AquaBelle
Spring 2012 GamesAquabelle is a 1-player spatial-relations game. The back story is that mermaids must catch all the bad fish in bubbles. The game has 48 challenge boards with different layouts of fish, and the player has 6 clear pieces in different shapes (square, rectangle, different L-shapes) with different placements of bubbles on each. The player arranges these shapes on the board so that the bubbles cover the bad fish. Only 1 configuration works for each board - the boards have 4 different levels of difficulty from starter through master.
The game is well constructed, and the boards store nicely inside the box. As a parent, I like that this game teaches problem solving and encourages creative thinking. Our reviewers' only critique was that sometimes the progression of puzzle difficulty is inconsistent. A level 2 puzzle took one tester's daughter over 10 minutes, while level 13 took her only 2 minutes.


