The Tower Cube is a 2x2x3 version of the original Rubik's Cube. It was invented by Katsuhiko Okamoto and made it first appearence in the early 2000s. Mass production of this puzzle started in 2009 by a company called Gentosha and today it's quite easy to get your hands on one. The mechanism used to create it is similar to the one found in a Rubik's Cube however if you turn any of the side faces a quarter turn the puzzle will be essentially locked until you complete a half turn.
The Tower Cube 2x2x3 is a part of a series of 2x2xN cuboid puzzles. It is comprised of 8 corner pieces and 4 edge pieces. This small amount of moving parts results also in a relatively low number of possible combinations. According to our extensive computer simulations, this puzzle only has 241,920 possible combinations - each of which can be solved in 14 moves or less. It is considered to be a rather easy puzzle to solve.
The unofficial world record for solving the Tower Cube 2x2x3 belongs to Japanese Sohma Furihata - 1.43 seconds.