Game guides
How to play every PortalPi game: goals, controls, progression and practical tips, written for each game.
Start here
Each guide explains what a game asks you to do, which controls it uses, how progress is saved with your PortalPi account and a few tips that help with harder levels. Open a game from the list below for its full guide, screenshots and leaderboard, or browse the whole game library.
Arrow Path
Puzzle
Arrow Path is a board-clearing puzzle built around the direction of each arrow. An arrow needs a clear route to leave the grid. The challenge is to identify which pieces can move now and remove them in an order that opens routes for the pieces behind them.
- Start at open exits and work back toward the crowded center.
- Follow the entire route ahead of an arrow; a nearby clear cell does not guarantee that the full piece can leave.
Beat BTC
Action
Beat BTC is a stress-relief sandbox game. A ragdoll Bitcoin robot stands in the room, and you have a large collection of weapons and props to use on it: guns, blades, bows, explosives and more. Every hit earns coins, which you spend on new weapons. There are no levels to lose; the point is to experiment and have fun.
- Rapid weapons earn coins quickly; save them for when you want to unlock something specific.
- Dragging across the robot lands many hits in a row and is the quickest way to build up coins.
Birdie Branches
Puzzle
Bird Sort is a sorting puzzle in which groups of matching birds move between branches. A branch holds up to four birds, and a completed group contains four birds of the same type. Your choices change which birds are accessible and how much room remains for the next move.
- Keep an open branch available as temporary space instead of filling every branch immediately.
- Consider the group that a move will uncover, not only the group that you can transfer now.
Block Puzzle
Puzzle
Block Puzzle Jewel is a classic block-placement puzzle with jewel-style pieces. You receive a set of shapes and drag them onto the board. Filling a complete row or column clears it and earns points. There is no time limit in the classic mode: the game ends when none of the remaining shapes fits anywhere on the board. Extra modes add a timer or bombs.
- Keep the centre of the board open; corners and edges are the best places for awkward shapes.
- Avoid leaving single empty cells that only a one-block piece could fill.
Bubble Pet Shooter
Casual
Bubble Pet Shooter is a classic bubble shooter with a rescue goal. Baby animals are trapped in the bubble wall at the top of the screen. Aim, shoot and match three or more bubbles of the same colour to pop them, and free the required number of pets before you run out of shots. Unused bubbles become bonus points at the end of a level.
- Bounce shots off the side walls to reach bubbles that have no direct path.
- Popping a bubble that supports a large cluster drops everything hanging below it, often freeing several pets at once.
Color Blocks
Puzzle
Color Blocks is a sliding block puzzle. Coloured blocks of different shapes fill a board surrounded by coloured walls. Drag a block until it touches a wall of the same colour, and the wall absorbs it. Blocks cannot pass through each other, and each level gives you a limited number of moves. Clear every block from the board to win.
- Each drag counts as a move, so plan the order of removals instead of moving blocks back and forth.
- Clear the blocks that sit in front of other blocks first; one removal can open several paths.
Color Rope
Puzzle
Color Rope is a physics puzzle about connecting coloured ropes to the matching pegs. Each rope has a free end that you drag across the board. Ropes bend and wrap around posts and obstacles, so the path you choose matters as much as the destination. A level is complete when every rope end is pinned to the peg of its own colour.
- Connect the ropes whose paths are short and clear first; they are less likely to block the others later.
- Pull a rope around the outside of a post rather than across another rope that still has to move.
Fast Food RUSH
Arcade
Fast Food Rush is a restaurant management game. You run around your own fast food place, carrying food from the machines to the counter, serving customers and drive-through cars, and collecting the money they leave. Spend that money to unlock new machines, tables and workstations, hire staff and buy upgrades, until the restaurant runs almost by itself.
- Increase your carrying capacity early so each trip serves more customers.
- Hire employees as soon as you can; they keep the counters stocked while you collect money.
Juice Jam
Puzzle
Juice Jam is a fruit-matching puzzle played in levels with a limited number of moves. Each level asks you to meet its own objectives, such as reaching a score, collecting particular fruits or breaking glass tiles. Matching larger groups creates special pieces that help clear the board.
- Plan a useful match before swapping: a swap that fails to create a match still consumes a move in this build.
- Look for four- and five-fruit arrangements before settling for the first available match of three.
Kitty Hole
Puzzle
Kitty Hole is a timed colour-matching puzzle. Cats of different colours sit on a grid, and each level contains holes shaped like puzzle pieces. Drag a hole across the board: when it passes a cat of the same colour, the cat jumps in. Every hole has a fixed number of places, and a full hole leaves the board. Clear every hole before the clock reaches zero to complete the level.
- Plan the route of a hole before dragging it; a hole parked in the wrong place can block the path of another colour.
- Start with the colour that has the fewest cats left in the open, so its hole disappears early and gives you room.
Matches Puzzle
Puzzle
Matches Puzzle uses matchsticks to make geometric shapes or correct arithmetic equations. The instruction for each level specifies whether to add, remove or move matches, and exactly how many moves to use. Shape levels can also require every remaining matchstick to belong to a valid square or triangle.
- Count larger shapes as well as the smallest ones; shared sides can affect the total.
- A correct-looking arrangement may still fail if you have not used the exact required move count.
Merge Box 2048
Puzzle
Merge Box 2048 is a physics merge game. Numbered boxes drop into a container one at a time. When two boxes with the same number touch, they merge into a single box with double the value, and the merged value is added to your score. Merges can chain into bigger numbers. The run ends when the pile rises past the limit line at the top of the container.
- Keep large numbers together on one side so new boxes do not land between them.
- Drop small boxes where they can merge immediately instead of stacking them on top of big ones.
Rainbow Sort
Puzzle
Rainbow Sort is a liquid-sorting puzzle. Separate mixed layers until the glasses are filled with a single color. You can pour onto the same top color or into an empty glass, subject to the destination's capacity. Later puzzles introduce more colors, hidden layers and special containers.
- Preserve temporary storage: an empty glass can be more useful than an early partial grouping.
- The game pours the contiguous top-color group that fits, so check capacity before committing.
Sand Collect
Puzzle
Sand Collect is a colour-sorting puzzle built around a picture made of coloured sand. Buckets of different colours wait on a grid below the picture. Tap a bucket to send it onto a conveyor belt, where it scoops up exposed sand of its own colour. The belt has a limited number of places, so you must choose buckets whose colour can actually be collected. Empty all the sand to complete the level.
- The level is lost when the belt is full and none of the buckets on it can collect any more sand, so do not send a colour that is still buried.
- Clear the buckets in front first; they open the path for the buckets behind them.
Save My Pet
Puzzle
Save My Pet is a drawing puzzle. Each level shows a pet in danger, usually from a hive of angry bees, and sometimes from lava, water or spikes as well. Before anything moves you draw a single line with your finger or mouse. When you lift it, the line becomes a solid object, the pet falls under gravity and the bees attack. Keep the pet safe until the countdown ends.
- You only get one line, so draw it completely before you release.
- A closed shape such as a dome or a box over the pet protects it from several sides at once.
Shadow Ninja
Action
Shadow Ninja is an action survival game in the style of survivor arenas. You move a ninja around the map while your weapons attack automatically. Enemies spawn in growing numbers, and a boss appears near the end of each level. Collect the green gems dropped by enemies to level up during the run and choose new weapons or abilities. Survive until the timer ends to win.
- Never stop moving: standing still lets enemies surround you.
- Move in wide circles so enemies line up behind you and your weapons hit several at once.
Slingshot Squad
Casual
Slingshot Squad is a physics slingshot puzzle. Enemies hide behind and inside structures of wood, stone and other materials. Pull back the slingshot to launch the members of your squad at them. Destructible obstacles break and fall, and a level is won when every enemy is defeated. If your squad runs out before that, the level is lost.
- Hit the base of a tower so the whole structure falls on the enemies.
- Use a character's skill at the right moment; an explosion near the target does more than one at the start of the flight.
Square Pets
Puzzle
Square Pets is an automatically moving obstacle course. Your pet travels forward while you control the stack underneath it to get over obstacles. Timing matters: the level contains walls, enemies and height changes, so a stack that helps in one section may be awkward in the next.
- Look beyond the closest obstacle so you can prepare for the next height change.
- A held button keeps adding blocks; release it as soon as the stack reaches the height you need.
Tile Matching
Puzzle
Tile Match is a layered tile-clearing puzzle. Select uncovered tiles to put them into a seven-slot tray. Three tiles of the same type disappear from the tray, making room for more selections. Covered tiles become available as the tiles above them are removed.
- With only seven tray slots, several unfinished sets can block your next useful move.
- Prefer a selection that both completes a set and uncovers another matching tile.
Wildscar
Survival
Wildscar is a multiplayer survival world with gathering, base building and player combat. Start with the resources around you, establish a place to return to and decide how much risk to take when exploring. Bases need upkeep, other players can raid, and the shared survival world follows a monthly wipe cycle. Your personal Realm provides a separate persistent building world.
- Check Tool Cupboard upkeep before leaving a base unattended; building a wall is only the start of maintaining it.
- Place a sleeping bag early and learn its destination before taking valuable supplies into a fight.