Chip's Challenge

A brilliant puzzle isn't measured by its graphics, but by how long a single room you simply can't solve keeps you up at night. Chip's Challenge did exactly that — and it did it back in 1989, tucked inside a portable console remembered today more with fondness than with the respect it deserved.

The story is delightfully eighties: you're Chip, a likeable nerd who wants to impress a girl named Melinda, and to get into her exclusive club you must work through a series of logic rooms. Out of this came a game of 149 levels where you collect chips, hunt for colored keys, push crates into water to build bridges, and dodge monsters and deadly floors. Each level has its own time limit and — crucially — usually just one correct solution, so progress is a blend of logic, spatial imagination and honest trial and error.

For a handheld of the time this was unusual depth and volume of content. Where other pocket games made do with a few repeating screens, here was a genuine building-block puzzle game of growing complexity, where new mechanics are introduced gradually and combine into ever more devilish puzzles. The studio Epyx, which was also behind the Lynx hardware itself, included the title among the launch games — and did well, because it was this game that proved the color handheld didn't have to be only about action.

The cult around Chip's Challenge outgrew its original platform. The game later reached other systems including Windows, where it was remembered by a whole generation of players who had never heard of the Atari Lynx. The community around it lives on to this day — fan-made level editors and sequels appeared, remarkable longevity for a puzzle game from the late eighties.

What makes the game timeless is the purity of its design. No needless clutter, no distractions — just you, the grid, the clock and one correct move after another. It's the type of game where you tell yourself "just one more level" and suddenly it's midnight.

Why play: A pure-bred grid puzzle with incredible depth for its era, one that hooks you with its simplicity and won't let go thanks to its devilishly clever levels.