Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box is far better than Curious Village in every way in my opinion. I was hooked from the first game, so my excitement for Diabolical Box was immeasurable. And I have to say, it exceeded my expectations.
Diabolical Box takes place right after the events of Professor Layton and the Curious Village. After hearing of a mystical and cursed box, Professor Hershel Layton and his assistant, Luke, set out on the Molentary Express to find this box. The story (In my opinion) is so much better than Curious Village in almost every way. The characters are once again, incredible.
The art style is really great and I love the music even more in this one. There are 138 puzzles in the main game, with 15 bonus puzzles. Making a total of 153 puzzles. Once again, I did all of them almost by accident just due to how addicting the puzzles were and how great the story is. The puzzle system isn't much different from the first but I'd say the Picarat score is more balanced this time
The variety of the puzzles are great too and I did enjoy playing most of them. Except maybe the sliding puzzles because I have no patience. I did find the puzzles a bit more repetitive this time around which I hope is fixed in Unwound Future
I can't express how much I recommend this game. Incredible story, incredible ending, incredible puzzles, incredible music, incredible presentation.
Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box is a must-play. Play Curious Village first. To avoid confusion. Great Game!
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Playing this again, it's weird to me how it's rated essentially the same as Curious Village. To be fair, I also initially remembered this as being the weakest Prof. Layton game, but I'm convinced now that's Curious Village. Diabolical Box is an improvement in so many ways, especially in the pacing and complexity of the story. And having the memo function is a big improvement for on-the-go play. I imagine Unwound Future will be even better.
I think most people agree that it plays better and builds intrigue/suspense better than Curious Village but the payoff for the story and the conclusion in general is really below par.
Haven't played the 3ds games nor finished Last Specter, but this definitely felt like the plot with the highest stakes. The Folsense theme might be the best song made for the series also.