Puzzle game templates
A puzzle template is a rule you can say in one sentence. The split is whether you search, deduce, push, match, or let go and watch.
Download Flockbay Free. Windows and Mac.
Say the rule aloud
A logic puzzle is one grid and one rule. The Witness (Thekla, 2016) teaches it with a panel you can already see the answer of. If you need a paragraph of instructions, the panel is wrong. Sokoban is "you can push, not pull," and the fun is getting stuck. Stephen's Sausage Roll (Increpare, 2016) is cruel about that. Baba Is You (Hempuli, 2019) lets you push the rule. Two blocks and two targets tell you if undo belongs.
A programming puzzle is that deduction with a run button. Human Resource Machine (Tomorrow Corporation, 2015) is an office of commands. Opus Magnum (Zachtronics, 2017) is a machine you can watch fail. Three commands, one task. A word game is feedback on a letter. Wordle (Josh Wardle, 2021) is the small one. The first guess has to change what you know.
The scene, the board, the arc
A hidden-object scene is five items drawn to be missed. Hidden Folks (Adriaan de Jongh and Sylvain Tegroeg, 2017) hides them in a joke. A list of fifty is a job. An escape room is three clues and one lock you can walk to. The Room (Fireproof Games, 2012) is the box. A code you were simply told skips the search. A puzzle adventure spreads the lock across a place. Myst (Cyan, 1993) makes the next area the reward. Two puzzles and one door, not a third puzzle on the door itself.
Match-3 is a swap and a cascade you did not fully plan. Bejeweled (PopCap Games, 2001) is the board. Candy Crush Saga (King, 2012) puts a gate on move five. Tune the cascade before you add a story. A physics puzzle lets go. Angry Birds (Rovio, 2009) is an arc. World of Goo (2D Boy, 2008) sags. One launcher, one target, one obstacle.
The AI puzzle maker and the puzzle game maker cover the family. A grid you deduce is the AI logic puzzle maker. A board of swaps is a different page, and the match-3 template is where that board actually starts.
Every template in this genre
Every build and style in this genre
- Escape room template: build it step by step
- Hidden object template: build it step by step
- Logic puzzle template: build it step by step
- Match-3 template: build it step by step
- Physics puzzle template: build it step by step
- Programming puzzle template: build it step by step
- Puzzle adventure template: build it step by step
- Sokoban template: build it step by step
- Word game template: build it step by step
Start from this template in the Flockbay app
Describe your version in one sentence. The AI writes a brief from the template, and nothing is built until you approve it. Free for Windows and Mac.