Review: “Cruise”, Heye, 8/10

Publisher: Heye (Germany), published Jan 2015

Title:  “Cruise”, Artist: Anders Lyon, 1500 pieces 

OUR RATING: 8/10

Another brand new 2015 Heye puzzle hits my JigBoard! This one is “Cruise” in 1500 pieces.  How does it stack up?

Box Quality:

This puzzle comes in a Heye triangular box. Yay! I love the triangular boxes and it’s a treat to be able to get a new puzzle in one. You can see the front of the above. The back is below:

Top:

The top of the box is lovely for having face out on a shelf. It shows a nice close-up of the puzzle image, the Heye logo, and the piece size. It would be even better to have the name of the artist and puzzle on the top too.

Inside:

Inside the box is a bag with the puzzle pieces (in excellent condition, no damage, puzzle dust, or unseparated pieces). It also comes with a poster of the image on thick paper.  You can see the front and back of the poster below. The back acts as a mini-catalog, which is lovely.

Above: A look at the front and back of the poster than comes in the box.

The Image:

This is the first puzzle I’ve seen by artist Anders Lyon.  I really like ‘cut-away’ images like this one. Gale Pitt has done some nice Doll House puzzles in this cut-away style and there’s Loup’s “Emergency Room”, which is one of my favorite Heye puzzles. There’s also JVH’s “Hotel” puzzle. So I was immediately interested in this cut-away cruise ship image.

The sky and sea offer some interesting color and texture outside of the cruise ship itself, and the cruise ship interior is filled with detail and interesting figures.

(Click on any of the images in this review for a closer look.)

Puzzle Quality:

You can see my Heye brand comparison here for details.  To sum: Heye is one of my favorite brands. In this new 2015 puzzle, the pieces are a bit bigger than in older Heye puzzles, and I found that a nice improvement. As always, the pieces feel thick and have a nice, linen, non-glare finish to the pieces.

The puzzle cut is a grid cut, but with wonky lines and lots of variety in piece shapes. Each piece is unique and you never think a piece fits somewhere when it really doesn’t. The image reproduction is sharp and colorful.

Assembly:  

I’ve rated this puzzle an 8 because I didn’t enjoy the assembly as much as I loved Prades “Ballroom” puzzle (see my review here).  The sea and the bottom of the boat were the most fun to assemble. The sky came next. I liked the ‘writing’ and designs in the sky–made it more interesting than just blue-and-white.

The challenge comes in the interior of the ship. The human figures are quite small compared to “Ballroom” or a puzzle like Loup’s “apocalypse”, and they’re a bit sketchy in style.

So the interior of the ship was really almost a one-to-one exercise in matching a piece to the poster. There are a few rooms with a pink background or green background, but overall most of the coloring doesn’t lend itself to putting together small sections of the ship’s interior without referencing the poster. The ship is a very large area in a 1500 piece puzzle to have to match piece by piece.

I enjoyed the puzzle, and I would be interested in more by Anders Lyon.  It just doesn’t quite reach the perfection of a Loup, Ryba, Prades, or Degano to me, mainly because the characters are quite small in this one.

Above: The sea and red bottom of the boat were the easiest areas to put together.

More close-ups from the interior of the ship.

Conclusion:

If you like ‘busy’ puzzles like JVH and Heye, you’ll probably enjoy “Cruise”. Great brand quality, a nice poster in the box, and a decent 1500 piece size. Recommended!

Where to find:

The 2015 Heye puzzles are available at stores like puzzlewarehouse.com

JJ