Bridges: rules, scoring and a few habits
Bridges is an island-linking puzzle. Islands sit on a small grid, each with a number, and that number is how many bridges must touch it. Bridges run straight across or straight up and down, only to the nearest island in that direction, and no bridge may cross another. Two islands can share one bridge or two. Finish with every number met and every island joined into one connected group.
Drawing bridges
Drag from one island to its neighbour to lay a bridge. Drag the same way again for a double bridge, and once more to clear it. Undo is free and nothing you draw is permanent, so a wrong idea only costs the seconds it took. The clock starts with your first drag, you have three minutes, and the daily board ranks by solve time.
Early in the week the field is three columns wide, and from Thursday it grows to four. Each daily board has exactly one solution you can reach by reasoning, never by guessing.
Finding the links
- Look for islands with only one neighbour. Their number tells you exactly how many bridges go that way.
- A big number with few neighbours is forced: an island showing 4 with two neighbours needs a double bridge to each.
- Watch for bridges that would cut the board in two. Every island has to join the rest, so a link that seals off a small group is wrong.
- If a bridge would cross a line you're sure of, it can't exist. Rule it out and see what that forces.
Everyone gets the same islands on the same day, and the board changes at midnight Pacific time. Free Play hands you a fresh, unranked board whenever you want one more. Bridges is free in the browser and plays well with a finger on a phone or a mouse on a desktop. It's a tidy little map to finish over a coffee.