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> Results: PQ: Practical Intelligence Quotient
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Do you look forward to finding logic puzzles in action games? When a turn-based strategy game gives you an objective to finish in eight turns, do you rack your brain figuring out how to do it in six turns? If so, then PQ: Practical Intelligence Quotient for the PSP is exactly the game for you. According to the manual, it's not just a game but a test that "measures your intelligence by testing you in scenarios which are close to real life".
The ﾑtest' consists of ten stages of ﾑquestions' with ten questions in each stage. Playing the game consists of moving your player from the entry to the exit as quickly as possible, solving one or more of the thirteen possible challenges along the way. These challenges include stacking blocks, pushing walls, blocking lasers, avoiding watchmen, using weights to open doors and more. The questions are both entertaining and challenging, and the use of a generic person in a generic environment with simple techno music makes the game...er, I mean ﾑtest' flow very nicely. The score for each question is based on how much time is left and how many moves you have remaining. If you fail a level but have time and moves remaining, you can retry the question.  Upon completion of all ten stages, your PQ score is tabulated and you can upload it to the Internet to compare against the scores of others in various parts of the world. At that point you either start again with a new ﾑplayer', or go back and retry various stages to improve your performance. Because there is nothing other than ten stages of ten questions, there is little left to do once you get a reasonable score. This is not an infinite puzzle game like Lumines or Bejeweled, and therefore the replay value is very limited. The puzzles change each time you create a new player, but are static for that player. Difficulty is also fairly static, with tougher puzzles produced by combining more elements of the same difficulty rather than more difficult individual elements.  
From the official web site: "Studies show that games can help increase reaction time, teach logic, and expand spatial abilities. However, those qualities are usually veiled behind crawling through dungeons, shooting Nazis, and saving princesses."
Kids love puzzlesﾗthey love the challenge, the hunt for the answer, and aren't afraid to fail to get there. Adults love a puzzle right up until they discover it is actually a test and that they are being judged. Thinking of this as a puzzle challenge rather than a testﾗa challenge to do things as quickly as possible within as few moves as possibleﾗmakes it more fun for everyone. And as a game, it is a lot of fun. You need to assess your environment and move quickly to solve the puzzle to get to the exit. One wrong move and you fail, so it's better to be slow and cautious. The two biggest problems are replayability and the advertised purpose of the game. The ﾑtest' is problematic because what is tested is not always your thought process and operational efficiency but rather the combination of those with your ability to manage the controls and camera properly. The simple controls make this somewhat easier, but there were times when a single block makes the difference between excellence and failure. Also, since there is little replayability, few options and the game has limited personality (I found it somewhat charming, my wife said it reminded her of an empty ﾑHolodeck' from Star Trek: The Next Generation), keeping anyone engaged for the hours required to complete the 100 questions is not easy. There is not much reading required and the puzzle elements are pretty straightforward, so this game could be played by any age group. However, the required dexterity and attention to detail suggest that kids over ten years old are the most appropriate audience. My two sonsﾗ8 and 9.5 years oldﾗhad some fun playing it for a while, and had some good laughs as their player constantly climbed boxes they were trying to pick up and walking into laser beams they were trying to avoid. After playing for a bit, they managed to get serious enough to get some reasonable scores from a few puzzles and have expressed interest in further play. But ﾑplay' is the keyﾗthey are just enjoying solving the puzzle, not competing or being tested. This review edited by Dave Long Comments? Chat about it in our forums! Format For Printing | Tell A Friend | Digg | Slashdot | del.icio.us | Buy This Game Browse Amazon.com's selection of "PQ" themed games Home > Review Archive > Video Games > Results: PQ: Practical Intelligence Quotient |
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