Genius Undercover

‍One positive side effect of Smart acquiring the UK-based Happy Puzzle Company a few years ago is that I now get the chance to work on projects beyond single-player games. Last year, I designed Genius Connection; this year, I followed it up with Genius Undercover. By now, there’s a whole range of Genius games, and they share a common DNA. At their core, they’re two-player puzzle races: both players receive a randomly generated challenge, and the winner is whoever solves it first. Before starting work on Undercover, I took the time to analyze the existing titles, just as I do every year with the single-player SmartGames range. This led to the observation that most Genius games are essentially packing problems. That’s what inspired me to make Genius Connection last year, which is obviously a connection game — to introduce some variety. And for this year, I wanted to try something even more different: a sequential movement puzzle.

‍

‍The most obvious example of a sequential movement puzzle is the classic sliding puzzle — like a “fifteen puzzle.” So I started with the idea of a 3×3 grid filled with eight sliding squares. Each square tile would have two levels: a raised colored surface (dark blue or red, depending on the board) and a lower white surface. The goal was that, by sliding the tiles around, you’d create one or more white surfaces on the board in a specific shape— that could then be covered by translucent pentomino pieces. There are 12 possible pentominoes, and I wanted to use all of them in this game. They would be translucent and brightly colored, so the white of the board remained visible beneath them. We built a prototype and even developed software to ensure that every random combination of 1–4 pentominoes would always have at least one valid solution. Technically, it worked. But in practice, it was far too difficult to solve. Anticipating how the board would look after several sliding moves was almost impossible for the average player. Solutions ended up feeling like trial and error, and although the name of the brand suggests otherwise, these games aren’t meant to be enjoyed only by “geniuses.” The core idea still had potential, so I reverted the game mechanics back to a packing problem. Instead of sliding the tiles, I turned them into freely movable pieces. Players could now pick up the squares and arrange them however they liked. This change also solved a visual issue with the sliding version: there was always an empty gap left on the grid, which spoiled the effect when you covered up the white areas with some transparent pieces. Now that the concept was simpler, I looked for ways to make it better. Would it also be possible to create a set of square puzzle pieces that could be covered by up to 5 instead of 4 transparent puzzle pieces? And yes, after trying out different options, this was also possible, although I had to change the set of transparent puzzle pieces as well. That meant including a few tetrominoes and one triomino alongside the pentominoes, while still keeping the total at 12 pieces. My colleague Cameron ran the numbers: this gave us 12 unique potential challenges with 1 piece, 66 with 2, 220 with 3, 494 with 4, and 792 with 5. This breakdown matched perfectly with the five levels used in most SmartGames: one transparent piece corresponds to Starter, two to Junior, three to Expert, four to Master and five to Wizard. It also created a flexible system: players could compete tournament-style, where the winner of a round moves up to the next difficulty level while the loser stays behind. People could also opt to choose a specific difficulty level or to balance out the difference in skill between players. And of course, you can play the game solo as well — just take out a specific number of transparent pieces out of the cotton bag, and you’ve got yourself a challenge. With 1,585 possibilities in total, it’s unlikely you’ll repeat one anytime soon.

‍

‍To support easier and harder challenges, some sides needed to have large white areas, and others none. In order to create enough different options to make any combination of pieces solvable, I needed to make the square pieces double-sided. This made the tiles triple-layered. Although the white parts are still the low parts that will be covered by the transparent puzzle pieces, these have raised parts that match the height of the dark-colored parts. This design made it easier to count the number of white squares and ensured stability when pieces rested on mostly white sides.

‍

‍Unlike other Genius games, Undercover doesn’t need dice to generate random challenges. Instead, players draw 1–5 translucent pieces from a cotton bag, depending on the chosen difficulty. These pieces are placed in the center of the table, visible to both players. The catch is that only one set of translucent pieces exists. That means you can’t check your solution until you’re confident — and once you grab the pieces to test your board, you’re locked in. If they don’t fit, you lose. If you hesitate too long, your opponent might claim them first and win. This creates a wonderful tension: do you go fast and risk being wrong, or take your time and risk being too slow?

‍

‍In a way, Genius Undercover is a reversed-engineered puzzle. Normally, you’re given a board and must fit pieces into it. Here, it’s the opposite: you’re given the pieces and must build a board that will accept them. It’s a simple concept that becomes immediately clear after a few minutes of play, but it’s also counterintuitive enough that it’s tricky to explain in words. So although I didn't achieve my initial goal of creating a Genius game with a sequential movement mechanism, I am very pleased with the result. And of course, there is always next year to give the idea another try.

‍

‍UPDATE: Genius Undercover will be available by The Happy Puzzle Company in summer 2026. The rest of the world will probably need to wait until 2027.

‍GAME RULES GENIUS UNDERCOVER

‍

‍Genius Undercover features different playing modes:

‍• Progressive and fixed Two-player mode

‍• Single player mode.

‍

‍Progressive Two Player Mode

‍

‍BEFORE YOU START: Each player gets a game board and 9 square, double sided game board pieces. There is 1 set of 12 transparent puzzle pieces, shared by the players. Put all transparent puzzle pieces inside the bag.

‍ 

‍1) Randomly pull one puzzle piece from the bag and place it in between the players. IMPORTANT! Players are not allowed to touch this piece, flip or rotate it until they think they found a solution.

‍

‍2) Players race to fill up their gameboards with the 9 square pieces based on the selected transparent puzzle piece. Both sides of the puzzle pieces can be used, but the remaining white area must match the shape of the transparent puzzle piece that is visible on the table so that it can fit into the solution. When a player thinks he found a solution, he can grab the transparent puzzle piece and place it on his gameboard: 

‍• The transparent puzzle piece can be flipped or rotated to make it fit, but the position of any of the already-placed square game board pieces cannot be changed. If the transparent puzzle piece matches exactly the white grid on his game board, the player wins this round (3A)

‍• If the transparent puzzle piece doesn't fit (3B) or doesn't cover all white parts (3C), the player loses this round. 

‍

‍Put the transparent puzzle piece back inside the bag and randomly pick two new pieces for the next round: 

‍• The winner of the previous round now needs to make a gameboard where both puzzle pieces exactly cover the white area. 

‍• The loser of the previous round needs to make a gameboard where only one of the chosen pieces fits. This player can choose which one. 

‍• Continue playing rounds. The loser of a round always uses the same number of transparent pieces in the next round, while the winner of a round uses one more piece in the next round. So, a player winning more rounds will have much harder challenges.

‍

‍3) The first player to successfully solve a round with 5 transparent puzzle pieces wins the game. This player will have won rounds with 1, 2, 3 and 4 transparent puzzle pieces before this.

‍

‍Fixed Two Player Mode

‍

‍Rather than progressively increasing the number of transparent pieces with every win, players can also opt for a specific level of difficulty (see single player mode below). If they play this way the difficulty level doesn't need to be identical for both players. For example: If an adult plays against a child, they can decide that the child only needs to fit 2 transparent puzzle pieces while the adult needs to fill 3 or more to balance out the difference in skill level.

‍ 

‍Single Player Mode:

‍

‍You can also play this game as a normal single player SmartGame. Pick any number and shape of puzzle pieces according to the difficulty level you want to play: 

‍• STARTER: use 1 transparent puzzle piece 

‍• JUNIOR: use 2 transparent puzzle pieces 

‍• EXPERT: use 3 transparent puzzle pieces 

‍• MASTER: use 4 transparent puzzle pieces 

‍• WIZARD: use 5 transparent puzzle pieces 

‍

‍There is at least one solution for any combination of 1 to 5 transparent puzzle pieces. Often there are multiple correct solutions.