Earlier this week, we had the chance to ask Picross 3D Spokesman and puzzle designer Wei-Hwa Huang a few questions about Picross 3D. In addition to working at Google for a time, Wei-Hwa Huang is a well-respected puzzle expert.
Wei-Hwa Huang is a four-time individual winner of the World Puzzle Championship and winner of the 2008 Sudoku National Championship. He has co-written two books of handcrafted Sudoku variants, one book on the Rubik’s Cube and related puzzles, and was a key organizer for the first World Sudoku Championship held in the United States. When he isn’t working on puzzles he develops and designs games, and has been playing on Nintendo consoles since 1984.
1. Of the 350-plus puzzles in the game, how many did you create?
I wish I was involved in the Picross 3D puzzle creation, but all the puzzles were created by the developer (HAL Laboratory). I’ve personally created a few puzzles using their built-in editor and if you can find me and my Nintendo DS I’d be happy to share them with you!
2. How long does it take to make one of these puzzles?
Designing the puzzle is pretty easy and is as simple as building something out of colored bricks; it’s the creativity that’s difficult. Of course, this assumes that you have a good puzzle-generation engine, and Picross 3D definitely has one, so you don’t have to be good at the puzzles to be able to make a good one.
3. Why is the puzzling genre so effective at straddling the large variety of gaming audiences?
I think it’s because puzzles may be the basic essence of a computer game. You are given a situation and a goal and you have to use the tools at hand to achieve that goal. A puzzle is effectively that condensed into a few minutes of play time. Of course, one could argue that a true game is something that involves other players, either with cooperation or competition. But sometimes you just want a fun activity that you can do by yourself, and that’s a puzzle.
4. When designing puzzles for a specific demographic (if that’s even possible) what sorts of things must a puzzle creator consider?
The core thing is to figure out what your demographic considers fun. If they prefer logic questions over verbal wordplay, you need to know that. If they like right-brain visual thinking, you need to know that. If they don’t really like puzzle-solving and are in it just to be social, you definitely need to know that! Now, I’m not saying you have to completely play to the audience; sometimes you can nudge or guide them in directions they may not have chosen themselves, as some people also like trying new things. But if your demographic isn’t playing with your puzzles, then you both lose.
5. How have puzzles changed since the creation of video games?
Video games have made certain puzzles possible (for example, a puzzle that requires automatic management of hundreds of automata) that would have been a hassle to do otherwise. On the other hand, they’ve also made some puzzles much less interesting as it’s too easy to do them. Overall any medium can be used for puzzles — the desire to pose a question that you know the answer to and have people find it is universal.
6. How or what do you feel electronics like Nintendo’s DS and the iPod Touch add to the experience of solving and making puzzles?
I think undeniably they allow users to do things they couldn’t do before, which may enhance and improve existing puzzle ideas, as well as make possible ideas which weren’t doable before. For example, the touchscreen makes it very easy to view your puzzle from different angles in Picross 3D, something that would be more of a pain to do with simpler technology, such as a mouse or joystick.
7. Have you had a chance yet to think about how the 3DS might further alter that?
I haven’t gotten to play with a Nintendo 3DS yet. Get me one and I’ll tell you!
8. You must have a unique perspective and mind to be able to create what you do; I’m wondering if we both looked at the a painting or mosaic, if we would see the same thing, or if you would see geometric relationships rather than a portrait. Do you feel your aesthetic sense is different than most peoples’?
I think my aesthetic sense is definitely different, but probably still within the realm of being acceptably human. I may prefer the works of Magritte over the works of Seurat, but surely there are others who have similar preferences.
9.What got you hooked on puzzles, and when did you start creating puzzles?
I’ve been hooked on puzzles since longer than I can remember, so I’m afraid whatever got me hooked on puzzles is now lost forever. Creating things is the natural progression to consuming things, and even that I’ve been doing for long enough that there wasn’t a particular start. You begin by regurgitating puzzles, then modifying them and making them your own. It’s a gradual process; I didn’t sit down one day and say “okay, enough solving puzzles, I want to make one.”
10. Aside from creating puzzles, have you spent much time studying the history and theory of puzzles? How has that affected the way you create and look at them?
I have spent some time but certainly not to the amount a dedicated puzzle historian might. I think understanding the progression of puzzles throughout history is useful in many ways; you can attempt to look for trends, which can help you extrapolate (what sort of new puzzles would we see in the future?) or interpolate (if puzzle type X turned into puzzle type Y, is there a possible puzzle type in between that might be interesting?) Many of the puzzles I create are simply puzzles that are in one genre or medium adapted to a puzzle in a different genre or medium.