The "Giant Puzzle" was first introduced in 1888 by McLoughlin Bros of New York. We found a picture of the old puzzle in Slocum and Botermans book, "New Book of Puzzles" (1992) and were fascinated by it. It has a bit of a Sudoku edge to it, and it’s really hard.

We kept the original name: "The Giant Puzzle" but it’s not giant sized, measuring about 5.5" x 5.5" x 1.25". Ergonomically it’s terrific to handle.

It has 25 pieces in the base. Each piece is different. There of 5 pieces of each color. The the numbers 1,3,5,7,and 9 are also printed on the handles of each color. (thus there will be a blue-1, blue-3, blue-5, blue-7, blue-9, and then likewise for each color). The handles are a nice feature of this puzzle which we added from the original design which just had flat blocks which we found very awkward to get in and out of the puzzle.

The object is to arrange all the pieces in the base such that there is no color repeated on any row, column, or any diagonal. Also, no number can be repeated on any row, column or any diagonal. Also, each row, column and major diagonal must add to 25. To tackle easier tasks to warm your brain up, you might try to tackle each of the requirements separately (that is, just work on colors, or just work on numbers, or just work the 25 addition) before you take on the full challenge of making them all happen at once!

This terrific puzzle is very challenging and will highly appeal to the person who enjoys Sudoku or enjoys logic puzzles.

Level of Difficulty: Level 5

Handmade by Creative Crafthouse in Hudson, Florida.

At Creative Crafthouse, we pride ourselves on offering high-quality, handcrafted wood mind-bender and brainteaser puzzles and games. We know that logic, reasoning, and analytical skills are all vital to cognitive development. The earlier your child or student can hone these skills, the better off he or she will be in life. No matter what your age developing problem solving skills,  patience, and determination are important qualities to cultivate.

We know that nearly all people enjoy an interesting challenge and will work at something for hours on end to find the answer. So we do our best to offer interesting, fun, sometimes magical and challenging puzzles with various degrees of difficulty and various types of challenges.  Many are our own design and some are historical designs that are unique to us.  Most are manufactured right here in our Hudson, Florida shop.  We have extensive laser skills along with CNC and traditional woodworking.  We are a small family business with 10 employees all striving for top quality and customer service.

Find more work from Creative Crafthouse here.