Product description: I love tricks that can play for children and adults alike, Mini Cube to Chocolate is one of them and Brix can do that too ! The idea behind Brix is brilliant, you have a stack of 12 Lego cards which allow you to build 4 figurines so you have 4 heads, 4 bodys and 4 legs. The cards are shuffled and layed down on the table, some are set face up, some face down. The spectator dictates all the choices and finally, you’re left with 9 cards face up and 3 face down, you show your prediction which completely matches. You then proceed to turn over the 3 face down cards, it’s a pirate head, a pirate body but a princess dress.. You show that your prediction is also correct! When everything seems to be finished, you pull out the real figurine from the now blank card! It’s a very interesting variation on an old principle.
Price and where to buy it: This is sold at $35 and you can find it in nearly every Murphy's magic partner !
What you get: You get a small plastic box, with inside everything you need to know in order to perform the trick. The explanation video has subtitles in English so you can understand what’s going on. You get 12 Brix cards with all the combinaisons possible, 3 prediction cards and the figurine. The cards are quite small so they can nicely fit in a wallet or be set down on the table. The do not fan very well but with some use, they will break in and you’ll be able to spread them with ease. Overall, it’s not cheap for what it is but the routine is worth the price in my opinion, I like this one a lot !
Teaser: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GG9QVppY86M
The pros and the cons: Here is the core of my review, let's begin with the cons, as I will usually be doing, I prefer to keep the good things for the end.
THE CONS:
The outcome will always be the same, you randomly get either the pirate with the princess dress or the princess with the wooden pirate leg.
You need to lay down the cards in a grid on the table, which means this trick will require table space.
THE PROS:
This can play very well for children but will baffle adults alike, I think it doesn’t take up that much pocket space and therefore it’s always interesting to have it in your close-up case.
It’s based on a old principle called “Quadraplex” by Nick Trost which a mathematical principle but without the usual boring stuff of a mathematical principle. I really like it because it looks so fair and clean, people won’t believe it (I still don’t know how it works).
I like tricks which have a kicker, a final phase people don’t see coming. The production of the figurine is clever and ends up the trick in a very nice way.
People can shuffle the cards before, with a clever subtlety, you don’t need them in a special order.
It’s colorful, easy to do and almost instant reset, if you need more “pros” to convince you !
Overall rating: I really didn’t think I was going to like this one so much. I’ll keep it in my Close Up case and I’ll be ready for any occasion, I really enjoy Brix and I’ll be using it, 4/4 hearts.
As for the difficulty level, once you know the basic principle, it’s really easy to do, 2/5 stars.