Three ways to fill a board
- 3games
- 20languages
Inlay Block Puzzle, Shale Falling Blocks and Barchan Block Puzzle all ask you to fill lines, and they differ in what happens next. In Inlay Block Puzzle you place pieces on an 8x8 board, three at a time, and a full row or column clears while everything else stays where it is. In Shale Falling Blocks the stones come down on their own into a well ten columns wide, and you slide and turn each one before it lands. In Barchan Block Puzzle you also place three pieces on an 8x8 board, but what you clear turns to sand, and the sand moves.
All three are free to play in the browser on a phone, a tablet or a computer, with no account. Each keeps your scores and stars on the device you play on, and a sync code moves them to another device. Each also has a daily challenge that is the same for every player that day.
Barchan Block Puzzle: sand and cascades
A cleared block with an empty cell right under it crumbles into sand, and sand falls until it rests on a block, on other sand or on the floor. Sand fills lines like any block, so one clear can finish the row below it and clear again: a cascade, and each step multiplies its points, x2, x3, x4 and on. A block resting on another block has nowhere to pour, so a full column always clears clean and rows over gaps are what start cascades. A gap under a row stops being a mistake and becomes a fuse.
While you hold a piece over a spot that clears, faint sand shows where each grain will land. Pieces cannot be turned, so you keep room for long lines and the 3x3 square. Clearing on consecutive moves builds a streak that multiplies every clear, and it survives two moves without a clear. Hard mode, unlocked by a cascade of three, switches the sand preview off and brings the big shapes from the start.
Streaks, tamps and stages
Inlay Block Puzzle multiplies points for clearing two or more lines at once and for clearing on consecutive moves, and emptying the whole board pays 300 points times the streak. Its hard mode opens at 3,000 points, with harder pieces sooner and a streak that breaks on the first move without a clear.
Shale Falling Blocks turns a messy stack into a chance: every ten cleared lines charge a tamp, and spending it packs every column down into its gaps before the full rows clear. Its 48 campaign stages run through six chapters, from the Riverbed to the Caldera, which is all duels, and Endless speeds up every ten lines to level 20.
Barchan Block Puzzle has a Journey of 30 stages in five places: Oasis, Red Canyon, Salt Pan, Dusk Erg and Night Caravan, six stages each. A place opens once you win four stages of the one before it. Every stage has its own starting board, some with rock cut into it, a goal of lines, points or a cascade, and between 18 and 27 pieces; winning with pieces to spare earns up to three stars.
Daily boards and racing a friend
The daily challenge is Inlay Block Puzzle with the same pieces in the same order for everyone, Shale Falling Blocks with a daily seam of the same stones and the same rubble floor for three minutes, and Barchan Block Puzzle with a daily dune: the same starting sand and the same pieces for everyone. Shale Falling Blocks and Barchan Block Puzzle also have an online mode; Inlay Block Puzzle is played alone.
In Shale Falling Blocks you and a friend get the same stones, and every clear of two rows or more pushes rubble rows into the other well; the first well to overflow loses the round. In Barchan Block Puzzle, Race a friend sends a link and you both play 30 or 60 of the same pieces at the same time, each on your own board with your friend's board shown beside yours, and the higher score wins.
Frequently asked questions
Which block puzzle is the easiest to start with?
Inlay Block Puzzle. You drag a piece onto the board and a shadow shows where it lands, with nothing falling. 
Barchan Block Puzzle plays the same way for the first minutes, and its first stages in the Oasis teach the sand rule. 
Shale Falling Blocks asks you to move and turn stones as they drop, so it comes last.
Can I turn the pieces in Barchan Block Puzzle?
No. The three pieces on offer cannot be turned, so you plan around the shapes you are given and keep room for long lines and the 3x3 square. Shale Falling Blocks is the one where you turn each stone.
Can I race a friend at block puzzle?
Yes, in two of them. Shale Falling Blocks is a real-time duel played to two or three rounds, and Barchan Block Puzzle races you both on the same 30 or 60 pieces. Inlay Block Puzzle is played alone.