Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box

In the world of Professor Layton, puzzles hide in every corner. When the professor’s mentor is mysteriously murdered, a cursed artifact called the Elysian Box appears to be behind it. With a ticket to the Molentary Express as their only lead, Professor Layton and Luke embark on an adventure that will test their wits and work their brains. Calling all brainteaser fans! With tons of in-game puzzles of different types and difficulties, there’s something for everyone from kids to adults. As Professor Layton, you’ll open doors with sliding puzzles, uncover clues with logic puzzles, and find answers by solving riddles. A cinematic experience! This large-scale sequel to Professor Layton and the Curious Village features three times the voiced dialogue and movies of its predecessor. The fully voiced movies, hand-drawn art style, and cast of eccentric characters bring the story to life and are sure to charm puzzle fans young and old.

User Ratings and Reviews

5 Stars a slice of heaven
As with the first Professor Layton title, Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box is sheer perfection, a must-play title. Play for a few minutes and you’ll likely get sucked in and want to finish the whole game. It’s also a great game to show off the power and sophistication of the DS platform to your friends.

This game is a fusion of two very different forms of entertainment: a collection of puzzles woven together into an intriguing mystery story. Not every video game fusion attempt succeeds; this one is flawless. The story is engaging and nicely complements the available puzzles (even though most of the puzzles are irrelevant to the storyline). Graphics and audio — both music and voice acting — are superb. I enjoy the audio on Professor Layton titles more than any other DS games, particularly the mysterious, atmospheric, and vaguely European soundtrack.

The game has an astonishing degree of polish and finishing touches. Once you’ve encountered a puzzle in the main game, you can also access it via a master puzzle index. Here, you can tag your favorites for easier recall later. You don’t have to worry about missing hidden puzzles, though, as they are made available to you later if you miss them during the story mode. Another example of polish is the fact that the game gives you 1 screen’s worth of “scratch paper” for each puzzle; that’s a bit cramped, but it sure beats switching back and forth between the DS and a pad of paper. Also of note are the many interesting side games and unlockables, which keep the game fresh and compelling.

This game easily earns a full five-star rating, but alas, nothing is perfect. I called this game a “slice of heaven” to draw attention to its primary drawback: it’s short. Hard-core puzzlers such as myself can solve this game and all side content in a weekend. The game designers attempted to address this limitation by providing the ability to download extra puzzles from the internet, but the reality is that you’ll move on to another game rather than be fully entertained by the slow pace of new puzzles online. On a related, if you’re looking for brain-busting puzzles, look elsewhere; the puzzles included in this collection are very approachable to young adults and casual puzzlers. (For example, the most complex puzzles are reduced down to multiple choice, probably to make it easier to check for a correct answer.)

Still, I strongly recommend this product to all players, with one exception. If you haven’t yet played the 1st game, Professor Layton and the Curious Village, play them in the right sequence to avoid having this 2nd game spoil some of the secrets of the 1st game. There’s one big spoiler at the beginning of game 2 in particular, so if you plan to play both games, don’t even start the 2nd one until you’ve finished the 1st.

5 Stars i hope they make more!!
seriously i love this game and the first one.. the puzzles really get you thinking and are so much fun. once i heard there was going to be a second game i was like waiting for it to be released and then my husband bought it for me and man do i love it.. if you like brainteasers buy the game!! you wont be dissapointed

5 Stars Prof Layton rules!
It was a very eager wait for Prof Layton and the Diabolical Box. The Curious Village had spoiled me and I just could not find another puzzle game that was good enough. So Diabolical Box had a mark in my calendar.

And it was so worth the wait! The Diabolical Box does not disappoint! The puzzles are just as absorbing, and are significantly different from the ones on the Curious Village. So there is no feeling of “Oh, I’ve done that one before”. The story line is just as refreshing. It was a nice touch to bring back some of the original characters and their idiosyncrasies.

The story is well distributed across locations as well, so you’re not thinking “Where do I go now?” So whether you’re on the Molentary Express or the village of Dropstone or the Castle, there are always places to explore and puzzles to solve.

The minigames are also a lot of fun. Keeping that hamster fit is not as easy as it looks. And who knew brewing tea was such an art form?!

All in all, a wonderfully engaging game and a must have for the puzzle aficionado.

So make friends with Prof Layton and Luke and join them on their quest to solve the mystery of the Elysian box. Meet fun, quirky characters along the way, and know that the game is not over when it’s over. Just like with the Curious Village, you still have weekly puzzles that you can continue to solve after.

In case I wasn’t clear, I LOVED the game! Can’t wait for part 3.

5 Stars Even Better than the First One
While I enjoyed Professor Layton and the Curious Village, it went by too quickly.

The Diabolical Box is like Curious Village but so much better.

* This game lasts so much longer that Curious Village, keeps you captivated longer and offers a lot more challenges. Without doing any of the “Bonus” games, this was twice the play time as Curious Village.

* The graphics are just as good if not a little better. There are cutaways of movie-like scenes as well as the traditional dialogue scenes, some with voice overs, some without.

* The puzzles offer a variety of simple to very challenging. There is a terrific selection of puzzle styles, sure to please all ages.

* Hint coins are still readily available with the option of buying up to three hints per puzzle.

* Puzzles are everywhere and seem to be just the right mix of puzzle to story/dialogue ratio.

* There is a huge improvement to the puzzles with the addition of a MEMO mode. Memo mode allows you to see the puzzle (slightly faded back) and have a scratch pad to make notes or work through the puzzles. This mode holds your notes as you go back and forth from the puzzle to memo again so your notes stay intact.

* The storyline is much more enjoyable and the scenery changes often enough (multiple villages, trains, etc.) so you are not traveling back and forth to the same spots over and over.

* The introduction of puzzles into the dialogue is a little more natural whereas in Curious Village when you needed to do a puzzle, the character intros to give you the puzzle were much more forced.

* The mini games include exercising a hamster (amusing), rebuilding a camera (interesting), brewing tea with different ingredients, as well as the old trunk standbys of a journal, mysteries list, and puzzle index. There is also a ‘locked’ diary.

* The music is fine and doesn’t seem to get annoying but the fake English accents are still pretty bad.

* The story ends and after credits, allows you to go back to a previous scene to finish playing any puzzles you may have missed.

* There is a bonus section that you can get into when starting the game that includes the “Weekly download Puzzle”, the puzzle index (the same as in the Professor’s Trunk), Layton’s Challenges which include some more difficult puzzles that progressively unlock the more you complete. There is also the Top Secret section including character profiles, art, music, and additional sections that unlock with clues found in the game.

The only problem I have with a couple of the puzzles is that they are based on noticing details in “photos” and looking at them on a DS screen is difficult since the resolution isn’t so hot.

I would highly recommend this game for ages 8 and up.

5 Stars Even Better Than The Last Professor Layton Game
The Diabolical Box’s puzzles are certainly diabolical! The brain teasers are even better than the ones in the previous Professor Layton game.

I LOVE playing these games — although being an over 60 senior, it offends me that the game is recommended for anyone 10 or above — as it sometimes takes me a couple of hours to figure out the answer to some of the harder puzzles!

The game is very brain stimulating and fun. The scenario of the diabolical box mystery is OK, the short video clips in the game never cease to amaze me — but the real joy of the game to me are the puzzles/brain teasers.

I recommend this game to anyone who wants to exercise their little gray cells while having fun.

Buy/More Info