Question 1

Getting Started with Mazes 3D Isometric (Video)

Accepted Answer

The video contains a short overview of the options and functions for the module Puzzle Maker Pro - Mazes 3D Isometric

You can find more tutorials on the Mazes 3D Isometric tutorials page. Video tutorials can be found in the Mazes 3D Isometric Playlist.

Question 2

Height Map Editor for Mazes 3D Isometric (Video)

Accepted Answer

The video gives a quick overview of the Height Map Editor for Mazes 3D Isometric.

You can find more tutorials on the Mazes 3D Isometric tutorials page. Video tutorials can be found in the Mazes 3D Isometric Playlist.

Question 3

How to use Puzzle Maker Pro - Letter Dice

Accepted Answer

Puzzle Maker Pro - Letter Dice Overview

This tutorial applies to Letter Dice

There is one add-on available for Letter Dice: Time Saver for Letter Dice

Letter Dice Explained

Letter Dice is a word puzzle, based on an existing tabletop game where a number of dice is being thrown, and you have to find as many words as possible by combining the letters on adjacent die faces. Usually 16 dice are thrown, which are then sorted in 4 rows of 4 dice.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/ebpePeS2Lk/English%204x4.png (Letter Dice - English 4x4)

Example of a Letter Dice puzzle for English words

The Letter Dice module can create these dice throws, and has some additional options:

Dice setups for several languages are provided, including French, Spanish, and German
Variations for 25 or 36 dice for English puzzles are included
You can create your own dice, just by typing the letters for each die on a single row
You can create additional fun innovative games, for example number games - place numbers on the dice, and the goal could be to add/subtract/multiple/divide numbers and get to 24 as many times as possible
You can create die faces with words on them, and create a game to find fun sentences or sentences with as many words as possible

Letter Dice Overview

To use Letter Dice, select the puzzle type in the drop down menu, or in the regular menu.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/Jyo7cLcqHE/Letter%20Dice%20Overview%20with%20Arrows.png (Letter Dice Overview with Arrows)

To create puzzles, you'll need to add the dice setup (as shown in the screenshot), and click Next Preview to generate a puzzle. Each click will result in a different puzzle.

There are no solutions (images or otherwise) for Letter Dice puzzles.

Dice Setup

By default an English set for 4x4 dice will be used. This is a set of dice - regular dice with 6 faces each - that was used for a popular letter dice game the past 30 years.

You can also select several other sets, like 5x5 or 6x6, and some other languages. Please be aware that the 6x6 English set contains some blank die faces, to increase the difficulty of the puzzle. This is not a printing error.

The letters on the die faces have been taken from public sources, however it's very easy to edit the sets yourself.

Set up your own dice

With Puzzle Maker Pro - Letter Dice you can completely customize your own letter dice game:

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/ASJIFRpSYi/Letter%20Dice%20Overview%20Numbered.png (Letter Dice Overview Numbered)

Define the number of dice, printed in rows and columns. When a new puzzle is generated, the dice will be placed in random order, and for each die a random face is selected
Set up the Separator. If you have die faces that contain more than one letter, you need a separator between the letters. By default, the comma is used. You can use a dash or a dot or any other character that is best for you
Set up the Dice. Each die will be created from the letters on a single line. For example the top line in the example "A,A,E,E,G,N" defines a die with six faces. Without the separator you could just type "AAEEGN", but then you wouldn't be able to add "Qu" to a die face.
After editing the dice, click "Verify" to check if you have the right number of dice, and if each die has the same number of faces. (Since this is a computer generated puzzle, each die can have more or less than 6 faces). You don't have to have the same number of faces on each die, but the software will warn you, just to prevent mistakes. Missing dice will result in blanks in the puzzle
Create a new preview from your own dice

Tips and puzzle ideas

Don't forget to add / print puzzle rules in your puzzle book or printable, if you create your own puzzle types.

Word Dice - Create dice with full words on each face, optionally creating separate dice with nouns, verbs and adjectives. Goals could be to create the longest possible (valid) sentence, or to create many sentences
Syllable Dice
Math Dice - Create dice with numbers, e,g, 1 to 10, and operators (+, -). The goal could be to calculate a given number in as many ways as possible.

Font Styling

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/p1tWwFAooq/Letter%20Dice%20-%20Font%20Styling.png (Letter Dice - Font Styling)

You can customize the font by clicking the white panel (or the looking glass icon) in the Font Settings area. You can set both the font and the font color.

Please be aware that the lettercase is by default set to 'Unchanged', to make sure that "Qu" is printed correctly. If you change it to uppercase (the default setting for e.g. Word Search), it would be printed as "QU".

For some other languages, such as Czech and Finnish, you may need to set it to Uppercase, to make the letters print correctly.

Grid Styling

You can customize canvas and die face color, as well as the line color and width:

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/ZvBhFPfq5n/Letter%20Dice%20-%20Grid%20Styling.png (Letter Dice - Grid Styling)

Time Saver for Letter Dice

The Time Saver for Letter Dice has two main functions:

Create a puzzle book from several Letter Dice presets - e.g. you can create presets for English 4x4, English 5x5 and English 6x6, or create Letter Dice, Word Dice and Number Dice presets
Flexible grid layouts for Instant Puzzle Books

Using Letter Dice Presets

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/gdqTsNoOlo/Letter%20Dice%20-%20Time%20Saver.png (Letter Dice - Time Saver)

First, you have to save your own presets. You can do this on the Puzzle Settings tab.

In the Time Saver, select the presets you want to use from the list on the left. (Click "Refresh List" if your presets are not showing).

Set the quantity for each presets. In the example, we set it to create 10 puzzles with the first preset, and 20 puzzles with the second preset.

Make sure the box "Use Time Saver to generate Puzzles is checked, then click the Create / Create (TS) button at the bottom left.

Flexible Grid Layouts

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/8sIkbEOyJm/Letter%20Dice%20-%20Time%20Saver%20Page%20Layout.png (Letter Dice - Time Saver Page Layout)

There are several ways to create Letter Dice puzzle books: Some books only have one puzzle per page, and include additional information, such as puzzle rules, score information and lines to write the found words. Other puzzle books have 4 or 6 puzzles on each page, and expect the puzzler to have a notebook available to write the solutions. (Hint: You can publish Letter Dice solution books / journals along with the puzzle books).

Adding Lines for the Words / Solutions

By clicking on the little gray squares in the Puzzle Layout (Instant Puzzle Books -> Page Layout -> General Layouts -> Puzzle Layout) you can also switch off some of the puzzle locations. In the example, only 3 puzzles will be printed per page. (This is a new feature in Puzzle Maker Pro v2022.14).

Puzzle Maker Pro does not print the solution lines for you. However, by switching off some of the puzzle locations, you can easily add lines or other information in Powerpoint or PDF. In Powerpoint you can use the Master Slides to set up the lines and other information just ones, and have it applied to all of the pages automatically.

Question 4

How to use Puzzle Maker Pro - Word Squares

Accepted Answer

Puzzle Maker Pro - Word Squares Overview

This tutorial applies to Word Squares

There is one add-on available for Word Squares: Time Saver for Word Squares

Word Squares Explained

Word Squares is a word puzzle.

Examples of a puzzle and solution:

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/O5LDuxA3R0/Word%20Squares%20Example.jpg (Word Squares Example)

Word Squares Overview

To use Word Squares, select the puzzle type in the drop down menu, or in the regular menu.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/Ub4SnTkimr/Word%20Squares%201%20Overview.png (Word Squares 1 Overview)

To create puzzles, you'll need to add a word list (as shown in the screenshot), and click Next Preview to generate a puzzle. Each click will result in a different puzzle.

To see the words in the puzzle, toggle the "Preview Solution" option at the bottom right of the window:

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/Ro4s3DMFEB/Word%20Squares%201%20Solution.png (Word Squares 1 Solution)

The first time you start this module, you'll see a list of 7 words displayed. These words are just for demo purposes, so you get a valid puzzle when you start the module.

Grid Sizes and Difficulty Levels

With Word Squares you get 7 grid sizes: 3x3, 4x4, 5x5, 6x6, 7x7, 8x8 and 9x9. The software will only use words from your list that:

Have the correct number of letters, for example 5 letters for x 5x5 grid, and
Have no duplicate letters. "Cobra" is valid, "agenda" is not, because it has two times the letter 'a'.

You can also use your existing word lists for word search or other software, and let the Word Squares software filter out all the words that should not be used.

There's a different set of difficulty levels for each size, similar to sudoku and latin squares puzzles:

Like our Wordoku software, the generated puzzles will always show all the letters of the word (no guess-work what the final letter should be). This is also known as well-formed puzzles.

Word List and Number of Puzzles

The word list is filtered before it's used, and only words with the correct number of letters and no duplicate letters will be used. That means that you can have a list of 10000 words, of which only 30 words can be used for Word Squares puzzles.

You can reuse word lists with formating for e.g. Zig Zag Word Search: The lines that start with #-characters and empty lines will be removed from the list of words.

The Quantity you set is actually the maximum quantity. There will be just 1 puzzle generated for each word. If the number of valid words is less than the required quantity, you'll get less puzzles. This is to make sure there are no duplicate words in your puzzle book.

If you specify Auto/Unlimited, it will use all the words from your word list.

For each word, you can add a colon and a description. For example "cat:mammal", or "Portugal:Country in Europe". The description can be used in the Instant Puzzle Books (see below). This means you can prepare word files that can also be used for Crosswords puzzles.

You can type the word list in the word list area (as shown in the screenshot above), or select a word list file. This file should be in plain text format, e.g. when you create it with Notepad on Windows. An example could be:

This word list would result in exactly 1 single puzzle for any grid size you select.

Word Styling

On the Word Styling tab, you can set the position for the solution word, and you can set the font, color, etc for the letters in the grid.

Solution Word Position

You can specify where you want the word to appear:

Horizontal on any row,
Vertical in any column,
Random - this means will randomly select Horizontal or Vertical and a random row/column number

Especially when you create multiple puzzles, the random option will create a greater variety of puzzles.

Font and Letter Color

You can click on the white font preview panel to change the font, font color and other settings. Additionally you can set the color for the solution letters, and you can set the color of the solution word cells (the default color is gray). For example, you can create the following result (depending on the fonts you have installed on your computer):

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/j1dfkv9tht/Word%20Squares%202%20Word%20Styling.png (Word Squares 2 Word Styling)

Grid Styling

Additionally you can customize the grid - the canvas and line colors and the line widths - to your own preferences.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/ZSYEM6CDV3/Word%20Squares%203%20Grid%20Styling.png (Word Squares 3 Grid Styling)

Puzzle Description

If you want to add a puzzle description for each puzzle in the Instant Puzzle Books, you'll need to add these descriptions to the words in the word list. This can be done by adding a colon after the word, and then add the description, e.g. "Portugal:Country in Europe". When you have a word list like this, you can enable the "Print Description" option on the Description tab:

Additionally you can set the font, and customize the space that's reserved for the description (by default it's 20%, that means that the actual puzzle will usually be made 20% smaller).

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/mg8NvDotED/Word%20Squares%204%20Description.png (Word Squares 4 Description (1).png)

The results in Powerpoint or PDF can look like this:

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/RD0SnmCk7I/Word%20Squares%205%20Description%20Example.png (Word Squares 5 Description Example)

Time Saver for Word Squares

The Time Saver for Word Squares allows you to create puzzles for multiple word lists at once, with an option to use 'any' size grid (depending on each word) or use a fixed grid size and filter the word list.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/wQSd5muilR/Word%20Squares%20-%20Time%20Saver.png (Word Squares - Time Saver)

Select the grid size - 3x3 up to 9x9 or Any. You can also set the difficulty level. If the specified grid size does not support that difficulty level, the maximum level will be used
The maximum number of puzzles, or Auto/Unlimited (which means exactly one puzzle for each valid word in the list)
The word position
Add Word Lists. Click this button to select one or more word lists (.txt files). The settings specified for the first 3 bullets will be used, and each word list will add another row in the grid below
You can edit the settings for each row. The rows will be processed in order and the puzzles will be added to the puzzle book in this order (unless you specify otherwise)
Optionally Delete selected rows or all rows if you made a mistake (or if you want to set up another puzzle book)
Randomize the file order or the word order within each file. This makes sense if e.g. the words in the word file are sorted alphabetically

Make sure the boxes "Use Time Saver to generate Puzzles and "Use Time Saver - Fast" are checked, then click the Create / Create (TS) button at the bottom left

Optionally you can also use the Preset Puzzles option, using several presets that you've previously saved for Word Squares puzzles.

Question 5

How to use the Time Saver for Zig Zag Word Search

Accepted Answer

Puzzle Maker Pro - Time Saver for Zig Zag Word Search Introduction

The Time Saver for Zig Zag Word Search resembles the Time Saver for (regular) Word Search, but the way word lists are handled is a bit different.

This tutorial applies to:

The Time Saver for Zig Zag Word Search will work with the squares, diagonals, words snake and random shapes options.

Time Saver Overview

The Time Saver needs two ingredients to work correctly:

Word Lists
Jobs to do

You can set up the 'Jobs to do' on the Batch Creation tab. A job is a specific puzzle type and format, for example "Squares" 10x10 with Quantity 5. This will create 5 puzzles for each (!!!) word list. If you set up 3 word lists, with enough words in each, you will get 15 puzzles.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/6zXxjw2BoS/Time%20Saver%20Word%20Search%20Diagram.JPG (Time Saver Word Search Diagram.JPG)

Main Settings

There are a couple of layout settings that control some of the styling for Instant Puzzle Books, such as the puzzle alignment and the font size for the word lists.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/fmgnyGujJc/Zig%20Zag%20Word%20Search%20Time%20Saver%20Main%20Settings.png (Zig Zag Word Search Time Saver Main Settings)

Variable Font Size - the font size is calculated for each puzzle, based on the number of words and the word length. For puzzle books this may lead to different font sizes for each puzzle, especially if you use different sizes for the puzzle (a 10x10 puzzle will have fewer words than a 25x25 puzzle)
One Size Fits All - the font size is calculated after all word lists are set up, to make sure each page looks similar

Word Lists

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/T6UYyswPDI/Zig%20Zag%20Word%20Search%20Time%20Saver%20Word%20Lists.png (Zig Zag Word Search Time Saver Word Lists)

Selecting Word Lists

Each word list should be just a text file with a list of words, for example when you create a file with Notepad.

You can select as many files as you want, and it's best in general to make the wordlists larger than the strict minimum. For example, for a 10x10 grid, the combined length of the words should be at least 100. However, when you create a list of more words, with a combined length of say 500, you'll get a larger variety of puzzles from it.

Word List Control

Just like the regular Zig Zag Word Search, you can choose how the word list should be used:

Auto: This will try to create as many puzzles as the Quantity setting indicates. However, if it runs out of words in the list, it will stop.
Repeat: This will use all the words in the list, and then repeat the entire wordlist (again and again) to get to the number of puzzles in the quantity setting. Each puzzle will draw random words from the list, so each puzzle will be different
Reset: This will reset the entire word list after a puzzle is created, so every puzzle can use words from the entire word list.

Merging Word Lists

You can choose to Merge all lists, to create just 1 large list. This will basically just add all words to a single list.

You can also choose to use each word list separately, which would work like the diagram above (each 'job' will be executed for each of the word lists). In this case you can also use the file names as titles.

Segmented Word Lists

Segmented word lists are available as part of the Extras Add-On, but are also available automatically as part of the Time Saver Add-On. This will allow you to combine multiple short word lists into one larger list, while still keeping the words separate.

Basically, you can use a blank line to separate the lists:

Optionallly you can add a title to each list, which will be used for the Instant Puzzle Books

In the future there may be other options for these segmented word list, to exploit additional features of the Instant Puzzle Books

Batch Creation Settings

When you use the Time Saver, don't forget to select "Use Time Saver to generate Puzzles" and to select the options for Batch Creation you want to use (e.g. "Use Time Saver - Fast"). This will change the text of the "Create" button to "Create (TS)".

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/66Euj4Po0j/Zig%20Zag%20Word%20Search%20Time%20Saver%20Batch%20Creation.png (Zig Zag Word Search Time Saver Batch Creation)

Fast Mode

This options is called 'Fast' because it doesn't depend on you setting up specific puzzle presets, but simply select the Zig Zag Word Search variation you want to use, and set the rows, columns and quantity. Additionally you can set the Sort Order, this will control the order in which the puzzle appear in your puzzle book (and the order in which the files are listed in File Explorer, if you sort them by filename).

Preset Puzzles

With this option you can use your own presets (that you have saved on the Puzzle Settings tab for Zig Zag Word Search) to create an entire batch of puzzles.

Question 6

How to use Puzzle Maker Pro - Zig Zag Word Search

Accepted Answer

Puzzle Maker Pro - Zig Zag Word Search Overview

Zig Zag Word Search is an alternative Word Search puzzle, quite different from the regular Word Search. It's also known as Jigsaw and Tetris Word Search.

This tutorial applies to three different products:

Zig Zag Word Search, the standard / regular Zig Zag Word Search module
Zig Zag Word Search - Extras Add-On, an add-on module that adds different complexities and options to the regular Zig Zag Word Search
Zig Zag Word Search Random Shapes, this module can be purchased separately, and adds random shapes (random polygons) to make a completely different type of word search

Additionally there are some Add-Ons available for Zig Zag Word Search

This main tutorial uses the regular Zig Zag Word Search for examples. Paragraphs for the Extras Add-On and the Random Shapes will focus on the differences for these modules.

Zig Zag Word Search Explained

Zig Zag Word Search is a puzzle where you have to find words in a grid. Unlike with regular Word Search puzzles, the words are not placed in straight lines, but a zig-zagging line, where the words can have corners. For generating these we have set up some basic rules:

Letters of a word are connected to each other horizontally or vertically
In general, the words should have exactly the number of letters required for the squares in the grid. If you have a 10x10 grid, then all words together should have 100 letters
Words cannot overlap

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/U78JkEdbbn/Zig%20Zag%20Word%20Search%2010x10%20Grid.png (Zig Zag Word Search 10x10 Grid)

In this image you see an example of a solution for a Zig Zag Word Search puzzle. Words are positioned randomly in the grid.

Zig Zag Word Search Overview

To use Zig Zag Word Search, select the puzzle type in the drop down menu.

To see the solution in the preview screen, toggle the "Preview Solution" option at the bottom right of the window:

Note: You'll need words with at least 100 letters to create a 10x10 puzzle. It's better to use a longer list with more words than needed, and create one or more puzzles from that. This way you won't have to worry about counting the letters. (See "Advanced Options" for additional options.

In addition to the Word List, you can also select a Word List file. This has to be in plain text format (.txt). Pay attention to this when you export from MS Word or MS Excel.

Advanced Options

The Advanced tab has some options to control the word list use, the spelling of the words, and an option for filling the remaining squares with random letters, so the amount of letters doesn't have to be exactly the right amount.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/ofFn83RSUK/Zig%20Zag%20Word%20Search%20Advanced%20Options.png (Zig Zag Word Search Advanced Options)

1 Wordlist Control

For most puzzles you can control the amount of puzzles using the "Quantity" setting. For Zig Zag Word Search there are other options as well:

Auto: This will try to create as many puzzles as the Quantity setting indicates. However, if it runs out of words in the list, it will stop.
Repeat: This will use all the words in the list, and then repeat the entire wordlist (again and again) to get to the number of puzzles in the quantity setting. Each puzzle will draw random words from the list, so each puzzle will be different
Reset: This will reset the entire word list after a puzzle is created, so every puzzle can use words from the entire word list.

Note: This may work slightly different if you use the Extras Add-On.

2 Remove Characters

Your wordlist may contain characters that you don't want to see in the puzzle. These may be spaces, dashes, or other characters. You can use both checkboxes to filter these characters. The word list will be created from the original words!

Note: the letter count used for the puzzles is based on the 'clean' words, after the spaces etc have been removed.

3 Random Fills

While the words for a Zig Zag Word Search puzzle should have exactly the right number of letters, there's an option to add noise or fill letters as well. This should make it a bit easier for you to set up word lists (but please be aware that your customers may not expect this).

Style

On the Style tab you can change the font, canvas and cell colors and the line colors and weight. (Canvas color is only used for masks, without masks, the entire canvas will be covered by cell backgrounds).

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/AdD6AV04xS/Zig%20Zag%20Word%20Search%20Style.png (Zig Zag Word Search Style)

Click "Next Preview" after changing the settings to see the result.

Extras Add-On

The Extras add-on offers two additional features: Diagonal connections for the regular Zig Zag Word Search, and segmented word lists for all Zig Zag Word Search modules.

Diagonals

Choose "Squares Diagonals" in the Grid Type list, then click "Next Preview" to see an example of a Zig Zag Word Search puzzle with diagonal connections.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/icYNvsua2n/Zig%20Zag%20Word%20Search%20Diagonals.png (Zig Zag Word Search Diagonals)

As you can see, letters can be connected horizontally, vertically and diagonally, and the diagonal connections can cross each other.

Segmented Word Lists

We use the name "Segmented Word Lists" for word lists that are already divided in several lists of words.

You can do this by using a blank line between the words. Additionally, you can use #title:"title" to add a title, for example "#title:Vegetables"

When you load a word list (click the little looking glass button on the Word List tab), you'll get a status notification showing you how many words and letters are part of each section. (This will take into account that spaces and other characters may be removed).

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/9FCBZyPQ9y/Zig%20Zag%20Word%20Search%20Word%20Count.png (Zig Zag Word Search Word Count)

When you use the "Auto" setting for word list control (on the Advanced tab), only one puzzle will be created for each 'segment'.

Random Shapes

To use the Random Shapes variation of Zig Zag Word Search, select "Random Shapes" in the Grid Type list, and click preview. This will display a puzzle like the example below:

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/m7FqP0n850/0-20221012105539--1-W-P.png (0-20221012105539--1-W-P)

How to create Mazes with random shapes using Puzzle Maker Pro - Mazes 2D Random Shapes?

This tutorial applies to Puzzle Maker Pro - Mazes 2D Random Shapes.

The tutorial "How to use Mazes 2D Squares" describes how to use the generic options for Mazes 2D.

The module Mazes 2D Random Shapes is available in Puzzle Maker Pro v2022.11 (or newer)

Mazes 2D Random Shape lets you create mazes with random shapes (polygons and triangles), resulting in a completely different maze each time you create or preview a maze.

The module includes

Voronoi Cells (an organic looking pattern)
Triangulation (irregular triangles)

In addition to the Random Shapes options, this module includes the 'standard' maze generation and style options in the Puzzle Maker Pro - Mazes 2D collection.

Note: The Masks Add-On is not available for this module.

Creating Random Shapes Mazes

Select Mazes 2D in the main Puzzle Type dropdown menu, then select either "Voronoi Cells" or "Triangulation" in the (maze) Type dropdown menu. Click "Next Preview" to quickly get a first impression. (Changing settings does not automatically create a new preview, because you may want to change multiple settings, and the mazes, especially at larger sizes, may take some time to generate).

Creating Voronoi Mazes

You may not know it by this name, but this type of pattern is quite common in nature, and also in logistics. Mr Voronoi created an algorithm to divide an area (in our case the canvas) in smaller areas (cells), where each point in the cell is closer to its center than to other centers. This is used for example to determine which area is served by a subway or bus station, or by a distribution center. In nature you can see patterns like this for example on a giraffe.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/nnlJcWzUpc/Voronoi%20Cells%20Example.png (Voronoi Cells Example)

In this example image, the dots are placed randomly. The black lines (cell borders) are equally distant from the two points they separate. Voronoi on Wikipedia.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/QGe4Be3GsF/Voronoi%20Maze%20-%20Even%20Spread%20Screenshot.png (Voronoi Maze - Even Spread Screenshot)

The number of rows and columns for the maze are used to determine the format of the puzzle (square, rectangle), and to calculate the total number of points or cells. Due the to the random way these mazes are generated, there are not actually 20 cells horizontally and 20 cells vertically in this example.

Changing the layout of the maze

All the common customization and randomization options for Mazes 2D will work for the Voronoi Cells as well, except that masking is not available. (This could cause parts of cells to be masked, which is too complex to calculate at reasonable speed).

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/hz0oqLdFtc/Voronoi%20Maze%20-%20Centered%20Spread%20Screenshot.png (Voronoi Maze - Centered Spread Screenshot)

The "Spread" slider will force the points to be more close to the center (while still random). This results in a maze with a very different look and feel, more like an old city.

Creating Triangulation Mazes

Triangulation is a way to connect all the dots (or centers) with non-overlapping triangles. Resulting in a pattern that is related to, but very different from the Voronoi pattern.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/OQ37BNZiND/Triangulation%20Example.png (Triangulation Example)

In this example image, the dots are placed randomly. The black lines connect the dots that are closest to each other, resulting in triangles.

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/LRAtNzr3PJ/Triangulation%20Maze%20-%20Even%20Spread%20Screenshot.png (Triangulation Maze - Even Spread Screenshot)

When we use triangulation to create a maze, the lines are connected more sharply, maybe less esthetically pleasing than Voronoi. This type of maze is also quite unique.

Changing the layout of the maze

All the common customization and randomization options for Mazes 2D will work for the Triangulation as well, except that masking is not available. (This could cause parts of cells to be masked, which is too complex to calculate at reasonable speed).

https://malcolm-en-gb.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/instances/wuGqS3zSeN/resources/dz1nOOI91v/Triangulation%20Maze%20-%20Centered%20Spread%20Screenshot.png (Triangulation Maze - Centered Spread Screenshot)

The "Spread" slider will force the points to be more close to the center (while still random). This results in a maze with a very different look and feel.