DropHex

DropHex is a drop puzzle on the Haunted Space Hotel Action Hex. Turn the hex, drop the molecule, match three.

THE LOOP

Molecules of hex ride the River across the top of the screen. Turn the hex left or right to bring the sector you want under the chute, then drop. The molecule falls into that sector's well and settles.

Land three or more of the same faction together and they clear - and they do not simply vanish. A match of the sector's own faction travels inward and feeds that sector's triangle, the wedge at the hub. Fill a triangle and it banks. Bank every sector in play and the level is complete.

So the question is never only "does this fit". It is "where does this belong": a match made in its home sector scores double, and a clear that collapses the stack into another match keeps paying.

THE ACTION HEX

The six sectors are the six factions of the Haunted Space Hotel - DEEP, STEM, HEX, DREAD, HONORED and SEED - in the same clockwise order as the Action Hex of the Haunted Space Hotel board game, each with its own colour and emblem. Opposites sit across the hub.

YOU PICK EVERY FACTION

A short tutorial opens the game - three wells and a small triangle - and walks you through matches, connections and every power, one step at a time. Skip it whenever you like.

Then you choose the faction you start as. Level 1 is that faction alone on a smaller board, and its triangle carries into level 2 already part-filled. At every level up to 6 you choose the next faction to join, in whatever order you like; the sixth joins by itself. Each pick brings a perk: DEEP, HEX and HONORED each put one more molecule on the River, STEM, DREAD and SEED each make your Green Miysst tank hold one more power. Levels 7 to 12 widen every well by a column, and after that the molecules keep getting bigger. Every run deals a fresh River.

MIYSST, GREEN AND RED

Only a chain makes Miysst, and where you chain decides which kind. Chain a faction in the well of its neighbour on the Action Hex and you make Green Miysst, the beneficial form, into your tank. Chain it in the well of its opposite and you make Red, the corrupted form, which fills that well's meter.

GHOSTS

When a well's Red meter fills, a ghost lands in that well: pale, matching nothing and never falling. A match that touches a ghost sets it free.

THREE POWERS, ONE TANK

RECOLOR - repaint the incoming molecule a single faction.
SHATTER - break it into loose hexes that pack into gaps instead of stacking rigidly.
CLEANSE - lift a ghost out of the well under the chute, no match needed.
All three spend the same Green Miysst. The tank holds two powers to start and carries from level to level. RECOLOR and SHATTER reach the incoming piece and nothing else - never a settled cell, never the score.

HOLD IT EITHER WAY

Every control is a button on the glass where it is drawn: two to turn the hex, one to drop and hold to hurry, and the three powers. Or swipe across the board to turn it. Turn the phone sideways and they move into the bars to the left and right of the board, so a thumb never covers the stack it is trying to read; hold it upright and they sit in a row beneath it. Phone or tablet, the same board. The game never asks you for a key the device does not have.

ONE PURCHASE, AND IT IS OPTIONAL

Levels 1 to 6 - all six factions, every feature - are free. One in-app purchase opens level 7 and every level after it, once and for good. No currency, no subscription, nothing else to buy.

WHAT IT DOES NOT DO

No advertising of any kind. No accounts, no sign-in, no sign-up. The only thing that ever reaches the internet is the store itself, for the purchase; nothing you do in the game leaves your device. Leave a run without finishing it and it saves itself; CONTINUE picks it up. Six save slots, a high score and your level progress, all of it on the device.

From Haunted Space Hotel Studios.