The present disclosure relates to a three-dimensional maze puzzle. More particularly, the present disclosure relates to the design and construction of a toy maze puzzle, where the paths of the maze puzzle are reconfigurable through rotations of the face panels of the toy.
Original mazes are built with real walls that leave passage between walls, and the player finds solutions of the mazes by traveling through a continuous route or pathway from an entry point to an exit point along available passages. Usually, at many junctures along the passages, the player has more than one choice. If the player chooses the wrong passage, he or she will encounter a dead end and has to retrace to the previous juncture to explore other paths. The games of mazes were later implemented on paper or playing board, for example, the “walls” or barriers can be represented by solid lines and the “passages” represented by the space between the solid lines. The player can solve such mazes simply by drawing a continuous line between the entry point and the exit point, or moving a small object along the passages. Such mazes can also be easily implemented on a computer, and a player can solve the mazes by indicating the solution by drawing the path using a pointing device. Conceptually, these mazes are two-dimensional in nature.
New generations of toys and games are built by combining a plurality of 2D mazes in a 3D object. For example, multiple layers of 2D mazes can be included in an enclosure, and a mechanism of inter-layer crossing can be accomplished by including holes on the 2D mazes or tunnels/channels between the 2D mazes. There are also 3D mazes where passages may extend in different spatial directions. For example, cubic toy products are available with each face of the cube including a fixed maze pattern, and passages at the edges and/or corners of the cube can span different faces so that a small object can be manipulated to travel across these different faces to reach a finish point.
There are 3D puzzles that challenge players primarily with maneuvering skills rather than solution-finding insights. For example. Perplexus® line of product is a 3-D ball-in-a-maze puzzle or labyrinth game enclosed in a transparent plastic sphere, where the player manipulates a small ball through a track by twisting and turning the sphere as a whole. The path to the finish point can be quite apparent to the player, but to actually maneuver the ball through the track to get to the finish point can be challenging because the segments of the track can be configured with many difficulty levels (e.g., varying width, visibility, friction, stability, and obstacles), and one mishap in the manipulation can result in the ball getting derailed from the track.
In one aspect, the present disclosure provides a space puzzle which comprises a plurality of outer face panels (or outer faces). At least two of the plurality of outer face panels each define at least one path segment. A position indicator can be coupled to and movable along the at least one path segment of each of the at least two of the plurality of outer face panels. Each of the outer face panels is rotatable, and the rotation of any one of the outer face panels is independent of and not altering any path segment defined in another of the outer face panels. The path segments on the outer face panels of the puzzle are configured such that at least one sequence of rotations of the outer face panels exists that permits the position indicator to travel along a continuous pathway between a preset starting point and a preset finish point along the path segments of the at least two of the plurality of outer face panels.
In some embodiments of the space puzzle, the at least one path segment is defined by a cut-out slit on the outer face panel where the at least one path segment is located. In some embodiments, the at least one path segment is defined by an element, a property, or a characteristic that is visually distinct from the remainder of the outer face panel where the at least one path segment is located.
In some embodiments, the space puzzle further comprises a puzzle core to which the plurality of outer face panels are engaged. The puzzle core can comprise a plurality of blocks fitted together, or a plurality of face pieces fitted together. In other embodiments, the puzzle core can comprise a plurality of rods/tubes that can be coupled to corresponding coupling structure (e.g., tubes/rods) on the outer face panels.
In some embodiments, the outer face panels of the puzzle can be coupled to the puzzle core via corresponding fixation panels. In some other embodiments, outer face panels can be coupled directly to the puzzle core.
In some embodiments, the outer face panels can comprise a paramagnetic material or magnetic material.
In some embodiments, each of the outer face panels has a same number of sides. In other embodiments, not all of the outer faces have the same number of sides.
In some embodiments, each of the outer face panels a periphery that takes the shape of a convex regular polygon.
In some embodiments, each of the outer face panels includes a digital touchscreen.
In some embodiments, the at least one path segment can be defined by a visual digital marker.
In another aspect, the present disclosure provides a space puzzle, which includes a plurality of outer face panels, where at least two of the plurality of outer face panels each define at least one path segment. Each of the outer face panels is rotatable, and the rotation of any one of the outer face panels is independent of and not altering any path segment defined in another of the outer face panels. The path segments on the at least two of the outer face panels of the puzzle are configured such that at least one sequence of rotations of at least one of the at least two of the outer face panels exists that permits a position indicator travel along a continuous pathway between a preset starting point and a preset finish point along the at least one path segment of the at least two of the plurality of outer face panels.
The present disclosure provides a 3D space maze toy having reconfigurable and dynamic paths by manipulations of outer faces of the toy. Solving the maze not only requires a player to be cognizant of the path patterns on each outer face of the toy, but also requires the player to take into account of connections of the path patterns in the 3-dimensional space as well as the time-evolution of the patterns. Therefore, the toy of the present disclosure presents enhanced challenges for a player's problem solving skills as well as enhanced intrigue.
As illustrated in
The path segment or segments in each of the outer face panels may take various shapes, and may not cross over. Also, the path segments can have different configurations. As shown in
The position indicator can be a solid object configured to be coupled to and movable along the path segment(s). As shown in
There are many ways to construct and/or assemble a toy puzzle of the present disclosure. The toy puzzle shown in
Then, as shown in
As further illustrated in
In the above illustrations, the respective outer face panels are separate structures from the corresponding fixation panels and can be assembled with the corresponding fixation panels, it is appreciated that each outer face panel and the matching fixation panel could also be permanently joined or manufactured as one integral part.
In some embodiments of the space puzzle, the puzzle core can be constructed differently, and no fixation panels are needed. For example, as shown in
In the described embodiments of the space puzzle of the present disclosure, the rotation of any one of the outer face panels is independent of and not altering any path segment defined in another of the outer face panels.
In a traditional two-dimensional maze game, a player tries to find a pathway from a preset entry point to a preset exit point. The objective of the puzzle game of the toy puzzle of the present disclosure is similarly to find a pathway from a preset starting point on one outer face panel to a preset finish point on the same or a different outer face panel. However, because of the 3-dimensional nature of the toy puzzle and the rotatability of each of the outer panels, the toy puzzle of the present disclosure enables a game having more levels of complexity. As such, the design of the path segments on the outer face panels of the puzzle are configured such that at least one sequence of rotations of the outer face panels exists that permits the position indicator to travel from a continuous path (or pathway) between a preset starting point and a preset finish point along the path segments of the at least two of the plurality of outer face panels.
As illustrated in
As illustrated in
As shown in
In alternative embodiments, the core face pieces of the shown in
In
(1) rotate Face B counterclockwise once (i.e., for 90 degrees), then the mover piece “P” can be moved from Face A through path segment p11, through bridge number 3 to Face B bridge number 7 (3+7=10), through path segment p20 on Face B, then through Face B bridge number 3 to Face C bridge number 7 (3+7=10), through path segment p30 on Face C, and finally it can stop at Face C bridge number 3 (See
(2) rotate Face B clockwise twice (i.e., for 180 degrees), then the mover piece “P” can be moved from Face C bridge number 3 to Face B bridge number 7 (3+7=10), through path segment p20 on Face B, then through Face B bridge number 3 to Face A bridge number 7 (3+7=10), then through path segment p20 on Face A, and finally it can be moved to the Finish position on Face A (See
One way to design the path or passage pattern on the faces of the cube puzzle toy can be as follows. On each face, one can choose to include different number of bridges, and can choose which bridges can be connected in the path. For a size 9 puzzle (9 bridges on each edge), there are more than 100,000 possible path patterns to choose from for each face. The six faces then will have more than 1030 path pattern combinations in total, and each of these 1030 combinations is a maze design. A computer program can be written to innumerate all possible maze designs. For each of the 1030 designs, the program can go through all the possible rotations by a trial and error approach to determine whether a successful path connecting the starting position and the finish position exists. Then the program can record all the successful designs along with the solutions and store them in a database. Finally, one can select a maze design from the database based on the preferred difficulty. Other ways to design the path patterns are also available.
In some embodiments, the outer face panels of the toy puzzle of the present disclosure can be polygons. In some embodiments, all of the outer face panels can be of the same class of polygons. For example, the space puzzle can take an overall shape of one of the convex regular polyhedral, known as the Platonic Solids, which include tetrahedron (4 outer faces of equilateral triangles), cube (6 outer faces of squares), octahedron (8 outer faces of equilateral triangles), dodecahedron (12 outer faces of equilateral pentagons); and icosahedron (20 outer faces of equilateral triangles). In some embodiments, not all the outer face panels are of the same class of polygons. For example, the space puzzle can take an overall shape of a truncated icosahedron when all the faces are aligned. Such a solid geometry has 12 regular pentagonal faces and 20 regular hexagonal faces. For another example, the space puzzle can take an overall shape of a truncated tetrahedron, which has 4 regular hexagonal faces and 4 equilateral triangle faces.
The material for constructing components of the space puzzle of the present invention can be plastic, metal, wood, or any other suitable material, or combinations thereof. Various components of the space puzzle can be manufactured by injection molding, 3D printing, or other suitable techniques.
The mover piece can be constructed in various ways in shapes and materials. For example, the mover piece may be constructed with a magnetic material, and the outer face panels are constructed with a material (e.g., a paramagnetic material) that is attractive to such a magnetic material, the mover piece can be simply attached on the surface of the outer face panels by magnetic forces. Or the mover piece may be constructed with or include a paramagnetic material and the outer face panels are constructed with or include a magnetic material.
The path segments on the outer face panels can also be constructed in various ways. In some embodiments, the outer face panels may be constructed by digital screens (e.g., LCD, LED, OLED, or the like) and the path segments may be formed by display units showing different color or shade than the remainder of the screen as effectuated by input control electronic signals. In such cases, the rotation of the outer face panels can also be accomplished in a virtual manner, i.e., the outer face panels are not actually physically rotated, but the pattern of the path segments on the outer face panels can be rotated by input control signals. This may be done by an operating method available to a digital touchscreen, e.g., a multi-finger gesture right on the face panels of the toy. The construction of the other parts of this “digital” toy, including the processor, memory, input/output module is within the skills of artisan in the field. In such cases, the mover piece can also be a digital object on the touchscreens movable and manipulatable by touching the touchscreens, e.g., by a human finger or a digital pen.
In some embodiments, the toy puzzle does not need to include a mover piece. In such cases, one can simply use one's eyes to track an “imaginary mover piece” moving on the available path segments on the face panels.
While the example embodiments of the invention have been set forth for the purpose of illustration, modifications of these embodiments as well as other embodiments thereof may occur to those skilled in the art. Accordingly, the appended claims are intended to cover all embodiments, which do not depart from the spirit and scope of the invention.
This application claims the benefit of priority of U.S. Provisional Application 62/719,633, filed Aug. 18, 2019, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
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20200054937 A1 | Feb 2020 | US |
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