You might know Nob Yoshigahara for his many design contributions over the years to the Cast Puzzle series. However, one of his most successful designs to date, the Rush Hour, is not a Cast Puzzle, nor the game I'm reviewing today, the Subtrax, but they're equally fascinating... And addicting, I might add.

Even though the concept is not entirely new, since it's a variation of the classic Peg Solitaire, the new design is very attractive and comes with plenty of different challenges to solve - 40, to be exact. The game is produced by ThinkFun, so you can expect a high-quality product.

One of the reasons I liked the Subtrax instantly was its color combination, blue, white and orange. You can see why, by the colors in my blog. Also, because I always enjoyed Peg Solitaire games. I have a few variations in my ever-growing collection.

The design is both elegant and very functional, like most ThinkFun games and puzzles, ideal for travel. The contents are stored in a sliding compartment and there's a slot in the top to place the challenge card being used at that moment. The dimensions are quite appropriate for this kind of portable game, with 18 x 13  x 3.5cm (7.1" x 5.1" x 1.4").

There are two major differences between the classic Peg Solitaire and the Subtrax: The grids are completely different. While in the Peg Solitaire you have straight lines connecting the pegs with an overall square area, the Subtrax uses diagonal lines to achieve hexagonal shapes; The other visible difference is the total number of pegs. The original has 32 and the Subtrax has only 15. I guess I don't need to tell which one is harder to solve...

If you ever played a Peg Solitaire game before, the rules are basically the same: the pegs move from hole to hole following the lines on the grid; you can only move one peg by jumping over an adjacent one and remove it; in the Subtrax, the orange peg is the last one on the grid.

I've seen countless variations of the Peg Solitaire game, and I have even reviewed one here recently, the Hoppers. So, with all these variations, you might wonder if the Subtrax brings anything new to the Peg Solitaire concept. My answer? - Yes and no...

No, because there's always that sense of dejá vù, that you played this before: you're jumping over pegs until only one remains. And yes, because in addition to the more traditional challenge, you're given a plethora of different challenges to solve in four different levels of difficulty. The new design with diagonal lines is also very interesting, and while not changing radically the concept, it does provide a new experience to an already known game... And I think I've already mentioned the superb color combo - That's a major plus!

Closing Comments:

If you like Peg Solitaire games, I guarantee you you'll love this new approach to the concept. The challenges start rather easy with very few pegs to remove and will gradually become harder until all pegs are used. It's made by ThinkFun, so you won't be disappointed.

Availability: I got my copy of Subtrax from Sloyd in Finland. International shipping available.

Nob Yoshigahara might be best known for his ever popular classic game, Rush Hour. However, thanks to his genius, he left us many other great puzzle inventions such as the Hoppers, a fun and addictive solitaire game manufactured by ThinkFun.

Hoppers was first introduced in 1999, when ThinkFun was still known as Binary Arts - A much cooler name in my opinion. At the time, the version that was released didn't feature the red frog, like the one you see here, which wasn't introduced until early 2003. A year later, Binary Arts decided to launch a slightly different version of the game with business executive tokens called Downsize. This version is no longer in production and might be rare to find, but I was lucky enough to find one for my collection on eBay a few years ago. I did get the Downsize version first, but now I much prefer the Hoppers game, as I reckon the idea of the frogs jumping over each other works better.

Hoppers is quite simple to understand: You pick one of the 40 challenge cards and set up the board with the frogs exactly like you see on the card. Like any other solitaire game, you solve it by taking one step at a time, removing one token simply by hopping over another into an empty space, as indicated by the lines on the board. You have the challenge solved when you're left with only one frog in the pond, the red frog.

The current version of Hoppers with the red frog is believed to be harder than the older version. In this one, the red frog must survive until the end and be the last token on the board. The new version also reduces the number of possible movements for each particular solution, because you can't just make a move that'll result in the red frog being removed. Something that might give some confusion is the fact of the red frog being moved altogether. In fact, you can move the red frog over other frogs just like any other token. Just make sure the moves you do have the right sequence that'll end with the red frog as the last one on the board.

The included 40 challenges are divided into four difficulty levels (beginner, intermediate, advanced and expert), which will keep you busy for a long while. Some of the intermediate challenges already require some heavy thinking, but the advanced and expert levels will surely put your solitaire skills to the test. It took me over 10 minutes at times just to solve a single challenge. For reference, the earlier levels don't take more than a minute or two to be solved.

Closing Comments:

I love solitaire games! I have several of them in my collection and they're among my favorite fun puzzles to solve. ThinkFun deserves all the credit for having a wide selection of these great puzzles in their catalog, and Hoppers is one of the best. I highly recommend it for any one remotely interested in puzzle games.

Availability: You can find the Hoppers game at Sloyd.fi in Finland. Worldwide shipping available.

Links:

Some tips on how to tackle the Hoppers' challenges by George Bell

A Few Challenges

Beginner:

Can you solve the next ones?

Intermediate:

Solitaire Chess is a logic puzzle/game invented by the Finnish Vesa Timonen and produced by Thinkfun since 2010. Vesa has also contributed with some of his designs for the Hanayama Cast Series, like the Cast Square or the Cast Loop, among others.

The game is for one player only and it's based on the rules of traditional chess. However, even if you don't know how to play chess, you'll most certainly enjoy the Solitaire Chess, as it's very easy to understand the rules. The objective is to capture every piece on the board, according to the challenge cards and following the movement rules, until only one piece remains on the board. There are a few key differences between the two games, but the piece movements remain the same:

- The Solitaire Chess is a simplified version with a quarter of the size of a normal chess board.

- Since the game is for one player only, all the pieces are the same color.

- Every time you perform a move, you must capture a piece.

- Pawns are not promoted when they reach the top row.

- The "check" rule is not applied for the King.

- Every challenge that includes the King will result in it being the last piece on the board (The King is never captured).

With these differences in mind, getting started with Solitaire Chess won't be a problem. Included with the game are 30 double-sided challenge cards (60 challenges in total) divided in four levels of difficulty, ten chess pieces (1 King, 1 Queen, 2 Rooks, 2 Knights, 2 Bishops, 2 Pawns), a chess board with a storage drawer and an instruction booklet with hints and step-by-step solutions.

(Click to Enlarge)

To set up a game, start by choosing one card with the desired level of difficulty and place the corresponding pieces on the board. You know you've solved the challenge when you have only one piece left. If you are left with more than one piece and there's no more possible moves, you need to reset the challenge and try again.

For someone like me that knows how to play chess, the Solitaire Chess is a surprisingly addictive game. If you're an experienced chess player and think that this game is not worth your time, you couldn't be more wrong. My only advice is to start from the harder challenges and you'll see that there will be times when you have to think very hard in order to know how to solve them. The strategy behind the Solitaire Chess is somewhat similar to the traditional chess in that you have to think many steps ahead.

I haven't played chess for a while now, maybe since I've started collecting puzzles back in 2008, but after playing a few challenges on the Solitaire Chess, I find myself totally immersed in it. The beginner and intermediate challenges are great to get the hang of it, but the serious ones start when you reach the advanced level and of course, the ultimate level, the expert. I can manage to solve the advance levels within 5 or 10 minutes, but the expert ones, can take up to 20 minutes, although I've solved a few within 10 minutes. This goes to show you that every type of player will have challenges that will certainly meet his skills, from novice to pro. After you've solved all challenges, you can try them all again after a while and see what you still remember. Great replay value.

(Click to Enlarge)

The Solitaire Chess is available at Sloyd.fi for €24.

Video: Check out Thinkfun's presentation video for the Solitaire Chess.

Closing Comments:

The Solitaire Chess is a brilliant concept and adaptation of traditional chess. It borrows the essence of chess and turns it into a fantastic and addictive puzzle/game that will be hard to put down until all challenges are solved. This is by far, in my opinion, one of the best puzzle/games from Thinkfun and also from the genre. I recommend it to anyone that is remotely interested in puzzles.

Examples of challenges (one per level of difficulty):

(Click to Enlarge) - Beginner Challenge & Last Piece

(Click to Enlarge) - Expert Challenge & Last Piece