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Blue Prince is an incredible puzzle game. Set in a lonely mansion with impossible architecture, its layered in mysteries, conspiracies and family drama. The mansion, Mt. Holly, officially has 45 rooms, but in order to collect your inheritance, you have to find the 46th. Every day youre given a set number of steps, and you have to literally build the manor (and the game) as you go, drawing from a pool of floorplans to create a new layout with each run. This is the foundation, but it goes so much deeper: When I previewed Blue Prince in December 2024, I couldnt have imagined its complexity. Its not a game you can fully understand in a few runs; it takes 10 hours to realize what its core puzzles even are, and even longer to then piece their solutions together, room by room, step by step. Its a slow, supremely satisfying burn. The puzzles in Blue Prince are cavernous and surprising, and its thrilling to interact with the games mechanics and items. Not to mention, its all absolutely gorgeous. Dogubomb Though Blue Prince isnt marketed as a cooperative experience and it doesnt have any kind of multiplayer input, it naturally lends itself to co-op play. Mechanics matter less than the concepts on-screen, and its useful to have one person on controls and another on a notepad, jotting down clues and tracking progress. Plus, one of the best ways to get unstuck in a game like this is to talk things through, and this naturally happens when youre playing together. Blue Prince is just a really intricate puzzle, after all, and weve been doing those things in group settings for ages. This is a true of many single-player puzzle games their common theme being that theyre secretly couch co-op experiences. You could say all games are local co-op if you try hard enough, but only in puzzle games can a bystander play along without ever touching a controller, directing the action and providing critical breakthroughs simply by paying attention. Youre not going to have the same level of impact watching your friend play Assassins Creed, you know? Dogubomb Blue Prince is only the latest example of an undercover couch co-op puzzle game. My partner and I have happily played a handful of similar games together in recent years, and its gotten to the point that I now breeze right past the single-player descriptor on most puzzle titles. Heres a shortlist of my households favorites: Lorelei and the Laser Eyes The Talos Principle 2 The Sexy Brutale The Rise of the Golden Idol Return of the Obra Dinn The Witness Viewfinder Storyteller All of these games are officially single-player, but theyre as good, if not even better, when played with a loved one. On my couch, weve also enjoyed actual local co-op puzzlers like Escape Academy, so if your relationship can survive those games, it should be able to handle Lorelei, Talos or Blue Prince with ease. While were waxing poetic about the intricacies of video game sub-genres (OK fine, just one of us is), Blue Prince falls into another one of my favorite categories, which I affectionately call anti-GameFAQs puzzle games. These are designed to be impossible to capture in a traditional walkthrough guide, and while the category isnt large, it includes some of the best titles of this generation, like Tunic and Lorelei and the Laser Eyes. These lean so heavily on the thing that makes video games unique as a media product player autonomy that they feel like a hostile attack on step-by-step explainers, and I absolutely love that. (These games also tend to remind me of House of Leaves, which could be another sub-genre on its own, but Ill stop here. For now.) Playing Blue Prince with my partner in 2025 reminds me of the specific lazy afternoon in the summer of 2008 when some friends and I discovered Braid on Xbox Live Arcade. We spent hours playing from my buddys dingy couch, passing the controller around, pointing at the screen and yelling out strategies, and just marveling at that little time-shifting toxic dude. Shared experiences like this generate a specific kind of warmth, and a great puzzle game can produce these moments over and over again. Even if its technically single-player.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/every-puzzle-game-is-a-couch-co-op-game-actually-163024595.html?src=rss
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If you've been hanging onto an older Apple Watch for a few years or you're an iPhone user who perhaps wants to pick one up for the first time to better track your activity, here's a deal for you. The Apple Watch Series 10 is once again on sale. It has dropped back down to $299, which matches a record low price. The smartwatch usually retails for $399. This deal is for the 42mm GPS version of the Apple Watch Series 10 with a Sport Loop strap in various colorways (there's no LTE connectivity in this one). Other configurations are available for less than usual too the 46mm Series 10 with a Sport Loop is also $100 off at $329. The Apple Watch Series 10 is our pick for the best smartwatch overall, though note that you'll need a compatible iPhone to use it. We gave the wearable a score of 90 in our review. Admittedly, this is a relatively iterative upgrade. If you have an Apple Watch Series 8 or 9, the upgrade might not be worth it. But if you're an Apple Watch newcomer or you're upgrading from an older model, this is probably the one to go for. The Series 10 has a larger screen than its predecessor, which makes it easier to see notifications and such. The thinner frame looks nicer too. However, while the Apple Watch Series 10 is great for fitness and wellness tracking, it's a bit disappointing that the device lacks the blood oxygen feature seen in earlier models (though Apple had little choice but to nix that here). Check out our coverage of the best Apple deals for more discounts, and follow @EngadgetDeals on X for the latest tech deals and buying advice.This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/the-apple-watch-series-10-is-back-on-sale-for-299-155611025.html?src=rss
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This week, we're diving into Engadget's coverage from the 2025 New York Auto Show. There are tons of EVs, as we expected, as well as some surprising disappointments (what the heck did Subaru do to the Outback?!). Also, we once again try to make sense of the Trump administration's tariff mess. Stay tuned to the end of this episode for a chat with Isaiah Saxon, the director of A24s The Legend of Ochi, about his puppet-filled kids adventure. Subscribe! iTunes Spotify Pocket Casts Stitcher Google Podcasts Topics Whats hot in EVs from New York Auto Show 2025 1:56 Federal Judge rules that Google has a monopoly on U.S. digital ads 17:42 Facebook antitrust trial begins after several attempts to scuttle the case 22:18 Tariff Watch: tariffs on semiconductors and electronics to be announced later 31:16 PS5 prices are rising around the world 34:22 NPR: Whistleblower shows evidence DOGE took sensitive data from federal labor board 42:35 Sidewalk alerts in Seattle and Palo Alto hacked to play AI-generated messages 47:18 New details for Mario Kart World 48:43 Around Engadget / Working On 51:42 Picks 54:31 Interview with Legend of Ochi director Isaiah Saxon 59:59 Credits Hosts: Devindra Hardawar and Nathan IngrahamProducer: Ben EllmanMusic: Dale North and Terrence O'Brien This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/smartphones/engadget-podcast-ny-auto-show-2025-and-a-chat-with-the-director-of-the-legend-of-ochi-140014709.html?src=rss
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