David Hedley Jones, senior vice president of the Rubik brand, said: "It doesn't need batteries and looks as though it should be quite easy. "But it is incredibly complicated. There are some really cunning tricks to it." Hamleys, the London toy store, has already had thousands of inquiries for the 360. It's head of sales Nigel Wheatley said: "It is our biggest item on the web. I expect thousands to be sold in days."

Now the reclusive Hungarian inventor hopes to recreate the buzz of Rubik's Cube with his new game, featuring six balls trapped within three transparent plastic spheres.

The puzzle, shown to the Sunday Telegraph ahead of its unveiling at a toy industry fair in Germany on February 5, confronts users with the same frustrating challenge – a task that is simple to understand, with only one possible solution, yet extremely difficult to execute.

Players must get the coloured balls from an inner sphere into matching slots on the outer sphere by shaking them through a middle sphere that has only two holes.