Post-a-Puzzle (Play at Home)

The party just arrived…through your letterbox!

Post-a-Puzzle contains a pack of 10 puzzles, a welcome telegram and a greeting card that gets posted directly to your special someone.

Only when the correct answers from each puzzle are entered online is your identity, message, photo or video revealed!

*Added bonus: if you purchase this game, use the code ‘REVIEW’ to get confetti added to your order for free!

There have been many new escape game companies appearing during the Covid pandemic, for many different reasons. But Post-a-Puzzle comes from the very experienced team behind Escape Room Cardiff (if you haven’t played their real-life games, you should), and it’s great to have that experience behind this game.

Before I go any further, one thing that should be mentioned and Post-a-Puzzle should be applauded for is their commitment to the environment. These types of games are often very wasteful so Post-a-Puzzle have partnered with Ecologi to ensure that for every game sold, a tree is planted. There is also no plastic lamination in the pack so when you’ve finished with it the entire thing can be recycled. Well done, Post-a-Puzzle!

When you receive the post-a-puzzle through your letterbox there is no doubt what it is, so the recipient should have a pretty good idea of what is ahead of them, we were certainly excited to give it a try. When we did finally find the time to do it, we played as a team of two although it can easily be played individually or in a larger team.

CONCEPT/EXECUTION

The most notable thing about this game is that there is no story. Often games will weave in a backstory of why you have received it and find a way to tie all the puzzles together. This game has none of that, it’s exactly what it sounds, you are just posting puzzles. Saying that, this game felt like a gift in itself, especially as it contained an actual greetings card.

When you order a post-a-puzzle, you can choose the card style (four to choose from), add a message for the reveal (can be video/text/image), add a ‘do not open until…’ sticker, and just to make it really feel like a celebration you splurge and pay a little extra to add some confetti, which of course is biodegradable.

PUZZLES

The envelope contains 10 puzzles for the recipient to complete. The puzzles can be tackled in any order, but each one is numbered. The number of the puzzles, plus the additional sheet that shows what you need from each puzzle (how many numbers) offers some nice signposting to make sure the recipient knows what they are doing and what order things go in.

There was a surprising amount of variety in the puzzles, some which we completed in mere seconds, others that took longer, and one or two that had us pulling our hair out for much longer. Most of the puzzles relied on observation and logic, but some lateral thinking was needed in places.

Out of all ten puzzles I think there were two we weren’t a fan of. One simply because it’s a type of puzzle we’ve seen a lot floating around the internet, and this one was even sneakier than normal (it was a fair puzzle though). The other puzzle we didn’t enjoy quite as much as there it felt like a leap to work out what we had to do with it, but thanks to the solid clue system, we were never fully stuck.

CLUE SYSTEM

I would imagine that a lot of the post-a-puzzles that are sent out will end up through the letterbox of people who don’t do this type of thing very often, so of course a decent hint system is important. Post-a-Puzzle have gone for a tried and tested clue system, which is one page containing all the puzzles and underneath there are dropdown boxes so the player can get as much or as little help as needed. If they get really stuck then it also contains the solution to ensure they get their reward at the end.

One bit that made me laugh, was the final clue on the page, simply titled ‘Give up? Or need to check the full answer?’. Hopefully this wouldn’t be needed, but it is nice to know it’s there just in case.

FINAL THOUGHTS

If you want to send someone a message and want to make them work for it, then Post-a-Puzzle is a great choice. Ten puzzles, a card, and optional confetti makes it feel like a party!

Mentioning it again because it’s such a great point, but credit to Post-a-Puzzle for making the environment part of their thought process. It’s nice to know that once we finally finish clearing up the confetti that it can go straight in the recycling/compost bin.

TOOLS REQUIRED

• Internet
• Pen and paper for note taking

Final Rating:

Team: 2 players

Time Taken: 42 mins

Website: https://post-a-puzzle.com**

*Disclaimer: we weren’t charged for this experience, but this has not influenced our review.

** this is an affiliate link, so if you order using this we may get a little kick back from the creators