One Short
Fifteen tiles, sixteen places.
What it is
The sliding tile puzzle: a square tray of tiles with one empty space. Slide a tile into the space, then another into the space it left, until the numbers are back in order or the picture is whole again. There are two trays: fifteen numbered tiles on a four-by-four, and a picture cut into eight tiles on a three-by-three, for a shorter puzzle. Tap any tile in line with the gap and the whole line slides in one go, and every tile that moves counts as a move.
Every puzzle can be solved. Exactly half of all the ways to lay out the tiles can never be put back in order, so each tray is checked by the rule before you see it, and if it fails, two tiles swap places. No numbers puzzle starts close to finished: its tiles are at least 24 steps from home between them.
On the picture tray, the game knows the shortest way. It searches all 181,440 positions that tray can reach, there in the page, and when you finish it tells you how many moves the shortest way takes, as information and never as a target. The first picture is a short one, and the next two are longer.
The pictures are painted by the game’s own code, such as a hot-air balloon, a whale or a castle. Small numbers can go in the corners of their tiles for anyone who is stuck. At the finish the numbers light up in order, or the last piece fills the gap and the seams fade.
How to play
- Start a pictureTap anywhere
- Start the numbersNumbers
- SlideTap a tile in line with the gap, or drag it
- Numbers on the picture123
A tray is solving itself when the page opens. Tap anywhere to start a picture, or tap Numbers for the four-by-four. Tap a tile next to the gap to slide it in, or one further along the same row or column to slide the whole line. Or drag a tile toward the gap: let go once it is 40% of the way there and it goes in; short of that it slides back. New puzzle deals another, and once you have moved it takes a second tap, as switching trays does. At the finish, tap Play again. Put the tablet down mid-puzzle and it waits for you: nothing takes your puzzle away.
On a desktop, click or drag, just as by touch. Or use the keys: the arrow keys slide the tile next to the gap in that direction, and Enter or Space plays again. P and N switch between the picture and the numbers (partway through a puzzle, press twice), and M turns the sound on and off.
What isn’t settled yet
No undo. Every move is its own undo: slide the tile back.
No timer and no best score. The count of moves is all it keeps, and only until the next puzzle.
Two sizes only: four-by-four numbers and three-by-three pictures.
One player. There is no race for two.
The pictures are all the game’s own. You can’t use a picture of your own.
Build Log
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Build 1
Every tray was made to pass the solvability rule before anyone sees it: count the pairs of tiles in the wrong order, add the gap’s row on the four-by-four, counted up from nought at the bottom, and if the total comes out odd, the first two tiles swap places. Worth writing down: exactly half of all arrangements can never be solved, so a plain shuffle would hand out an impossible puzzle every other time.
Credits and licences
No third-party engine — it draws to a plain canvas. The typefaces it does use are embedded under the SIL Open Font Licence, with the copyright notice retained in the shipped file. Cover and pictures drawn by the game’s own code.
One Short is original work by Launchway Games.