Slot Together Wooden Insect Models In Zen Build

"Enter the exciting world of insects with Exciting World of Insects, a new biweekly magazine about the exciting world of insects. Build one of the insect kingdom's deadliest hunters issue-by-issue with real wood parts for a praying mantis! The first issue's only 50p!"

The TV commercials downplayed that later issues cost far more than I could ever afford, leaving my childhood shelves covered in jigsaw-cut wooden mantis limbs, T. rex skulls, stag beetle carapaces, and Eiffel Tower crowns. Twenty years later, I might finally complete one, thanks to Zen Build. It's a free puzzler about assembling wooden models, and I cannot finish this mantis.

Zen Build's presentation is a bit scrappy but hey, you get to build wooden models. You're given a brief glimpse of their finished form then they explode into a cloud of swirling parts for you to assemble by clicking two parts that go together.

It automatically slots pieces together when you pair them correctly, which I'm somewhat glad for as I'd grow mighty frustrated if I had to try every piece every way. That said, the experience would be more faithful if it let me put a part in the wrong slot the wrong way around then end up complaining that it's broken because I can't attach the antennae anywhere.

And no, despite the similar name and tone, it's not related to wood-wrapping puzzler Zen Bound.

Zen Build's only got arthropods right now ('insects', it says, with its tarantula and centipede!), but creator Grigor Todorov is holding a poll to decide whether he'll next add 'animals', vehicles, or buildings. Who knows where a horse-drawn wagon would end up?

You can play Zen Build in your browser on on Itch.io or Game Jolt. For an authentic nostalgic experience, listen to whatever music you'd have playing as you fussed over your first issue parts (or enter my childhood). Arachnophobics, be warned that this video has a big wooden tarantula, but it does explode so perhaps this'd be cathartic: