I'm also a professional software engineer who did very well in high school and at the university and, similarly, my wife consistently beats me at this type of games.
Granted, my wife is well-educated and I believe she is smarter than I am, but it's like she immediately sees the solution while I see the input and have to work out the solution. I usually attribute this to my deficient color vision, since that's the property that usually trips me up. Alternatively, I've wondered if I'm focusing too hard and if the best approach might be reacting on instinct and relying on my subconscious to solve the problem before I'm consciously aware of having parsed the input.
Granted, my wife is well-educated and I believe she is smarter than I am, but it's like she immediately sees the solution while I see the input and have to work out the solution. I usually attribute this to my deficient color vision, since that's the property that usually trips me up. Alternatively, I've wondered if I'm focusing too hard and if the best approach might be reacting on instinct and relying on my subconscious to solve the problem before I'm consciously aware of having parsed the input.