Happy Cube
Happy Cubes are a set of mechanical puzzles created in 1986 by the Belgian toy inventor Dirk Laureyssens. The company "Happy bvba" has the exclusive license to manufacture and sell these puzzles .Happy Cubes are also known by a number of other names, among them: "Cube It!" cubes, "Wirrel Warrel" (in the Netherlands), "I.Q.ubes" and "Cococrash" (in Spain and Portugal).
The Happy Cubes were made of 8mm-thick ethylene-vinyl acetate foam mats (also known as EVA). The tiles were based upon a 5x5 matrix where the outer squares may be present or absent. The central 3x3 kernel was fixed. Initially the puzzle is assembled into a 2-dimensional, flat 2x3 piece rectangle fitted into a frame. The basic challenge is to construct a perfect, 6-sided cube out of these 6 pieces. Usually, there is only one way to fit the pieces into a complete cube and it can be reached with various levels of difficulty by trial and error.
Variations
There are four families of Happy Cube puzzles, each containing 6 different cubes. Each family has a unique texture, style and difficulty level. Within each puzzle family the cubes are differentiared by color. The four families of Happy Cube puzzles are:
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