Puzzle types

This is a list of puzzle archetypes mainly drawn from this article written by Emily Short, this discussion thread, this other article by Scarpia, which was a reaction to this article by Bob bates. They've been concatenated, reorganized, rewritten in a way that makes sense to me.

Diagnostic

Collect enough information to identify the correct object among several similar.

Research

Compile info from several sources to establish an actionable plan. Find the password to get by a guard (or a more complex sequence).

NPC manipulation

Make a NPC feel an emotion or adopt a mindset. Heavily used in conversation games. Great opportunity to delve into characterization.

Combat

May rely on a single specific solution that goes beyond the usual scope of combat (specific swords in Fromsoft games)

Resources management

Self-explanatory. Subset: managing limited time.

Geographical puzzles

Understanding, managing, manipulating space.

Mazes

Often a source of frustration. Include clues or original mechanics that help navigate it: a map, a parrot that remembers directions, an ariane thread, a way to leave marks behind. Being too easy will make it pointless.

Gestalt puzzles

Understanding a fundamental truth or mechanic about a place that isn't apparent at first.

Sequencing

Optimizing a process, finding the exact correct order of known steps

The classics

• A wolf, a cabbage and a sheep must cross a river
• Pour a volume A but you only have containers of volume B and C
• Magic square
• Move the matchstick
• Jump the peg
• etc.

Have an easy reset and either a hint system or an alternative to bypass them completely if they're too complex.

Logic puzzles

If the engine lends itself to it. Logigrams, integrams and similar deduction puzzles where you must form hypotheses and account for their consequences to validate or eliminate them.

Enigmas

(Enunciated by a character, not the environmental ones) Might feel arbitrary and too hard to solve, classic in some point&click games. They often add to the game atmosphere and to the enunciating NPC characterization. Leave clues nearby and / or allow alternative solutions.

Wordplay

Anagrams, adding or removing letters, usual expressions...

Cryptograms

Absolutely let the player know that it is a cryptogram puzzle (can easily be done through NPC characterization). Keep it simple! Nothing more complicated than Caesar's cipher.

Invented languages

• Chants of Sennaar
• Out There

Alternate reality

Visit a room in another dimension / time period, influence one through the other; combination of the remote control and timing puzzles

• Outer Wilds Echoes of the Eye

Remote control / magnet

Lever in a location is blocked by another element that you can only have an effect on from another location

Diverting a river

Or derail a conveyor belt. Affect the downstream zone. Might have to take into account a logic pattern (canals, dams, etc.)

The floor is lava

Part of a location is inaccessible, except through a counter-intuitive process

Trap

Anticipate the movement of a NPC / animal and time your action

Hidden dialogue

A dialogue option only appears if you've followed the correct answer sequence, or run through all possible options. A single mistake sends you back to the start of the sequence.

The oral exam

A NPC sends you quips / questions in a random order and you must meet each one with a correct answer.

Delegate an action

Understand that you can't perform a nevertheless necessary action, delegate it to your sidekick

Wait for the right moment

The action causing a resolution is only effective in a very specific timeframe or by following a hidden or semi-hidden timer of some sorts, learning actionable informations about it is necessary

The parrot knows

A NPC (parrot, drunkard, etc.) regularly gives a legit piece of intel from time to time, placed among junk quips. It becomes senseful when faced with the adequate situation.

Follow the compass

An item gives directions from location to location. Can be visual, spatial, auditory.

Smuggle an object

Find a hidden way to move an object from a location to an adjacent one where its use is particularly beneficial.

Approximated recipe

Use substitution items for a recipe. Might rely on wordplay or shared attributes.

Disguise

Often to access a location. Calls for custom assets and animations, which will probably not be reused. Fundamentally a key that you bring to a lock, but can be a source of humor especially if you make the player make its own disguise instead of, say, buy it.

Coordinates#

Acquired completely separately, many combinations possibles with false ones. Only the exact correct combination works.

Search engine

Looking up information in a big database, you need precise identifiers to land on the relevant entry

Repeat until success#

Literally repeat an action. New feedback each time absolutely necessary to encourage repetition. Especially effective if the player will naturally perform the action several times (like entering a location).

Exhaust a dialog line

Same but with a dialogue option.

Exhaust dialog lines

Go through uninteresting dialog options so that a hidden one ends up being available

Babel Fish puzzle

Named after an infamous puzzle in Infocom's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Performing what seems like one simple action slowly evolves into an absurd sequence of reactions that prevent you from reaching your goal and each time forcing you to start over from the beginning (small progress is nevertheless achieved on every single attempt). Humoristic because of the sense that the game is actively toying with you.

Did you pay attention ?

Question asked on a previously shared minor info. Might be in a dialogue, in a book. Useful trick to make sure the player has necessary intel for the rest of the adventure.

Extensible arm

Combine a long object and a hooked one to catch a faraway object

Machine identification

Examine a machine, identify how it works and how it may be of use to you

Machine operation

Learn the controls of the machine and use those to your advantage. Learning might be trial & error or follow a certain logic.

Burning candle

Either limited-time use, or secret functionality once it's consumed.

Timed puzzles

"Timed" as in "timer-based". Engine has to accomodate for it. Often what gives life to adventure puzzles according to Scarpia. They can remain very simple and still feel great. Always good to consider to replace bartering puzzles.

Follow the rythm

Obey cues that dictate our way of moving. Real-time action.

• Inside when blending in with the drones
• Chants of Sennaar and its infiltration phase

Distract and grab

Always a classic, but suffers from repetition. Not always a subset of timed puzzles.

Track a NPC

Let him reveal a location or a path

Logic combination

You have elements that you know are useful, you must find a way to combine them, most often through semiotics.

ex: you have "old man, man and horse", and "legs" -> 3, 2, 4

Just do it

It is obvious you can perform an action, but the player is distracted by suggestions that it won't work, it's outside the scope of the game... Maybe deflect the player's attention toward elements that seem like they'll be necessary to the resolution. Needs to be either smart or funny.

Fiddleware

perform a task manually with controls akin to the real ones. Close to QTE if timer or skill needed, close to a physics puzzle if in a realistic simulation.

Magic glasses

Search for hidden elements in an environment thanks to a special device.

Hot and cold

Feedback as to whether you're close to the solution or not. Meter, NPC's expression, etc.

Objection!

Identify lies in a series of affirmations thanks to evidence and testimonies.

Break the cycle

A chain of events is either in perpetual motion or can be started by the player. Learn to use / influence this chain for your own goals.

Bartering

Easy to implement, easy to solve. Acquire an item and perform an exchange. Said item might not be explicit and need to gather clues or to interpret NPC indications. Can easily bore the player because of how overexploited it has been.

• Clearly show the hurdle but leave the means of overcoming it open. Suggesting through dialogue the kind of solution that is expected is good practice.
• Don't obviously put the solution near where it'll be used.
• Always possible to combine this structure with another, variation is always good.

Inventory / combination

Either using a tool to transform an object into another (axe + tree = log) or combining several objects into a new one.

Verey often simply a step in a larger puzzle. Has to be logical without being either the obvious use of involved items or too arbitrary.

Expect players to try logical combinations that might somewhat make sense but are not correct; try to identify those through beta-testing and prepare reactions of some kind for them.

Good practice: use item descriptions and their flavour to prepare for their ulterior use.

Escape rooms

The solution is right near us but we can't see it yet. Sequences can be quite complex. Another potentially frustrating puzzle, the solution has to be somewhat original in its use of tools and strategies.

Remember the sequence

1. Observe
2. Understand that the sequence will be useful later
3. Memorize / note down the sequence
4. Apply the sequence

Dialog tree

Find the correct sequence in a conversation. Beware of quips that are too flat and conversations that are too complex. Good practice: make it an optional alternative to another puzzle.

GUI / boardgame puzzle

Using a well-known boardgame as the support of a puzzle (solving a chess problem, for example). Requires a dedicated GUI that may or may not be reused. Script and asset heavy. May be worth if there's a solid connection between said game and your main characters.

Intended use of an object

The simplest puzzle there can be. Use the key to open the locked door.

Unintended use of an object

Make use of the secondary characteristic of an object. The diamond earring can cut glass, the candle's wax can be melted into a key impression, etc.

Those objects have primary uses that necessitate efforts to steer the player towards this secondary use, but some items (especially in very codified, narration-deprived context) have such an obvious use / reason to exist that considering an alternate usage is extremely hard -> dedicate considerable time and efforts to make this solution apparent (probably through a fake puzzle to eliminate the obvious use), or simply let circumstances reduce the available options so much that there's really only one course of action, and the player understands the secondary use in question while performing it.

Grand Poo World 3's footboard key

Not a puzzle in itself, but a particular screen in Grand Poo World 3 brings you to use a key not as a mean to open the final door, but as an object to stand on in order to be able to open it.

Exluded middle

If a → b and c → d, then in a situation where player has reasons to believe that b → c and they want to achieve d, hopefully they recognize they should perform a.

Preparing the way

The player also has to meet the condition that makes b → c effective.

Delayed action

Performing an action now for a distant, future effect. Harder if more than one location is involved.