Ardent fans of Sudoku or picture logic puzzles like Picross looking for a new fix may want to give this lackluster title a look, but if you don't already know how to play, this game isn't going to help you.

A Challenge Indeed

Earlier this week I reviewed the other Challenge Me game, Challenge Me: Math Works. I found it to be a very irritable and boring offering that was very poorly documented and it basically left players to fend for themselves when it came to, you know, figuring out how to play. There were several other major flaws too, but this other Challenge Me game does little to improve things.

Challenge Me: Brain Puzzles has two game types: Sudoku and Picture Logic Puzzles. There are 500 puzzles of each to wrap your mind around, and several ways to play, too. Game modes include Instant Fun, where you can just jump into a puzzle and not worry about it affecting your profile's score. There is also a Challenge Me! mode whereby the game will show you a graph after you complete a puzzle. These graphs are similar to those 'star graphs' seen in other brain games that analyze five different mental characteristics. The idea is that you complete a puzzle as fast as you can, and Challenge Me will then show you where your mental strengths and weaknesses are.

The two other available modes are Free Play Mode and Individual Puzzles. In Free Play, you can choose from any of the 500 puzzles available; the top three scores are kept. Individual Puzzles shows a rank for each puzzle according to its difficulty. A 'par time' for completition is also attached to the stage. The goal is to simply complete the puzzle within the specified time frame, although if you don't, you can continue playing.

The fact that Brain Puzzles only has two game types is pretty bad in itself considering that most other brain games, of which there are a ton of on the DS, have quite a few more types. Still, my biggest complaint is the lack of tutorials and documentation. Granted, the intended audience may very well know how to play Sudoku and how to negotiate these picture logic puzzles. For that select group that not only knows how to play but also how to play this digital rendition of it, you can probably deal with the fact that there is no documentation or a tutorial on how to play. Sure, the manual mentions what the intention of each mode is, but an actual example or built in tutorial would have helped this game tremendously.

After nearly a half hour trying to figure out how the heck to play the picture logic puzzles, I asked a colleague to see if he could figure out what you're supposed to do. Turns out, he was as baffled as I was and as the minutes ticked by, we realized we were still trying to figure out how to play the darn game and we had yet to eek out an ounce of joy.

The lackluster presentation doesn't help things. Ultra plain visuals, forgettable elevator music, and just a handful of effects don't offer much excitement or motivation for continued play.

By this time, any DS owner has probably already played at least one other, much better, brain game and Challenge Me just can't compete -- it's a chore more so than an engaging puzzler.