May's Mysteries: the Secret of Dragonville: unsolvable puzzle

I've come across a puzzle which I think is impossible to solve without a huge amount of luck and randomness. It's puzzle 48 in the main story, and I've had to skip it.

In the puzzle, you have to put the words of ice cream flavours into the grid. The flavours you have are BANANA, CHOCOLATE, CARAMEL, COCONUT, LEMON, MOCHA and PISTACHIO. Words are placed like in Boggle, moving only horizontally or vertically. Spaces can be used more than once for the same letter. The first letters of words are placed outside the grid, and then you have to fit the rest inside.

The grid looks like this:

		B
	*	*	*	*	*	*
C	*	*	*	*	*	*	P
C	*	*	*	*	*	*
L	*	*	*	*	*	*
			C		M

For the words starting with letters other than C, you can at least start off with the first letter. For LEMON, you can see that the word has to continue along the bottom, since you can't have a word starting "CM". But after that I get stuck.

		B
	*	A	*	*	*	*
C	*	*	*	*	*	I	P
C	*	*	*	*	*	*
L	E	M	*	*	O	*
			C		M

I've had a load of goes at solving this, and nothing. I've tried terminating the PISTACHIO on the MOCHA's O, but that hems in the whole of the right side of the board. The hints suggest concentrating on the words starting with letters other than C (gee, thanks), and then the second hints says that the positioning of CHOCOLATE is key. That really doesn't help.

So, any ideas, anyone?

Update!  Tom from Croatia (see comments) has solved it!  The solution can be found on my new blog.

May's Mysteries: the Secret of Dragonville: a crime against humanity

Some of the bonus puzzles are picross puzzles. Amazing!

Unfortunately, some of them could have multiple solutions and the only way you can solve them is by guessing. If you put a mark in the wrong box, you lose a 'life' - and you get five lives per puzzle. Guessing in picross games is evil, and it upsets me.

Other than that, the game continues to be charming and unnervingly similar to Layton. I've now found an underground tunnel under a grave, and Mayor Doyle didn't follow me down the rope. Was he kidnapped, or is he the bad guy after all? I suspect the latter.

May's Mysteries: the Secret of Dragonville: go here, here, here, here ...

The similarities to Layton are blatant, to be frank, including the static shots of the character when you pass or fail a puzzle. The music sounds similar, the dialogue is similar, the way that you're told to look for different things and search in certain places is very similar. The only difference is the quality of the puzzles and the fact that there's no annoying little sidekick piping up at inappropriate moments.

May's Mysteries: the Secret of Dragonville: very laytonesque

I read a review that said that May's Mysteries was reminiscent of a Layton game. It's not just reminiscent, it's virtually identical, down to the art style, the idea of the fantasy world, the story and the interaction. Controlling May, you move between locations, tapping on characters to solve puzzles, build the story, and get points. The puzzles aren't quite the same as in Layton - there are a few limited types, including text-entry and rearrangement - but the feel is identical.

One thing that I can see being annoying is that I've got one puzzle wrong so far, and after failing it I wasn't given an option to retry it. This goes against my OCD tendancies somewhat.

But it's charming from what I've seen so far, and it's very likely that I'll see this through to completion.

Goldeneye 007: all over the place

I've not played a FPS on the Wii before, save for a few games of Red Steel on launch, so I found it pretty hard to adapt to the controls of this. To start with I was weaving all over the place, unable to aim or even get through a door. By the time I got to the end of the level, jumping off the dam, I was still finding aiming a bit tricky, but could at least walk down stairs without falling off the side to my death.

I was expecting a remake, but it's very different, with the levels being designed to be more complex. This is both a good and bad thing. Bad, because I was hoping to recognise everything. Good, because they're actually very well done indeed.

Tiny Tower: not restarting

I may have been a little overkeen on my last post about Tiny Tower. There is no synchronisation between different devices as such, only the first time that you play. When I started it on my iPhone, it asked me if I wanted to resume my game; however, after that point my iPad and iPhone have led completely different tower lives. I'm not playing it on both, so I've deleted it from my iPad.

I'm now up to 21 floors, and have some really rubbish people in residence. I'm slowly evicting them and trying to get people with better skills in.

3D Classics Xevious: not an arcade machine

The 3D effects on Xevious are possibly the best I've seen on the 3DS, and they are game-changing in a way I've not experienced before. The two layers of game are separated to such an extent that you can focus only on one plane of action at a time, and you have to constantly move between the two to avoid bullets and enemy ships. It makes it a lot harder, having to watch for bullets int eh top plane while lining up bombs in the bottom - to the extent that I've not managed to complete the first level yet.

Its arcade origins cause some issues though. When you use a life, you're put back at the start of the stage you're at, but the enemies are as tough as the part you'd got to. So you can be put back at the start of the first stage, but suddenly the enemies are shooting at you rather than passively moving out of the way. As a result, if you lose a life it's actually better to quit and restart. Obviously, in the arcase this is designed to make sure that you only stay on for a limited time, but here it just feels annoying.

Tiny Tower: you can't please all the people ...

... any of the time, it seems. Tiny Tower is a sim game, where you build extra floors, juggling between residential and commercial types, so as to maximise returns from all the shops who employ the bitizens who live in the tower.

Each bitizen has an ideal job. None of my bitizens have an ideal job which matches to the business types I have in my tower. They are all moderately happy - I'm doing my best to make sure they're doing something they're good at, after all - but I do wonder why they're moving in to a tower where they can never be completely happy.

I like the way it sychronises my game between my iPad and iPhone. It means it gets played a lot more.

Burnout Paradise: online shenannigans

Having been turned off only by the size of the single player game, I was more than happy to join the UGVM gang online. It's a completely different game when you're playing with people you know, driving around the same city and randomly crashing into them. The races from point-to-point were great fun (even if the game did glitch and give me an old banger, when everyone else was in an F1 car), and marked man events - where everyone tries to takedown one nominated player - led to hilarious carnage.

A few days later, I went online by myself, and it was still fun - just not as much. But it helped me to get a few more achievements, and I'm now over 10,000G. I may need to play more Wii games to compensate.

World of Goo HD: factories and virtual worlds

I played World of Goo on my Mac some time last year, but found it a little too tricky to control, with my mouse skills not up to the fast speeds needed. On the iPad, it's a different story. I've been making my way through the story, and have completed the first three chapters now, moving onto a strange virtual world where it's seemingly less about creating structures as it is about flicking goo balls between parts of the level. I'm not sure I approve.

However, the other game within the game, of building a tower of goo, is very addictive indeed. It's made all the more so since you can constantly see a cloud just overhead representing someone else's tower - and you want to build just a little further to beat it. I've got 200 goo balls in my playground now, so am starting to reach a fair height.

The Game of Life

I've not posted for a while. And I won't be posting for a while either.

I'm getting married tomorrow, and then I'm going on honeymoon. I have a feeling there may not be many videogames played.

Pilotwings Resort: completed!

I've completed the free flight mode, in any case. The last info point was in the middle of the ocean; the last stunt ring was hidden around the back of the golf island.

I've not perfected all the missions, but I will one day. It's such a relaxing game to play - and the 3D adds to it hugely.

Halo 3 ODST: completed!

My home console game of choice for the past couple of weeks has been ODST, the fourth in the Halo series despite the fact it has a 3 in the name. I believe it's considered part of Halo 3, but I can't quite see why since the story as far as I remember doesn't really fit alongside Halo 3's. I could be wrong.

I remember this having a relatively muted reception when it was first released, with people not liking a lack of variety in levels, thinking it was too short, and having a story where you don't play as Master Chief. It does seem shorter than most Halo games, but that's no bad thing since it's actually of a length where I'd consider replaying it. This is helped by the fact that the story is really well told, with an initial scene explaining the game - splitting up the troop - and the rest of the narrative told by an interpolation between Rookie finding clues as to what happened, and flashbacks during which you take control of other members of the team. With you all meeting up in the end, and fleeing a burning Earth.

While the setting was all similar - all around New Mombasa - there was plenty of variety in the types of game, with various levels demanding sniping, explosives, getting past hunters or just a load of grunts and elites. The original Halo required a bit of puzzle solving to work out how to get past different levels, and this is no different - though with the Rookie parts, there's further need for exploration and it's all a bit more eerie. There's a good range of weapons on each level as well - meaning you can often find a beam rifle when you need one.

And as for not playing as Master Chief - so? The only part that grated was when controlling Buck, who kept on shouting idiotic gung-ho phrases which were far too American, which I'd never do. Other than that, the only difference was the need to pick up health kits occasionally, and the fact you can't jump as high. Not a huge problem for a game not designed around jumping.

I've got Reach to play now - but I'll not start that for a while, I think. Halo is good in smaller doses.

Space Channel 5: chu chu chu!

I'm still not sure if they say "chu" or "shoot".

Back in 2006, Owen posted about Space Channel 5. He wanted to try again five years later, to see if he could get past the first level. Unfortunately, he never got the chance to.

In his memory, today a number of people from ugvm and RLLMUK have played Space Channel 5 - the idea being to at least finish the first level. Owen said he got kicked out because his view rating wasn't high enough, so I presume that's after the robot battle. I ended the level on 21%, well above the 15% cut-off.

The graphics have aged quite badly in places - walking on the spaceport roof, for example, the pre-rendered background looks like it's at a different angle to the characters. And background characters seem to have rectangular heads. The rhythm of the music is difficult sometimes, but after calibrating the TV to 'game mode' it worked OK.

I played the first section a few times, though, since my Dreamcast kept coming up with disc read errors to start with. I hope it's not on the way out. I would normally just get a new one but I recall PSO characters are tied to the console.

Anyway. Space Channel 5. Sorry Owen, it's not that hard to get past the first level. But I did it for you, so you can say you've done it now.

Pilotwings Resort: a strange sense of déjà vu

I wasn't overly impressed with Pilotwings on the SNES, so was pleased to see that the 3DS game bears very little resemblance, with even a different structure to the missions.

It's also a lot easier; I've completed (but not perfected) most of the main levels now, and have found the majority of information points and stunt rings, balloons and rings in the free flight mode. I can understand the complaints about it being light on content, but it's such fun to play that I'm happily going back through missions trying to improve my score.

My main disappointment is that the location is the same as that used in Wii Sprots Resort. I've flown over that island so much now that there's not much left to explore. We'll need somewhere new for the next game.

Ridge Racer 3D: someone's in my slipstream

I can see the commentary getting tiring very quickly.

But not the game. I've never really been into Ridge Racer before - Ridge Racers for the PSP was pretty good, and Ridge Racer Type 4 was fun for a month or so - but this gives a much better, more controllable race. And it's in 3D as well. Proper 3D. Unfortunately, because of the way the polygons break up at a distance, it makes the horizon go a bit funny, but there's no doubting that this is really quite amazing stuff.

I've been playing around with the various games and utilities for a few hours now. The 3D effect works really well, though some applications have quite a narrow effective viewing range. You just have to hold it still.

Game memories: E

Ecco the Dolphin: Defender of the Future (Dreamcast)
The original Mega Drive games were pretty, and at the time were examples of great pacing and exploration. They’ve aged badly, though, and are far too difficult and imprecise to be fun. The same with this, in fact, with the momentum behind Ecco making any fight a random punching at buttons and hoping to flee. And while the Mega Drive games still look great, in a sprite-based way, this is starting to look a little ropey. Especially when you compare it to ...

Endless Ocean (Wii)
A lovely, relaxing, dive game with little to panic or scare you. Exploring the intricate environments is great.

Evil Twin (Dreamcast)
Mediocre action adventure type game which was far better on the Dreamcast than the PS2, but sold only 12 copies.

Exit (PSP)
I really enjoyed this for a while – working out how to save everyone and get to the exit in time was a good logistical puzzle. But it all moved so slowly, and the animation playing out over and over again made it an exercise in frustration in the end.

Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem (Gamecube)
I’ve only even played half an hour of this, because I’m a wuss.

Essential Sudoku DS (DS)
Not for the Sudoku, but for the 1000 colour picross puzzles included. The interface used to complete the puzzles was superb, and while the front-end looks like it was put together by a five-year old with a set of crayons, you can look past that to the excellent implementation. I completed this. All one thousand puzzles.

Elite Beat Agents (DS)
It’s fun, but not amazing. Maybe just because I’m not very good at it.

Excite Truck (Wii)
It’s a racing game, but completely different to every other racing game I own. I love it, but it’s quite a light experience with me feeling very often that progress is down to luck more than anything else.

Earth Defence Force 2017 (Xbox 360)
EDF! EDF!

Game memories: D

Doom (32X)
I played the PC game a fair bit, yes, but the 32X game is where I really learnt to love Doom (and the GBA conversion kept the affair running). It played brilliantly on the console, particularly with the MD's sublime six-button controllers.

Doom RPG (N95)
A really clever adaptation of the game, set to a turn-based first-person RPG with all the enemies and weapons of the original. I'm not sure if there's any way to play it now, short of buying an old phone.

Dr Kawashima's Brain Training (DS)
I played this religiously every day for ages. I'm not sure it improved my mental capacity at all, but I had fun. I have the brain of a 20-year old, apparently. Maybe that explains why I still like S Club.

Drawn to Life (DS)
A surprisingly good platformer, in which you draw the characters (to an extent, within animation boundaries). Each time you find a new thing, you colour it in and it stays like that for the rest of the game. The only issue is that the game is a little too hard for its intended audience.

Disaster: Day of Crisis (Wii)
A great experience, but I don't think it's got a huge amount of replayable value to it. Having said that, I never did finish it, and I last played it ages ago, so I may well start from the beginning again.

Dead or Alive: Xtreme Beach Volleyball (Xbox)
Or "look at our boobs". The volleyball game wasn't as good as Beach Spikers (which I forgot, oops), and the 'gifts' section was awful. I paid £5 for it, and that was £10 too much.

Donkey Konga (Gamecube)
I was so excited about this. I bought the game and bongos in an HMV in Kingston because they were selling it the day before release day, and carried everything home across London during rush hour. The game didn't disappoint; the highlight to me being Don't Stop Me Now, which, whenever it comes on in a club or disco nowadays, causes Kieron, Matt and myself to exchange knowing glances.

Dancing Stage (PS)
I had a load of these. I wish I could play them on the PS3, but there's nowhere to plug the dance mat into.

Wii Sports Resort: bettering Pilotwings

I spent some lovely relaxing time flying around Wuhu Island, collecting the information points (of which I now have 50 of the 80) and sightseeing. I can now fly at night or in the evening, and shoot balloons which everyone seems to hold. But there's no pressure to do so, and it's lovely to just fly around and investigate. I just wish you could do so for more than five minutes at a time.

After this, I wanted something more energetic, so I played a bit of swordfighting, and then the 100-pin bowling game. My high score sits around 2000, I think, which is pretty good given the need to knock down all pins twice in a row.

One thing Wii Sports Resort doesn't do too well is the stamps. These are similar to achievements on the Xbox 360, but are less imaginative and seem to be bolted on at the last minute. It's almost worth ignoring them completely.

And Yet It Moves: twisty

As one of the few WiiWare games with a demo, I thought I'd give this a try. I'm glad I did, since it's a really clever idea, if a little rough around the edges in places. At any time, you can pause the game and rotate the wiimote to rotate the entire level. With this, part of the level move, or you can fall through small gaps, or you can walk up walls, and so on. It gets quite tricky after a while, particularly because as you fall you build momentum and so you can't just rotate the stage to fall to the exit otherwise you get squashed.

I'm tempted to buy the full game, but I don't have enough points on my account at the moment. If I could pay with cash, I would.