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2D tilt mazes

This page features the ever popular single-goal and multi-goal tilt-mazes. Try the single-goal mazes first, and then tackle the multi-goal mazes. Capturing all those blue-targets is not as easy as it looks. Update Feb 2002: a selection of tilt mazes are now available as part of a free puzzle package called PuzzleBox developed by Kevin Brain for MacOS X and OpenStep. Also Bill has provided a page of design describing his tilt maze console.

Sorry, this is a Java applet.

A red ball sits in a flat tray containing one or more blue squares (goals). The challenge is to guide the ball around the tray and collect all the blue squares. Tilt the tray to, literally, start the ball rolling. The ball rolls in a straight line until it hits a wall, you can then tilt again. Controls Click Restart to load first maze or reload current maze. Click Previous/Next to switch between mazes. Movement Use the cursor keys to tilt. Keys n – next maze p – previous maze r – restart current maze s – jump to first single-goal maze m – jump to first multi-goal maze

Here is a photo of a tilt-maze implemented as a walk-round maze (Cherry-Crest Farm, near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA - Summer 2001). Photo provided by Robert Abbott.

The photo on the right shows a mechanical implementation of a 2D tilt maze made by M. Oskar van Deventer. The maze is made of transparent material and filled with very black coffee. The 'runner' is an air-bubble in the coffee that moves through the maze when you rotate it. The object is to get the air-bubble in the centre, while keeping the Coffee Maze vertical.

The photo on the left shows a top down view of the tilt maze console developed by my partner Bill Mitchell. It utilises mercury switches to detect tilt and supports a wide variety of configurable puzzles. Read more about it on its own page.

PuzzleBox is a collection of diversions for Mac OS X and OpenStep computers developed by Kevin Brain. As well as 2D tilt mazes the collection includes Sokoban, Black Box, Pentominos, peg jumping, a 15-puzzle, and many more. It includes a style editor for customizing graphics, a board editor for making your own challenges, and a tool for retrieving new challenges, games, and other resources over the web. The application is an extendable framework for puzzle games, open for other developers to add games.