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Top 10 Portable Games for Long Trips 9



Professor Layton and the Curious Village (Nintendo DS)

At its core, Professor Layton And The Curious Village is a collection of classic puzzles and brainteasers: You're asked to rearrange matchsticks, solve an assortment of sliding-block puzzles, and the like. The puzzles are often brilliant, sometimes frustrating -- but what sets the game apart is the way they're all tied together.

Professor Layton carefully wraps its puzzles into a larger story of mystery in intrigue, lumps several similarly-styled puzzles together, and peppers the solutions with history and trivia. If you need hints, the game gives you just enough help without making things obvious; with each completed puzzle comes another feeling of accomplishment. If you dig games like 'Brain Age' and its sequel, you're going to brain-out on Professor Layton.