Pros • Useful extras and challenges • Over 150 puzzles • More meta-puzzles (hamster, tea, camera) • Better story than Curious Village • More puzzles to download	Cons • Puzzle direction can sometimes be confusing
Bottom Line Kick back, relax and think. A fantastic collection of puzzles wrapped in an entertaining school.

"If you enjoyed Professor Layton and the Curious Village, you will find that Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box polishes off a rough edge or two, and then adds more puzzles. A lot more. Better yet, it adds more variety and more rewarding ways to find them. Here’s a game that puzzle addicts can savor for a very long time."

Jason's Score: 9.0

This time, Professor Layton and Luke are investigating the story of the Elysian Box, which has a sinister reputation: anyone who opens the box dies shortly thereafter. Despite this ominous trend, it seems that a lot of people are going to a lot of trouble to find it. As with Curious Village, you'll spend your time wandering about, talking to people, examining things and then solving puzzle after puzzle as you tackle the mystery. The game takes place over a train ride and two cities, which makes exploration a lot more varied and interesting.

When all is said and done, the game has over 150 puzzles: math, logic, sliding shapes... You'll see most of the game types of Curious Village and more. Strangely though, I didn't see any matchstick puzzles (that might come as a relief to players of the first game), and I've completed the game with just about 12 puzzles unsolved. In a particularly applause-worthy move, Nintendo is also issuing more puzzles via downloadable content.

I particularly enjoyed the presentation of the puzzles, which is a lot more intricate and imaginative than the first game. There are several meta-puzzles that are played over long stretches of the game, and they lead to some cool rewards. For example, if you complete the camera minigame, it will lead to a whole new type of game. And if you complete that new type of game, it will lead to yet more puzzles. If you complete the hamster meta-puzzle, you will get an extremely useful bonus ability. There's a lot more incentive to explore every nook and cranny of the game, and try out those bonus puzzles.

Another improvement I like: more story, and I don't just mean the addition of more animated sequences. The story is better overall this time around, with one slight reservation. Without spoiling, the big secret of the game is somewhat reminiscent of the one in the Curious Village. However, I'm willing to let that slide because the big revelation does a number on the heartstrings and has some very tragic yet touching consequences.

I don't have many complaints about Diabolical Box. I could say that sometimes the puzzle instructions aren't entirely clear, but it could be counter-argued that I'm just thick sometimes. What I do know is that I've sunk close to 11 hours into the game and there's still quite a lot I haven't seen (I haven't brewed tea for everyone, for example). The characters, mythology and style of play have officially grown on me. Time to start harassing Nintendo about getting the two other Professor Layton titles ported over to North America.