The Wand

This was a fun little puzzler in which we're looking for three-colour combinations to input into a wand, the effects of which can be then used to advance us through the castle. The puzzles start off easy and straightforward, getting more complex towards the end. They're just hard enough, I think, to elicit that all-important sense of achievement that puzzle-solving has to evoke without crossing the line into being frustrating.

The puzzle design is fairly old-school. A couple of the colour combinations come to us in two parts, and unfortunately it's sometimes possible to brute-force the final answer based on just one part of the puzzle. I think that part could have been tightened up a bit.

The story itself is just an excuse for the puzzlefest. We're not told who we are or why we're here, aside from our goal of winning the challenge and getting the prize. That's acceptable, I guess: we have a long tradition of puzzlefests clothed in just the thinnest veneers of arbitrary story. It's just that I keep thinking that something more could be done in this direction.

I guess it's kind of like bacon & eggs and coffee. Enjoyable and satisfying on its own, and requiring a certain amount of skill and expertise to get right ... but kind of standard breakfast fare.