Play The Incredible Machine in Your Browser

About The Incredible Machine

The Incredible Machine, often shortened to TIM, is a puzzle game in which you build Rube Goldberg devices: elaborate chains of parts that set each other off. Kevin Ryan designed and coded it, and Jeff Tunnell produced it at Jeff Tunnell Productions, a studio that no longer exists. Dynamix published the first game in 1993, and Sierra On-Line is also listed among the series’ publishers.

The 1993 game started a series. The same team made the versions released from 1993 through 1995, while the later games of 2000 and 2001 had different designers. Across the series, versions appeared for MS-DOS, the 3DO, FM Towns, Windows, the Macintosh and iOS.

The rights have changed hands since then. In October 2009 PushButton Labs, a company founded by Jeff Tunnell, acquired the whole series and its intellectual property. Playdom, a division of Disney Interactive, later bought PushButton Labs, which is why The Walt Disney Company holds the rights today.

How it runs in your browser

DOS.Zone carries the 1993 MS-DOS game, listed simply as The Incredible Machine and tagged as a puzzle and educational title. Clicking Play opens that listing in a new tab, where js-dos, the open-source DOSBox port DOS.Zone builds for browsers, emulates an IBM PC and starts the game.

You don’t download or install anything, because the files are served by DOS.Zone, and you don’t need your own copy or an account. The site has no ads. Players on the listing give the game a 5-star average from 53 reviews.

The page doesn’t say whether solved puzzles are remembered between visits, so if you’re planning to work through the game over several sessions, check DOS.Zone’s page first. DOS.Zone identifies it by its 1993 release year and doesn’t mention any of the later games in the series.

Controls and devices

The Incredible Machine was built for a keyboard and mouse. DOS.Zone doesn’t publish any controls for it, so explore the game’s own menus when you start.

DOS.Zone’s description says the game can also be played on a phone with its virtual on-screen controls. For a game made with a mouse in mind, though, a desktop or laptop is the better fit. Chromebooks haven’t been confirmed.

Who it’s for

It suits puzzle fans who like working out cause and effect, and anyone who remembers building contraptions on a family PC in the 1990s. DOS.Zone tags it as educational, so it may also appeal to younger players who enjoy figuring out how things work. For another puzzle game from 1993, try The Lost Vikings, and for a point-and-click adventure with puzzles of a different kind, The Secret of Monkey Island also runs on DOS.Zone.