Animals Connect

Animals Connect is built to a fixed size: eighteen levels, each one a grid of animal tiles that has to be emptied completely before the next opens. How that works is written out in Mahjong Connect Tips.

Links are made between identical animals, and the connecting path may bend at most twice. On the early boards almost every pair is reachable, but by the later levels the grid is packed tightly enough that the tile you want is boxed in, and the order you take pairs in becomes the whole puzzle, since a route blocked by a standing tile is no route at all. Easter Link puts the same rule on a board of a different size.

The clock is worth beating rather than merely surviving, because finishing a level inside the time limit pays extra bonuses on top of the clear. Lof Games sized the board at 800 by 450 for pointer and touch, which keeps each of the eighteen layouts on one screen without scrolling. The same two-bend path rule drives the Connect The Insects grid.

1. Pick out two tiles showing the same animal.
2. Trace the path between them, since two bends is the limit and standing tiles block it.
3. Clear the grid completely to finish the level.
4. Do it inside the time limit to collect the bonus.
5. Work on through all eighteen levels.

• Count the levels — Animals Connect runs to eighteen boards, so overall pace matters less than finishing each one within its own limit.
• Clear the rim early — edge tiles have the shortest legal paths, and opening them frees the animals behind.
• Trace, then click — a route with three bends looks fine and is refused, which costs seconds you are being scored on.
• Chase the bonus — beating the limit pays extra, so a level cleared slowly is a level worth replaying.