Puzzle Arcade
12 Achievements
200
15-20h
Xbox 360
5*250
Build 5 puzzles of 250 pieces or more.
10
How to unlock the 5*250 achievement in Puzzle Arcade - Definitive Guide
Just a heads up. This apparently ONLY counts puzzles you do alone - multiplayer ones won't count. I did 1 puzzle locally over 250 pieces and 2 over LIVE, and neither of them counted toward the achievement.
You can, however, do them in either Classic or Turbo mode.
You can, however, do them in either Classic or Turbo mode.
4 Comments
Out of curiosity, do they have to be different puzzles, or can I do the same one over five times?
By xZx Moose 74 on 21 Feb 2012 10:33
I honestly can't remember - it's been over 3 years since I got this achievement. Maybe someone else can answer that and I can add it to the solution.
By Botafogo007 on 21 Feb 2012 14:48
This achievement glitched on me, requiring me to do all 5 puzzles in a single session. Previous to going for this I had all other achievements including the 1,000 piece expert puzzle, the multiplayer one for 300 pieces, and the 3 layer fractal puzzle which is well over 250 pieces, none of which counted toward my progress.
Luckily, if you follow this guide it should only take you about an hour and a half of straight playing to get all 5.
What I did was go to the puzzle "Many of Them", and change the number of pieces to 252 (just above the minimum requirement). Make the game type turbo and set the difficulty to beginner. Press Y to change the sorting of the pieces to do edges first. Zoom all the way out and just drag the piece along its corresponding edge and it will auto place the piece where it's supposed to go once you drag it over the correct spot. This is the part where being zoomed out is key, as it is far easier for the piece to "lock in" the more zoomed out you are.
After you are done with the entire edge, change the sorting to position on board. You will see this sorts the columns in to top left, top right, middle, bottom left, and bottom right. Do every column except for the middle. This allows you to focus on only a portion of the puzzle and will make things go a lot quicker. Once all that is left is middle, sort by color, which will help you spot where things are supposed to go. When everything is said and done, depending on how fast you are you can finish the whole puzzle in around 15 minutes. Rinse and repeat 4 more times for the achievement, or less if you were lucky and it didn't glitch on you.
I tried doing the "stacking" tactic on classic and found it to take almost twice as long. Stick with turbo, things will go faster. Furthermore, it is reported that doing multiplayer matches do not count towards this, so you should do this solo just to be safe.
Luckily, if you follow this guide it should only take you about an hour and a half of straight playing to get all 5.
What I did was go to the puzzle "Many of Them", and change the number of pieces to 252 (just above the minimum requirement). Make the game type turbo and set the difficulty to beginner. Press Y to change the sorting of the pieces to do edges first. Zoom all the way out and just drag the piece along its corresponding edge and it will auto place the piece where it's supposed to go once you drag it over the correct spot. This is the part where being zoomed out is key, as it is far easier for the piece to "lock in" the more zoomed out you are.
After you are done with the entire edge, change the sorting to position on board. You will see this sorts the columns in to top left, top right, middle, bottom left, and bottom right. Do every column except for the middle. This allows you to focus on only a portion of the puzzle and will make things go a lot quicker. Once all that is left is middle, sort by color, which will help you spot where things are supposed to go. When everything is said and done, depending on how fast you are you can finish the whole puzzle in around 15 minutes. Rinse and repeat 4 more times for the achievement, or less if you were lucky and it didn't glitch on you.
I tried doing the "stacking" tactic on classic and found it to take almost twice as long. Stick with turbo, things will go faster. Furthermore, it is reported that doing multiplayer matches do not count towards this, so you should do this solo just to be safe.
2 Comments
Great guide! I had the same glitch... I'd recommend either the map that looks like a painting with boats, harbor, and city all on it--it's a wide picture. Sorry don't remember the names though :-) That map took about 15 minutes, and I got about 12 minutes first try with the picture that's fruit with a water/blue/white background. That one went really well. Thanks!
By Shadow 00 Fox on 23 Jul 2013 18:34
I'm not so sure it's glitched. I just think the achievement description is a little too vague. I'm fairly certain that multiplayer puzzles don't count towards this achievement (based on numerous other comments, both here and elsewhere, as well as my own experience), and I'm pretty sure the Fractal Puzzles don't count, either, because it's not a single puzzle with a bunch of pieces, it's a whole lot of way smaller puzzles with just a few pieces. None of the individual puzzles in the Fractals are anywhere near 250 pieces. The 1000 piece Expert achievement counts, though.
I can also confirm that it doesn't have to be done in a single run, or even on the same day, at least it didn't for me. I had done two 250+ puzzles, the MP puzzle and the two Fractal puzzles over the last couple of days. I did the 1000 piece Expert puzzle earlier today, and then two more 250+ piece puzzles just a little bit ago, and the achievement popped at the results screen after the score was tallied on the 2nd 250+ piece puzzle just a little bit ago. Take out the two Fractals and the MP puzzle, and that's exactly 5 puzzles of 250+ pieces.
All that said, this is still a great guide, because the method laid out for doing the puzzles quickly was spot on. I did the last two exactly as you described, and it took less than 15 minutes each. +1 from me.
I can also confirm that it doesn't have to be done in a single run, or even on the same day, at least it didn't for me. I had done two 250+ puzzles, the MP puzzle and the two Fractal puzzles over the last couple of days. I did the 1000 piece Expert puzzle earlier today, and then two more 250+ piece puzzles just a little bit ago, and the achievement popped at the results screen after the score was tallied on the 2nd 250+ piece puzzle just a little bit ago. Take out the two Fractals and the MP puzzle, and that's exactly 5 puzzles of 250+ pieces.
All that said, this is still a great guide, because the method laid out for doing the puzzles quickly was spot on. I did the last two exactly as you described, and it took less than 15 minutes each. +1 from me.
By Impdaddyzer0 on 13 Feb 2015 04:44
5*250 - 10G (Original Achievement)
Difficulty: Medium
Estimated Period of Time: Long
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To get this Achievement, you must build 5 puzzles with at least 250 pieces.
All 5 of my puzzles were in Single Player, Picture Puzzles.
1. Amazing Stories - June 1940, 1120 Pieces (for the Kilopiece Colossus Achievement)
2. Band of Brothers, 285 Pieces
3. Many of Them, 252 Pieces
4. Pixeltown, 252 Pieces
5. Regenerating, 256 Pieces
(Just in case you wanted to know 5 that wont cause any glitches, I did 1 and 2 ages ago, and 3, 4, and 5 all back to back today.)
My best advice is to open them up on:
Construction Mode: Classic
Experience Level: Beginner
Number of Pieces: 250+
Piece Shape: Squares
Then once the puzzle starts, start using the Stack Method (stacking all the square pieces on top of each other as neatly as you can, doesn't have to be perfect). Once they are all stacked, which should take 10-15 minutes or so, you can grab one piece and rapidly click it into place next to the pile until you get a match, then move it over to the new match and repeat. Use the picture on the right of the screen for reference to see exactly where you are in the puzzle and move around accordingly.
So stacking takes 10-15 minutes, and building takes about 5 minutes. Taking your time you can more or less do a puzzle in half an hour.
Good luck and message me if you need more info.
Difficulty: Medium
Estimated Period of Time: Long
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To get this Achievement, you must build 5 puzzles with at least 250 pieces.
All 5 of my puzzles were in Single Player, Picture Puzzles.
1. Amazing Stories - June 1940, 1120 Pieces (for the Kilopiece Colossus Achievement)
2. Band of Brothers, 285 Pieces
3. Many of Them, 252 Pieces
4. Pixeltown, 252 Pieces
5. Regenerating, 256 Pieces
(Just in case you wanted to know 5 that wont cause any glitches, I did 1 and 2 ages ago, and 3, 4, and 5 all back to back today.)
My best advice is to open them up on:
Construction Mode: Classic
Experience Level: Beginner
Number of Pieces: 250+
Piece Shape: Squares
Then once the puzzle starts, start using the Stack Method (stacking all the square pieces on top of each other as neatly as you can, doesn't have to be perfect). Once they are all stacked, which should take 10-15 minutes or so, you can grab one piece and rapidly click it into place next to the pile until you get a match, then move it over to the new match and repeat. Use the picture on the right of the screen for reference to see exactly where you are in the puzzle and move around accordingly.
So stacking takes 10-15 minutes, and building takes about 5 minutes. Taking your time you can more or less do a puzzle in half an hour.
Good luck and message me if you need more info.
From the Main Menu select Single Player, then choose Picture Puzzles. You'll need to complete five puzzles with at least 250 pieces each.
Here is a list of five easy puzzles with their piece count:
Amazing Stories - June 1940: 280
Art Forms in Nature: 266
Colored Pencils: 294
Dynamic Stillness II: 266
Seasons: 256
Once you've decided on your puzzles choose these settings for each one:
Construction Mode - Turbo
Experience Level - Beginner
Number of Pieces - (lowest amount past 250)
Piece Shape - (any)