puzzles and adventure

Most video games has a flow to them, if it has a story that is.  Since the story is a huge part of Adventure games, it certainly has a flow of its own.  But it has to face one of the most scary thing in gaming, Puzzles.  It's a flow stoppers.  Sometimes a puzzle was so impassible to a player, you might as well wait for Oedipus to solve it for you.  And yet, Puzzle solving is one of the most personal experience you can ever get in an interactive media. 

For most adventure  games are a mix dose of puzzles and story.  You cannot simply tell a player about he solution to a puzzle and still hoping he get the same kind of experience if he tackled the task alone.  It is one of the reason that Adventure games have very little replay value.  Because the most obvious gameplay mechanics is not a gameplay  after all.   I think this is one of the advantage of the Longest Journey series, since the strength of the series lies with the story, not the puzzles.  An hard puzzle could literally stop the game to flow, which is very important to most gamers, I'd imagine, since I am one of hem.  I understand the joy of solving a puzzle.  I would also suffer greatly when there's no other action for me to do in the game, but to sit and stare at the screen and being puzzled.  At that point of time, the game basically stopped.  There's no more progression that I can make.  It is like an unbeatable boss in an action game.  The difference is that I blame myself for my hand eye coordination, and here, I am shameful for my intelligence.