Thrift Treasure: Coggy Puzzle Game

On a recent trip to Stuff Etc. in Iowa City, we happened across a puzzle game that reminded us of the fidget toy craze from a few years back. Coggy by Fat Brain Toys was hanging on a wall of games, missing its original box. Priced at only $1.99, I decided to take a chance just to have something to manipulate with my hands when I was bored.

Coggy is very similar to the puzzle games offered by ThinkFun. Like those, this is a single-player challenge with levels that increase in difficulty. Made of plastic, Coggy articulates in a similar manner to Rubik’s Snake where the subsequent piece rotates against the previous.

The segments of Coggy are made up of two circular pieces connected vertically to another stepped two-circle piece. One side depicts colorful cogs and gears while the other has them only in black and white. Also included in the (missing) box is a how-to-play pad with forty different challenges.

The object of Coggy is to bend the puzzle so that it matches the diagram in the book. At the beginning you’ll only work with the colored side of the puzzle and any spaces shown which appear blank are considered wild. You only need to match up the ones depicted in the challenge and there may be more than one possible answer. Later puzzles utilize the black and white side. For these, there are no wild spaces. The final result must match the instruction book exactly.

That’s all there is to Coggy! The puzzles begin easy enough, but the later ones really are quite challenging. A good toy for backseat travel or waiting for a doctor’s appointment. I wouldn’t recommend it for two players since only one can handle the puzzle at time. And one of us in the house is a little more grabby-grabby…

You can purchase Coggy direct from the publisher or on Amazon for under $15! It would make a good stocking stuffer for the holidays for anyone 8+. Any younger and we’d be afraid it would break too easily in smaller, less coordinated hands.

Do you enjoy single-player puzzle games?