Starsplit

Starsplit is a match-3 built around one move that nothing else has. Once a level, a gold star arrives on the board. You don't swap it. You tap it, and you choose what it becomes — a cross that clears a whole row and column, three rows, three columns, or a crater five across. It costs you nothing. The four are not a power ladder. They clear almost the same number of cells, and they differ in SHAPE. There is no best one to learn: there is the one this board needs. A lane straight down a column of cargo. A crater on a patch of nebula. Rows across a line of asteroids. That choice is the game. THREE HUNDRED LEVELS, THREE SKIES Every chapter is somewhere else. The first hundred is the Local Arm, deep indigo and close to home. The second is the Ember Reach, a star-forming cloud lit from inside — where the board starts fighting back. The third is the Cold Deep, thinner and greener and a long way out. The next hundred does not exist until you have finished this one. A BOARD THAT DOES MORE THAN SIT THERE Asteroids dam the column beneath them. Nebula only burns off where something is destroyed on it. A stasis field pins a gem where it stands — still matchable, but it will not move — and from the second chapter on, it spreads on its own unless you answer it. Wormholes splice the bottom of one column onto the top of another, so gravity stops going where you expect. EVERY LEVEL WAS PLAYED BEFORE YOU GOT IT The difficulty is not guesswork. Every one of the three hundred levels was played hundreds of times by a bot before it shipped, and its move budget moved against what that measured, until the whole run climbs smoothly from the first level to the last. Level 187 is the same board for you as for everyone else, on every device — so a level that is unfair is a level that can be found and fixed, not shrugged at. FOUR WAYS TO CHEAT A comet clears the row you drop it on, a rocket the column, a blaster takes one tile, and a shuffle redeals. None of them cost a move. BUILT TO BE COMFORTABLE Colourblind marks put a distinct shape on every gem colour. Reduce motion cuts the flourishes without touching how a move resolves. Hints are there when you want them and off when you don't. Sound, music and haptics each have their own switch. A STAR SPLIT COSTS NOTHING, AND NEITHER DOES A BOOSTER The star is free, the four shapes are free, and none of the boosters spend a move either. The move counter is a clock on your sitting, not a currency — nothing in Starsplit is designed to run it down and then ask you for something. NO INTERRUPTIONS. NO ACCOUNT. No ad ever plays on its own. There are no banners and no interstitials. Twice in a level a button may offer you a video — five more moves when you have run out, or a life back when the bank is empty — and both times you can simply say no and both times there is another way. Nothing is personalised, nothing follows you between apps, and you are never asked to allow tracking, because there is nothing to allow. Stardust is the one currency and playing earns it. It buys boosters, refills lives and pays for those extra moves. You can buy stardust if you would rather not wait, and that is the only thing real money does here: there is no second premium currency, no energy timer dressed up as a purchase, no level pack held back, and no ending you have to pay to reach. All three hundred levels are in the game you downloaded. No sign-up, no account, nothing to make, and the whole game plays offline — on a plane, on the underground, anywhere. Progress lives on your device and goes nowhere else.