The designers behind Tesshi-e go down memory lane with this fresh remake of their very first escape game and they drag us along for the ride. It's a wonderful, nostalgic look back that brings those old, simple designs into the stunning present. With its stunning graphics, involving puzzles, and two endings, Mild Escape 1 is a fantastic addition to the Tesshi-e escape catalogue.

At first, To Nothing sounds like a misnomer for SuzumeDr's newest escape game. You start out in a somewhat sparsely furnished room with nothing in your hands except a black-and-white sports bag. You dump out the bag's contents and instantly all the slots in your inventory are full. The catch? As you go around and solve puzzles, every object in the room and in your inventory will... disappear, one by one. It's hard to be original in a well-established genre like the room escape, but SuzumeDr is definitely good at his trade.

Muu's quiet little cave-dwelling life is about to be turned upside down when he sets out to find the source of an explosion that rocks the land. Though short and somewhat challenging, this platformer packs a lot of appealing retro charm into a small package and is worth checking out for the fifteen minutes or so it'll take you.

This lyrical work of interactive fiction, brainchild of Jonas Kyratzes who created The Book of Living Magic, will envelope you in a surrealistic experience of discovery, a gentle stroll through a timeless pastoral state where your decisions are rewarded with rich verse and life-pondering revelations. Each passage presents you with a choice which will determine your path; stroll slowly through the experience and play more than once to fully appreciate the outcomes of each option. Arcadia: a Pastoral Tale elevates the oft misjudged browser game onto the loftier plane of artistic poignancy.

The creators of Grisly Manor bring another beautiful but easy point-and-click puzzle adventure to your iOS. Your Grandmother, once a great adventurer/archaeologist, sends you off to complete the journey she was never able to make, to a place where the seasons are at your fingertips. Low on challenge but big on style and user-friendliness, it's the perfect way to relax and get a little adventuring in all in one go.

Robamimi never fails to delight escape-the-room aficionados with beautiful yet minimalistic interior design, light puzzles that require thought without enervating the brain, and buoyant endings that leave us smiling in accomplishment. Move about the room following the arrow keys, clicking on anything that begs closer examination and keeping an eye out for clues, no matter how surreptitiously found, until you find your way out. With its seamless, intuitive quality to gameplay, a neatly organized inventory, and lack of misdirection, Sound Color R turns a graceful and serene diversion into a spark of vibrancy and music to light up your day.

We've all had that problem. You know, the one where the Netbots start to plug up the kitchen sink so the water doesn't drain. Or the one where the Netbots keep your bowling ball from coming back down the ball return at the local bowling alley. Managing the Netbots can be quite a tricky task, as a group of scientists find out in Maik Haider's Netbots, a puzzle where you have to learn to divide to conquer.

Similar in concept to the Total Perspective Vortex, from Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Scale of the Universe 2 isn't really a game, but it'll still blow your mind. You start at human scale and can scroll all the way down to theoretical concepts like strings or all the way up to the potential size of the universe. That's pretty big, and you have to scroll for a long, long, long time time to get back to human scale from there. It's kind of terrifying, honestly. Try not to think about it too much.

Feed some peckish porcupines in pursuit of the perfect Philly "sammich". Strap a porcupine into the slingshot and aim, clearing a stage of balloons using as few rodents as possible. Each color balloon affects your prickly pal's trajectory differently and you'll have to contend with air currents and pesky clouds to boot. Plus, you'll get to brush up on your geography as the porcupines bounce their way across America on their quest to the City of Sammich-y Love.

Imagine a dimension not only of sight, but of mind; a journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are imagination. This should help put you in the right state of mind before you venture into Louis (T)'s unique puzzle platformer, where you control a black pawn in 4-dimensional space. Your goal in each of the 14 levels is to touch the grey checkpoints through what looks like some impossible jumping. This game will blow your mind! Or possibly just blow it up.

Usually, you'd be greeted to each Letters in Boxes challenge with a warm smile and an equally warm chocolate chip cookie. This week, however, we're telling you to get lost! We've got another batch of homegrown puzzles for you to tackle, all themed around mazes. In each grid, you'll find a way in and a way out, but how to get from one to the other is left for you to figure out.

Super Crazy Guitar Maniac Deluxe 4 is all about re-imagining the Guitar Hero experience for your home PC. It improves over its predecessors with amusing presentation and a host of new options and features. You can play every song in two difficulty levels, garner achievements for epic thrashing or embarrassing failure, and battle egregious enemy bosses like the diabolical Puppet or the innocent Pizza Guy through the shear power of Rock. Or you can just put on your headphones and sneak a quick jam in a break in your day.

Would you go to the ends of the earth, through bat-infested caverns, crossing fiery pits of lava and crawl like a spider to get your significant other a gift? Of course you would—because it's fun! So flex those finger muscles over the [WASD] or arrow keys because each level is another test of dexterity and ingenuity in the courtship gauntlet. The funky tuba tunes and art that brings to mind The Flintstones is especially enjoyable, worth a either a quick dabble or dogged determination to the end.

As the title suggests, the room you're to escape from is haunted, although it is haunted with a Japanese ghost, which means not jump scares, screams, and buckets of blood, but rather quiet glimpses as you explore each area of the tiny apartment searching for a way out. Escape from the Haunted Room is an atmospheric little escape game with amusing puzzles. It's not very long, but it contains enough chills to be worth the effort. Enjoy trying to escape the room with the good ending.

If you've ever considered that walking around dressed like a tree, or fish or bear or stoneman, and talking in a computer-simulated voice is one of your life's aspirations, well here's your chance. Your fancy-dress fantasies can be finally fulfilled in The Fisherman's Wrath, an unusual kind of adventure game by BigDino. It's tricky trying to define what kind of game this is because it involves a little bit of battle, a little bit of avoidance, quite a bit of exploration and a lot of dressing up...in awesome disguises.

If the hero of Pick and Dig 3 could jump and actually bothered to use the mace on his back, there'd be no challenge to the puzzles in this platformer, and therefore no fun. The levels in this game are nonlinear, and unlock based on how many you've completed and your own ability to maneuver around the level select screen, so if you get stuck on one level, you can always try some others to get coins to upgrade.

Having a rough day? Has life got you stressed? Well, here at JIG, we know that nothing relieves tension quite like a good old fashioned physics puzzler chock full of explosions. Detonate bomb blocks by clicking on them, clearing them all from the stage while taking care not to blast any stars away. Complete a stage in as few clicks as possible for a bonus. Relax, put your feet up, and blowup something cute for a while.

Color has you test the accuracy of your perception of color as you learn about key concepts in the theory of color and design. Simply move your cursor about the large color wheel and click when you have matched the color of the timer inside, before time runs out. Later levels have you matching multiple colors at once, giving you the opportunity to learn about complementary, analogous, ternary, and quaternary colors, all in the context of the game.

Robin Vencel proves he is master of the charming and cute little point-and-click puzzle game with another installment of the popular Monkey GO Happy series. All new puzzles in this edition of Marathon will have you pointing and clicking to turn those adorable little monkey frowns upside down as quick as you can.

Slice, grate, carve and fry your way to the top of the culinary food chain with the wave of a finger in this time management-heavy cooking sim app that's so addictive, it has to contain MSG. Once you know the basics, there's an easy pick-up-and-play style that will compel you to sneak a few days' work in between classes, during lunch breaks, before bed, whenever.

The cute and captivating sandbox meets simulation game Clouds & Sheep is going to be the number one reason you can't keep a full charge on your Android device. Combining elements from games like Tiny Tower, Pocket God, Virtual Villagers, and more, you are put in charge of a pasture of lovely little sheep, your only goal being to make them happy and make them multiply. To do that, you'll take control of the weather, utilize dozens of items, and complete challenges that range from zapping things with lightning to rolling sheep into rocks!

A puzzle game in which you direct streams of colored particles from lotus flowers to colored chakras, achieving totally zen-eriffic enlightenment on the way. It's quick, and perhaps a little easy, but it sure is relaxing to watch colored pixels flow across the screen. Ahhh...colored pixels.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and, in this spoof of one of the most popular escape-the-room designers to ever grace JIG's pages, No. 1 Game is very good at copying the trademark features that we love so much—photo-realistic graphics, fun-to-solve logical puzzles and even a happy coin ending! Of course, they throw in their own trademark: ten green escape men which you must find before exiting. It's not only a lot of fun to be part of the parody, you'll be left with an increased appreciation for the original's artistry and a temptation to replay the classics which inspired the clone.

Need a dash of rainbow splashed across your logic puzzles? Conceptis delivers a cacophony of colorful curiosities with Color Pic-a-Pix Light, the latest addition in their Conceptis Light series. You might be familiar with Pic-a-Pix puzzles from their previous black-and-white edition, but this new batch adds the twist of color, meaning the logic gets more twisted, and the solutions more dazzling!

Flex your carpentry muscles and laugh in the face of physics in this stacking physics puzzler. Click and drag a variety of wooden pieces into position, figuring out the best way to pile them into a relatively stable design while also attempting to collect blue stars and avoid pesky red ones. It's the perfect chance to redeem yourself for that failed wood shop class, but with fewer splinters!

Tomatea has outdone themselves with this amazing and delightful little gem, packed full of use of found objects, letter puzzles, number puzzles, and some other treats that we won't spoil. Just solve a ton of color puzzles and you too can enjoy the refreshing feeling of going out after the rain and enjoying the wonder of mother nature. It's time to dive into this amazing new room escape and taste the rainbow.

While it isn't big on innovation, Neutronized's adorable platformer is big on charm and packed with loads of classic platforming action to boot! Play as a pudgy, snowball throwing penguin and run, roll, butt-stomp and hope your way through a beautiful world packed with interesting enemies and loads of style.

Understandably, helicopters are hard to come by in the insect world, so it's up to one intrepid little caterpillar to create its own and your help is required in this puzzler. Point and click your way through each screen to help the caterpillar find parts, avoid predatory foes and achieve its ultimate goal of becoming a beautiful butterfly.

Dustforce is a speed-centric acrobatic platform game from Hitbox Team. A demo first appeared back in 2010, showing off the concept and basic design. Since then, the game has undergone some silent but effective changes, improving upon the controls and adding loads of content to sweep through. It's a fast, combo-centric arcade experience that emphasizes speed and perfection, and thanks to the online highscore boards and per-level badges, you'll be strangely compelled to keep playing until everything is just right.

This physics puzzle game created by Vyacheslav Stepanov continues the brilliant fun began in the original Let It Glow. Click on objects to remove them to direct the flow of electricity toward a light bulb long enough to make it glow. It's short at only 20 levels and occasionally it involves fickle subtleties in physics law. Yet, besides being very satisfying to play, Let It Glow 2 fulfills your penchant to invent and construct; ergo, this is a shining example of what makes the phuzzle so gratifyingly enjoyable.

Originally released as a download version in 2008, this lovely musical game by Alexander Porechnov of Kranx Productions mingles elements of tetris, sudoku and hidden object scenes into a point-and-click puzzle that's both unique and very entertaining. First seek and find the pieces of a musical outline, then use audio, geometric and symbolic clues to place the puzzle pieces in their correct order to reconstruct a classic song. With its melodious instrumentals, gorgeous graphics and challenging puzzles, Musaic Box is as pleasing to the eyes and ears as it is fun to play.

Minoto serves up this strange and silly homage to the new year in another trademark point-and-click puzzler. Help a dragon do his duties and get him safely past all manner of... unusual obstacles by thinking outside the box and indulging in a little charming and colourful surrealism.

Tesshi-e's latest stars a protagonist taking a much-needed vacation to the titular open-air hot spring, only getting into it isn't so easy; a number of puzzles to solve and inventory items to pick up and use lie in wait before the customer can warm their body properly. This game doesn't break Tesshi-e's streak of good escape games; the puzzles are fairly logical and make sense without being too easy, the controls are just fine, pixel-hunting is nonexistent (as is a changing cursor, but who needs it?) and there's a save feature for when you want to take a break from your break.

An escape game that is heavy on story and light on escaping, since the goal is not to leave the room but to find a time capsule left by your now deceased wife to celebrate what would have been your 10th wedding anniversary. Even if you don't have a sentimental bone in your body The Time Capsule is still a lot of puzzle packed into a small space and definitely fun for any escape fanatic. Let the soothing music clip relax you as you solve puzzles that range from pretty simple to head-banging-hard and enjoy the mid-week escaping challenge.

Created in just 72 hours for Ludum Dare #22, this puzzle game took second place in both innovation and overall competition. Your goal is to eliminate all the tiles on the screen by moving the dual protagonists across the game board, each seemingly on a different planes. As you pass over a color-coordinated square, it disappears, barring further passage, in most instances at least. The lovelorn duo continually gain new abilities, inspired by their circumstances and feelings, adding new dimensions and means to move on. This twist on game mechanics not only keeps it fresh and fun, it makes the narrative truly interesting and enjoyable rather than just words bridging across levels.

e slow paced but challenging iOS title from Highline Games has a sharp focus that sticks firmly to word crafting. No weirdo bonus mini-games, clowns, hidden objects or other gimmicks, just long levels of wrapping your brain around a grid of letters. Oh, and just so you know, W.E.L.D.E.R. stands for Word Examination Laboratory for Dynamic Extraction and Reassessment. Aren't you glad you were curious?!

Symphony is a simplified adaptation of the popular music puzzle game Auditorium. Control the colorful streams of light into the target boxes by positioning the arrows to fill them with music.

MoonMana offers up simple but undeniably lovely arcade playing with this hypnotic game about catching stars and... no, that's about it, really. While there isn't much to them, both Stellar Hunter games are beautiful and satisfying in that way you sometimes just want that feels specifically designed to make you relax with a smile on your face.

Legend tells us of King Midas, granted a gift by Pan that all he would touch would turn to gold. The tale is the inspiration for Midas, a puzzle platform game by Wanderlands, and overall winner of the Ludum 22 Game Jam. In it, you must guide the king to his love, but not before you reach the river that will wash him of his "gift". The theme for the competition was "Alone", a word that's perfectly captured by this short, challenging, and even poignant game.

Kanoti's short point-and-click puzzle might be aimed primarily at young kids, but that doesn't mean anyone can't enjoy it! Play as an assistant to the official Hot Chocolate Dude (yes, that's now his official name) attempting to deliver the royal frothing spoon before the King gets his daily cup. Short but definitely sweet, this is one game that's exceptionally easy but also packs in a lot of charm and silliness.

In this edition of Letters In Boxes, Steve realizes how big of a nerd he is after basing an entire set of puzzles around a numerical pattern, while slipping in a reference to a British game show in the same paragraph. But you don't have to be a nerd to play our game, you've just got to dive into these cube-based puzzles and find the hidden words to win!

Sometimes Cloudy Challenge, by Haretoki, is a fresh, fun, and fabulous Japanese escape game. The space is small and cramped, less a room and more of a large closet. Crammed within the confines are a plethora of strange and wonderful devices, each one more mysterious than the last. Take the plunge and enjoy a small yet meaty escape that is sure to tickle your logic circuits and prompt at least one "wow, cool!" moment before you're done.

Sometimes Cloudy Challenge, by Haretoki, is a fresh, fun, and fabulous Japanese escape game. The space is small and cramped, less a room and more of a large closet. Crammed within the confines are a plethora of strange and wonderful devices, each one more mysterious than the last. Take the plunge and enjoy a small yet meaty escape that is sure to tickle your logic circuits and prompt at least one "wow, cool!" moment before you're done.

Like to share your candy? One look at the big, dewy eyes of Om Nom might just convince you to. ZeptoLab's iOS smash hit physics puzzle swings into your browser via the impressive power of HTML5. Slice through ropes with the flick of a mouse and deliver the candy to the wee beastie below, avoiding obstacles and nabbing stars along the way. A simple concept with a beautiful presentation and a whole lot of charm makes this one the perfect treat for coffee break style gaming.

You know what are always enjoyable? RC Tanks, especially ones that you can use to fire things at your least-favorite sibling. It took Emitter Critter to realize how this universal archetype of fun might translate well to flash form, and the result is the new top-down shooter, Awesome Tanks. It's nothing too complicated: Shoot stuff. Get coins. Buy upgrades. But when so many arena games are drenched with gore or zombie blood (not that there's anything wrong with that!), it's always cool to see polished genre works that are "kid-friendly" without feeling too "kiddy". Awesome Tanks' fifteen levels have the combination of frenetic action and colorful explosions that all ages should enjoy.

Dateline: Quadrilopolis. To the world at large, mild-mannered office worker Cube Kent seems to do nothing more than work at the office of Office Work Incorporated. However, due to a mysterious accident as a young involving a radioactive chemistry set, whenever there is a call for help, he need only to duck into a convenient telephone booth to become... Square Hero! NDGames' Champion of justice, and puzzle platforming protagonist extraordinaire! He's here in his poly-bagged, holographic, foil-embossed, varient-covered, action-packed first issue, and while it's not quite Eisner Award-worthy for innovation, it's definitely a fun romp, true believers.

A crazy, multiplayer romp through a visually lush game featuring three moderately-mad fantasy characters with their own unique abilities? Show us where to sign and we'll be there! Actually, now that you mention it, Trine 2 happens to be all of the things described above, plus a whole lot more. It's got action, it's got physics puzzles, it's got both single- and online multiplayer modes, and it's got a sense of humor that will probably remind you of Magicka. It's a modern-day version of The Lost Vikings, and any gamer will be proud to experience the world Trine 2 has to offer!

Ever wanted to be the king (or queen!) or everything? How about as a reason to blow everything up? This adorable, frantic arena shooter packs tons of action, upgrades, enemies, bosses, and even power-ups into one simple but explosively fun experience to keep you on your toes.

Ever wanted to be the king (or queen!) or everything? How about as a reason to blow everything up? This adorable, frantic arena shooter packs tons of action, upgrades, enemies, bosses, and even power-ups into one simple but explosively fun experience to keep you on your toes.

Japanese, Dghgbakufu, is one designer who combines simple yet beautiful visuals with challenging puzzles. There's no narration, no story, no music. Just a room. With puzzles. Logical puzzles. And sometimes that's all we need out of a decent escape game.

Soothing is the best descriptor of a Tomatea game, and Snowflake Night fits right into that oeuvre with its serene backgrounds, lilting music, and gentle puzzles. Start up the game and let the overall experience wash away any mid-week frustrations as you navigate around the beautiful space and let the calming music flow as you skip lightly from one puzzle to the next. Had a rough week at work or school? Stressed out waiting for the weekend? Take a deep breath, let it out, and experience the joy of Snowflake Night, a calming experience no matter what the reason.

Alone. A word that has both good and bad connotations. For Matt Rix' Ludum Dare entry, it's a goal. In The Word Alone, you are given a Boggle-esque board where you are tasked to eliminate all the other letters to leave just 'A', 'L', 'O', 'N' and 'E'. Do you have the word and spatial genius to accomplish this?

Raise your hand if you've heard this one before: The evil Dr. Mad has corrupted the programming of six thematic robots and has sent them out to do his bidding, each utilizing a weapon that would be suspiciously effectively against exactly of their evil kin. The only thing possibly standing in Mad's way is the new creation of the good Dr. Thane: the high-jumping, fast-dashing, laser-blasting, ability-stealing Rokko Chan! Okay, Japanese developer King admittedly isn't exactly trying to hide the inspirations for his retro platformer. But if Rokko Chan may look and play like a ROM hack, then it is a very lovingly crafted one of high quality.

Making Monkeys is just as charming and quirky as Greg Sergeant's previous game Use Boxmen. With only 11 true levels, this puzzle platformer is definitely brief, but it works well as a coffee break game, maybe along with some monkey-shaped toast and a banana.

Originally released as a WiiWare download back in 2008, LostWinds has finally wafted its way to the iOS device world, bringing with it the same shining visuals, imaginative gameplay, and creative use of physics, all told through the wide eyes of a young boy. LostWinds combines traditional platforming elements with a touch of wind manipulation, giving you control over more than just the main character as you explore the lush world before you!

If you're a logic puzzle fan (both paper-and-pencil and electronic, alike), you've probably heard of a little game called picross. It's a crossword puzzle meets number logic with an artsy twist. Fugazo brings their puzzles to you in the next installment of their popular series, World Mosaics V, where you find a familiar experience with a new storyline and, of course, 100s of new puzzles!

From Strawberry Café, here's a brisk escape-the-room game just for kicks! Bunny is chillin' with his shades on and there is some funky tropical Christmasy New Year's partyesque thing going on here. So hack into the computer, pick up some clues and solve the requisite puzzles so you can get out of this place.

Trigger Knight is an experimental one-button RPG where your mouse button is all you need to keep a cute little warrior upgraded and healthy as she relentlessly charges towards the right side of the screen. A nice proof-of-concept that's fun for a coffee break and hopefully a precursor to a more fleshed-out version later.

Joy to the world, a new Plexus puzzle has come! Let us receive the jigsaw! It's never too late for some jolly good puzzling fun, and this latest treat from the puzzle providers at Plexus has jolly sprinkled all over it. A PieceFull Christmas contains familiar images you might expect to see around Christmas time, including a decorated tree, presents, elves, and jolly old St. Nick himself. Perhaps the fact that this is a Plexus puzzle you can overlook the fact that it's no longer Christmas time.

It's a truth universally acknowledged that a single lunch in possession of a good screwdriver must be in want of a sequel. So it is with Dismantlement: Box Lunch 2, the perfectly explosive follow up to the first box lunch dismantlement surprise. As with the first, this Dismantlement is on the easy side yet still likely to cause more than a few "face palm" moments amongst its players out there. Nevertheless, it is an irresistibly satisfying bite-sized bit of a point-and-click fun. Dig in and enjoy!

The bouncy blue elephant is back for another installment in the wildly popular puzzle platform series! There's just one level in this whole game... but once you get to the end have you really beaten it? Packed with riddles, pastries, challenges, and even a little bullet action, it's the perfect way to spend your free time.

Popular developer Mateusz Skutnik wishes us all a Happy New Year with another entry in his "Where Is..." series of New Year's games! In this installment, players help a gnomish-looking Santa find the infant personification of the new year. The adventure-platforming gameplay is fun, if not particularly difficult; and the quirky character design, watercolor background art, and atmospheric music and sound are all quite engaging.

If there's anything Christmas specials have told us, it's that the big man at the North Pole is notoriously bad at managing his assets. In Tesshi-e's holiday escape this year, Santa has lost ten of the Happy Coins he's supposed to give the children, and in The Happy Escape it's up to you to find them and save Christmas once again. Tesshi-e has come through with a spectacular escape this time, as per usual; the puzzles flow perfectly and logically, the sounds and graphics are charming, and although there's still no changing cursor, you never really have to do any pixel-hunting.

Knuckle Cracker's Creeper World 2: Academy introduces you to a whole new experience. Rather than the top-down view of the original Creeper World, you're given a side view which, at the very least, offers an easier visual of creeper depth. With both an interactive tutorial at the beginning of levels and the same control setup as previous games, it's a cinch to pick up even if you're new to beating back the creeper.

This sequel to Lucas Paakh's William and Sly is a vast, richly layered feast for the eyes. While gameplay remains much the same, there are also marked changes (improvements as far as most players will be concerned): no more darklings or boss battles yet plenty of exploration, item gathering, and questing. Gaining helpful abilities involves your platforming and puzzle-solving skills to add just the right amount of gameplay into what is a sumptuous work of interactive art.

Q.U.B.E.: Quick Understanding of Block Extrusion is one of those special games you don't get to see as often as you would like. It's a first person puzzle game, which is rare enough in its own right, but then you combine that with a stark method of storytelling, creative use of environmental puzzles, and an interface that's as smooth as the shiny blocks that make up the levels. What you're left with is a thoroughly satisfying game with masterfully designed puzzles from beginning to end.

Pity the poor dude who is in charge of Middleshire, one of the areas of the kingdom we first saw in Royal Envoy. First, he's late to the meeting with the king, then all he can report is bad, bad news about the region. The King is not happy about any of this, so he once again appoints someone (as in you, the player) to go and get this poor place redeveloped so that the folks will be happy in Royal Envoy 2, the latest time management amusement from Playrix Entertainment.

Frozen Candy, a holiday match-3 puzzle game from Avox Games, looks a heck of a lot like Puzzle Bobble. In fact, if good ol' dinosaur Bub was on ball-firing duty instead of that Brian Poesehn look-alike of an elf, one could be fooled at a glance for thinking it to be a complete clone. Once you start playing, though, the unique feel of the mechanics allow Frozen Candy to shine as it's own creation, making for something that feels both familiar and innovative.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow... and snow... and then snow some more in Snow Tree, this charming little arcade physics game from Alexey Izvalov. Control the snowfall by clicking and dragging with the mouse to create invisible air currents, directing the flakes into a tidy pile to form a delicate, branching, and ever-growing tree (keeping the white stuff away from your front door and driveway in the process). Pile the snow as high and efficiently as you can to build your score, and snag some of those neatly wrapped presents floating high in the clouds to earn extra points and increase the maximum amount of snowflakes available to build with.

We all know the life of a snowball is short and packed with excitement. But it's not all high flying arcs and battle cries, as Godvil Games shows us in the festive Hide Snowman. Much like the Cover Orange series, your goal is to use the queue of objects (or optionally the ability to delete an existing structure) to put the happy little snowman heads in a safe place to hide them from the melting, hot pellets of the flying wood stove. What are you waiting for? The snowmen are counting on you!

Farmer Vlad has built a paradise for piggies. He sends a letter to the closest litter, inviting them to vacation in his literal hog heaven. Unfortunately, all sorts of danger lies in their path: bears, wolves, birds, UFOs... A reflex platformer by VladG, 300 Miles to Pigsland takes the non-stop gameplay of Canabalt, sends it through the cute-ifier machine and adds a sprinkling of upgrades, making for a fun, if repetitive, time.

Your favourite demolition crew is at it again, with different tools to tackle the craziest jobs! After New York and Tokyo, they've moved on to Moscow, and if you think blasting is easy, this physics puzzle with make you think again. Packed with Nitrome's signature style and charm, as well as an out-of-this-world surprise or two, this is a fantastic seasonal installment to a fan-favourite series with a lot of challenge.

This tricky little puzzle platformer will force you to forget any "nobody gets left behind" policies you might have, since someone's gotta bite the bullet for you to win. The Green and Red astronauts are stranded on a planet, and the only way out is for the Reds to nobly sacrifice themselves to open the way forward. A simple but challenging concept when both of them move at once.

Stretch paths to connect numbers of the same color in this fun-filled browser-based puzzle pack from Conceptis. This pack contains 30 brand new puzzles in three sizes (10x10, 15x15, 20x20). These aren't the hardest Link-a-Pix puzzles out there, and they serve as a great introduction to this puzzle type if you've never tried them before. Regardless of your experience level, these path-forming challenges are a great way to spend a good stretch of time.

It's been a while since you've escaped the Playroom, and it seems the little girl who masterminded it has set up yet another difficult escape for you. In Playroom 2, the rather aptly named sequel by Kayzerfish, you've got a new room full of colorful toys and knickknacks to solve your way out of. At least this one has an open-air balcony and a nicer bed. If you're looking for a charming yet challenging escape that taxes your skills just enough to be entertaining, go play in Playroom 2.

Neutral's newest seasonal escape. What more needs to be said? This escape-the-room game, though miniaturized (that little banner at the top of Neutral's web page is the game—click it to begin), is full of the details and enjoyable, logical puzzles that you'd expect from the best escape game designer in the biz. Merry Christmas JIG readers!

Gameplay in Pinata Hunter is simple and distinctive, as you swing your mouse Wii-mote style to bludgeon your quarry for tasty treats. After a few upgrades it's immensely satisfying (and addicting). Like squeezey stress toys, or inflatable punching bags, no one can accuse relentlessly beating on a colorful elephant sculpture for candy to be a deep experience, but you'll hardly care once you can fill the screen with flying candy.

"Winners Use Government Grants!" says the opening screen of Digiwoog Disaster, a new edutainment point and click adventure game. Well, we should be happy that Digiwoog and BoMToons were the winners picked by the US Department of Justice to help kids learn about mobile devices, since they've come up with something really cool. An unidentified flying object has crashed on Woogi World, and Dr. Wiggenstein knows that only Woog of action Jett Woogman has the smarts and skills to investigate. He gives Jett a brand-spanking new DigiWoog mobile device, chock full of helpful apps. And so Jett sets out to solve the mysterious mystery of the mysterious UFO... and maybe learn a little about mobile phone safety!

Once again one of Tesshi-e's wacky friends has locked you into a room filled with strange devices. Escape from the Device-Filled Room has everything you expect from a top-notch design, easy controls, a save feature, decent English translation, and the obligatory happy coin alternate escape. Get ready to challenge yourself with another of Tesshi-e's freaky friends and their habit of locking you into a strange house!

Poor Kichu is little and blue, so very blue. In this platform game by Prasan Games, help Kichu by navigating your way through obstacles and deadly traps, collecting diamonds so the melancholy pipsqueak can be big in riches and find true happiness at least. Little Life has solid controls, short levels, and some areas of high difficulty albeit nothing out of the ordinary in platforming. Yet it is so cute and heartwarming, both you and Kichu are sure to be smiling by the end.

Nations need to brace themselves for a complete loss of productivity as folks all over the world once again become immersed in the major time-suckage that is a bloons tower defense game. Enough talk, time to play Bloons Tower Defense 5!

Box? Wake up!... C'mon, do we have to get out the non-rotatable wooden objects and attach them to surroundings, and let the physics of the situation jostle you awake, like last time? Oh well... guess we do. Wake Up The Box 3 is the latest in Eugene Karataev's popular series of puzzle games. Even if it feels a bit of a step backwards, it remains a very fun coffee break kind of game.

Anything good is always better when there is more of it. So when Candyflame comes out with more Isoball, it's a no-brainer that it's going to be awesome. Merging the joy of a Hot Wheels track, a Lego set and a very fragile glass marble, Isoball X1 adds thirty-six more levels, eighteen hidden achievements and a complex sandbox to the player pleasing physics puzzler. Gameplay sounds simple: devise a route to move the ball from start to finish. Yet this feat is made complicated by a multifarious map, prescribed checkpoints and a limited number of building blocks. When you also take into account fun new pieces, a helpful "how to" menu and keyboard shortcuts, it's easy to see why Isoball X1 is not only compellingly addicting, it's more fun!

The chugging little car is back! Windosill, a 2009 release from Vector Park, creator of Acrobots, Levers, and Feed the Head, has wormed its way to the iPad, bringing with it all the dream-like levels of the original browser game. Windosill remains one of the most charming experiences any casual player could hope to stumble upon, and it's a perfect fit for the iPad and a great mobile game as well!

Slip and slide around with Lockehorn, the hero of Nitrome's wintry arcade avoidance game! Your fellow tribesmen have been imprisoned in blocks of ice by evil snow spirits, and it's up to you to save them while trying to avoid the same fate. Push your frozen pals across the temple floor and try to crush all enemies against the wall to open a pit of flame that'll thaw your friends. A seasonal treat that requires a lot of patience, but also offers a lot of charm.

Alien war rages upon the surface of the moon. But would Santa dare forget those space marines that made it onto the "nice" list? By Kringle's beard, I say thee nay! Even it if means strapping a rocket to his back and launching himself to space, ol' Saint Nick will deliver those gifts if its the last thing he does! Berzerk Studios brings you Santa Rocket, and while not particularly innovative for the arcade launch genre, it is a solid holiday work.

What do you get when you can click an owl to hit a penguin to knock over a sleeping elephant? Why, you get Alma Games' physics puzzler, Snoring 2: Wild West. Your goal is to knock over the sleeping elephant, because he's being quite loud. Each animal has different characteristics, and you interact with some of them by clicking on them. While on the easy side, it's so cute you may just have to grab the nearest kiddo and introduce them to the wonders of physics puzzlers.

Home. It's the only thing E.T. wanted. And to reunite with his robot family is all this adorable mechanical youngster wants in this whimsical point-and-click story from BeGamer. Help him get back to Earth by clicking the right places and in the proper order. Odd-yet-entertaining, although not as strange as Minoto, there's as much fun in watching each scene unfold as in figuring out how to get there.

Accidents happen, right? This week, we were going to feature another fantastic set of Letters In Boxes puzzles, hot off the presses and ready for solving. But then, as Murphy's Law would dictate, just before our publication deadline, the puzzles got warmed up by something other than hot ink: Coffee.

Wield the awesome power of language in this innovative physics puzzler. Click on different areas of each level and use the keyboard to change the environment, either by typing characters or deleting them, in order to remove the specified text from the screen. You can watch the text plummet by deleting the platform it's resting on, type "water" to make the text float away, or key in "fire" to ignite bombs and blast the text from the screen.

Even if you don't speak Russian you are still probably familiar with matryoshkas, also known as nesting dolls. And just like the dolls this escape game unfolds in layers, each one revealing a lovely little surprise. Despite the fact that it is called a "mini-escape" Matryoshka contains all the bells and whistles expected in a well-designed escape game: easy inventory control, great puzzles, intuitive navigation, and even a save feature. Come and give Matryoshka a try and, even if you're a macho guy, discover the joy of playing with dolls (and escaping).

Haven't you always wanted to lord it over an entire tower, Trump-style? Well in Theme Hotel from Toffee Games you can do just that. Inspired by games such as SimTower and Theme Hospital, this simulation game puts you in charge of building a hotel from the ground up and taking it all the way to five stars.

We live in slightly unbalanced times. But you know what? That's not always a bad thing, especially when Ttursas is at the helm. Imperfect Balance 3, the latest in the physics puzzler series of odes to ultimate unsturdiness, has just come out, and it's shakiness is nothing but awesome. Imperfect Balance 3 may not be a reinvention of the formula, but it's a solid level pack that will appeal to fans of the series.

Like Portal? So do the folks at HighUp Studio, who openly took inspiration from it to craft this challenging little puzzle platformer about robots put to the test. While Invertion may not be an entirely unique game, it definitely offers a test of your patience, perseverance and puzzling skills with smooth controls, creepy narration and nicely detailed animation.

An arcadey combination of mouse avoidance and WarioWare-style mini-games, Mouse Quest by Oilold takes two love-em-or-hate-em genres of casual gameplay and fuses them into something quite likeable. The plot is nothing too special: the mysterious Shapemaster has transported you to his dimension and presents your cursor with various fast-paced challenges so that you may prove your worth before facing him. Overall, the presentation has the minimalism of someone new to game development, but it's very enjoyable work all the same.

New from Yoshio Ishii of NekoGames, TOUKA is a short and simple game of darting your mouse all over the place. It follows closely in style and basic format as the previously-released KIKKA and OUKA, only this time around, there's less puzzle and more action.

Swift Stitch, from Sophie Houlden, author of some fan-favorite browser games like Linear RPG and BOXGAME, is a one button (almost) arcade game that's all about speed, direction, and crashing into walls because you got confused as to which way your ship was going to go when you pressed the "switch" button. Smart decisions and quick reflexes get you through this game, and if the 20 odd levels in the free browser demo get you excited, there's more than twice that content awaiting you in the full version!

Get set for another rapid fire series of mini-games and puzzles to tease your brain and challenge your wit. The clock is ticking so see how fast you can make it through on your first go-round. Your final score depends on you thinking fast on your feat and on the edge of your seat!

Robots Can't Think, Z3lf's newest puzzle platformer, has you controlling a robot through a set of challenges. You can pick up, drop or throw blocks; climb along walls and ceilings and, most importantly, warp through space and time. When you die, the system will attempt to 'rewind' to a previous safe position, but to help prevent death, you can scan the level with a click of the mouse. Robots Can't Think is a challenge, so don't be surprised if you find yourself creating a pile of scrap metal, but it's worth it.

Sometimes receiving a message can be so exciting that the letters seem to jump off the page. Then those letters form into a giraffe, which will dart across the landscape pursued by snakes, sharks and Godzilla. Okay, that just might be the interactive music video for Japanese rock group Andop's song "Bell". With an amazing combination of typographic and charcoal art, the game so visually interesting that it makes up for the CPU-hogging and somewhat loose gameplay. There are probably easier ways to post a missive, but this is definitely one of the most fun.