cat again to the west. In the local bar, a few more puzzles were waiting. I continued chasing the cat towards the park, solving a bunch of puzzles along the way. I caught up with it at the park entrance and used some fish bones and old lady gave me to lure her and finally caught her. Chapter 2 was complete and Chapter 3 started. I went back to the manor and saw that everyone was in a state of panic. Inspector Chemley was there, investigating a crime. While I was chasing a cat, Simon was murdered! I talked to Matthew, the butler and he said he found something in Simon’s room – a strange cog with a hammer and a wrench embedded into it. The inspector said I’m a suspect to, so I can’t leave the city before the investigation is concluded.

Lady Dahlia retreated to her room so I went there to talk to her. She asked me to help solved the case and left. I’ve found a photography in her room with her holding a child, presumably the lord’s former daughter, Flora. I asked the lady about it and she said she never had a child. This was strange so I asked the butler and he said that the women in the photo was the lord’s former wife and her similarity to lady Dahlia is pure coincidence. I’m guessing this will be important later, but for now, I need to go back to town and find Ramon who is missing. I saved my game and decided to take a break.

Based on a recommendation I got on one of my previous posts and all around good reviews of this game, I decided to try it in spite of the fact that it did not seem that appealing to me.

The result? I like it! It has some fun puzzles and I actually like the style of the graphics and story telling. There’s voice acting and the presentation is that of a cartoon. It also has it’s flaws, though. Some of the puzzles are strange and misleading. For instance, the puzzle with the two farmers. It clearly says that the plot is split in half, but, since the game put some much details into how fast they work, I assumed that this couldn’t be the correct answer, even though it was the first thing that crossed my mind. The one with the dog that got run over was weird to. I assumed i need to move two of the legs from the bottom to the top, but the game wanted them in a cross formation when I pointed them all backwards. Both formations seem perfectly plausible to me, so I really think the game should accept both answers.

Professor Layton and the Curious Village Cover Art

It has that old cartoon style. It reminds me of Doctor Dolittle.

Still, all of this might simply be because I’m not used to the game yet so I will give it some time. For now, I’ve solved eleven puzzles, including a bonus one and also got to chapter 2. I have two mysteries to solve. I need to find the golden apple and find out what was the source of the noise that scared the ladies cat.

I tried out this one yesterday, but I don’t think I will be playing it anymore. The best way to describe it would be Pokemon without the exploration. Or the leveling. Or familiar monsters (to me at least). There’s one town, navigated by menus. You get a random monster by drawing a glyph on the screen or shouting something in the microphone, then you go and train it at your ranch. You need to feed it and let it rest when it gets too tired. Every now and then there’s a tournament where you can win money and other stuff and increase your rank. Once you hit a wall, you try and get a new, better monster by summoning or breeding. All you get in the game are menus. You train through menus, watching a training animation every time, you travel through menus, and basically, you fight through menus. The fights aren’t that good either. You get a screen on which you click to move closer or move away from the enemy and, based on the distance, chose one of 3 attacks. After one minute, the one with more health wins.

Monster Rancher DS Box Art

The box art looks nice, but the game didn’t suck me in.

Basically, for me, it’s a duller and more tedious version of Pokemon and I do not like it one bit. Time to try another one.

My computer is acting up again. I can’t afford to do anything about it right now, so I was hoping to start using my DS again. The problem is, I didn’t follow the platform for a while now, so I have no idea what to play.

Any suggestions for a good newer DS game? I’m looking for something not to short that I could digest in small chunks. Almost any genre is OK. Please comment!

During one of my many train rides, I actually managed to complete this game on the third difficulty level. This means I have unlocked the Elite Beat Divas. Their difficulty isn’t much harder than Sweatin’ when it comes to the necessary clicking speed, but the buttons are much smaller so it takes way more accuracy. I managed to complete a few levels on this new difficulty, but I have yet to complete it entirely or unlock the third bonus song.

Instead of Pokémon, for which I was mostly to sleepy, I decided to play this one during my train rides. I finished Breezin’ during a single ride, and then proceded to complete Cruisin’ over the course of the next two. I also managed to unlock the first bonus song. I was a bit rusty, but you remember this game fast, so I’m now steadily progressing through the Sweatin’ difficulty.