It’s fair to say that I’m a huge fan of Douglas Adams… not the biggest by any stretch of the imagination, but I’ve read the Hitch-Hikers books multiple times, have the TV series on DVD, and even backed a slightly expensive Kickstarter to fund the writing of a book put together from a thorough examination of Douglas’s personal note books and archives.

I know what the number 42 signifies.

To see a game with the name “The Answer is 42” with an Achievement list based very much on the books triggered my interest… I was almost disappointed to discover, a little while later, that this was a number based puzzler.

On sale at launch for £1.99 and a reasonably quick completion… I bought it day one.

Spread over 100 levels this is a maths based game… a grid of numbers are laid out with several coloured in to denote starting positions… so a yellow 17 and a red 6 will mean there are 2 routs to find through those numbers.

You have to use all the numbers on the grid in each level.

From the 17 you have to move along grid lines (usually 8 of them, diagonals, horizontal and vertical) to make a line add up to 42.

You can use these numbers more than once as long as you don’t go over a previously used line, nor can you cross over a diagonal line that is already in place… for from 17, add 10, add 7 and add 8 gives you 42… line complete.

Move onto the 6 and repeat the process… once all lines are in place and all numbers are used the level ends.

You can’t use another coloured number in a line… so moving from the yellow 17 you can’t use the red 6.

Later levels introduce negative numbers and much more complicated pathways… I hit level 50 with no issues at all, but will admit to having to revert to using a guide for a few in the 80s and 90s… maybe half a dozen times in the whole game… thus, when you check the completion times for the game on TrueAchievements my time is a couple of hours longer than any of those around me.

It’s fun… but doesn’t really fit in for an Indie Fest style post given the lack of story, characters and the like… but for less than the price of a tub of fruit in your local supermarket, it’s a fun (and reasonably taxing) way to spend an evening.