Zen Puzzle Garden

Much like Mr Miyagi from Karate Kid, the sensei of Zen Puzzle Garden appears more keen on teaching his apprentice how to put up with a mundane task than on teaching him the secrets of the warrior.

Rather than rubbing wax on and wiping it off, this sensei instead entrusts his young student with tending a series of fairly pathetic-looking flower beds with a rake, an activity that no doubt causes the shaven-headed boy to learn something about martial arts (possibly one featuring a rake), patience, and perseverance in the process.

These two qualities stand you good stead, too, as Zen Puzzle Garden is an often tricky, if uninspiring, logic puzzler.

The trickiness comes from the limitations imposed on your movement across the fertile fields.

Raking is performed by dragging a path from one concrete paving stone surrounding the outside of the field to another. Any alterations to this path can only be performed if an obstacle (which can be an object or a previously ploughed plot) stands in the way.

This is explained very well during an extensive tutorial, which not only demonstrates the controls but also gives tips on how to approach objects in the centre of the field stranding your poor student with no place to plough.

The uninspiring part comes from the fact that there’s really little else to think about once you’ve learnt the basics from the sensei. Indeed, the first 15 (of 30) levels may very well still be the tutorial, such is the ease of the layouts presented.

Things start to become a little more interesting once the game finally throws in movable objects that need to be pushed across the ground, but there’s still a persisting feeling that, even by the final few stages, Zen Puzzle Garden hasn’t developed one step beyond what the tutorial already demonstrated.

A few more locations (to complement the day/night temple) or just a few more tricks like land that needs plowing more than once wouldn’t have gone amiss into helping mix-up play a little.

Solid block

Despite the flat gameplay development, Zen Puzzle Garden still does enough right to make it worth a look for those seeking to test their brainpower.

The puzzles, while not that varied in approach, are tough to solve come the latter stages thanks to some tricky ordering of moves.

The graphics and sound are also well pitched for the subject matter, with the pseudo-Chinese beats in the background and some nicely drawn menus enveloping you in the world.

But while it’s hard to not get sucked into raking the ground for a good hour or two, the lack of variation in the task will likely send most players into a trance.