Our favourite puzzlers expand our minds, enabling us to think in thrilling new ways. And you truly need to think outside the box when you’re twirling Moncage’s giant, rotating cube.

Each side shows a different animated scene – a factory, playground, moonlit highway – all of which interact when you spin the cube and line up two sides just so: a cardboard box in a factory might roll down a ramp to land on a slide in a playground, for example. This then releases a drone that rises to reveal a charming seaside town. Surreal and surprising, these revelatory moments happen again and again throughout the game.

The depth of each scene amazed us. See that TV in the far corner airing a newscast? Switch the channel to a cartoon, and suddenly the TV is inside a kid’s bedroom, where powering up a toy train leads to new discoveries. Or tear pages off a calendar hanging in a hospital room and the nearby scenes suddenly reflect the passing seasons. Like a nesting doll, Moncage holds endless worlds within worlds.

And it’s especially immersive on iPad. The clean, colourful graphics shine on the large Liquid Retina display, while spatial audio subtly shifts effects around you as you rotate scenes. Super-smooth touchscreen controls make manipulating the cube a wondrously tactile experience.

The sequence that begins with a ship cruising through the water, only to evolve into something else entirely.

As we dove through the boat’s hatch, we spotted a pocket watch on the desk. Aligning it with a control panel in another scene ignited an enormous rocket. As it surged upwards, we spun the cube again, and a third world offered a distant view of the rocket exploding in a shimmer of light – now part of a fireworks show above a crowded theme park.

Not sure how to pronounce Moncage? According to co-creator Yijia Chen, the title rhymes with “montage” to reflect the cube’s true meaning – a montage in a cage!

To unlock a secret ending that fleshes out Moncage’s overarching narrative, find all 28 still photos, then replay the game. This time, during four key sequences, you’ll notice glowing strands surrounding the cube – align them with objects inside the cube all four times to reveal the alternate finale.

Moncage is the first game from Optillusion, an indie studio founded by two NYU graduates. It took the team four years to craft their debut title; they’ve since released the experimental game WADE as part of Triennale Game Collection 2.