How to play Skyplinth

Climb above the Warden's gaze. Absorb it. Take its place.

Skyplinth is a free 3D strategy puzzle game you play in your browser. Each landscape is a chequered world of hills and hollows, watched by the Warden from a platform on the highest ground. You can't walk. You can only absorb what you can see, build, and move your mind into a new robot body, square by square, until you are high enough to look down on the Warden and take its place.

The rules

1. Drag to look around. Point or tap at a square to target it. The arrow keys turn too.
2. Absorb trees, boulders and robot shells for energy: 1, 2 and 3. You must be able to see the ground they stand on.
3. Build a Boulder, put a Robot on top, then Transfer into it to climb higher. You can only build on a flat square you can see, on bare ground or on a boulder.
4. The Warden turns slowly on its tower. If it sees the square you stand on, it drains your energy.
5. If it glimpses you but not your square, it turns a nearby tree into a Gazer. Absorb the Gazer or break its line of sight, or it shoves you into hyperspace.
6. The radar shows the Warden's gaze as a wedge. The CLIMB counter shows how much higher you need to be.
7. Get higher than its platform and Absorb the Warden. Build a robot on the platform, transfer in, then Hyper.

Controls and energy

Every action has a key, and the same buttons sit along the bottom of the screen on touch devices.

• AABSORB+1 / +2 / +3
• TTREE−1
• BBOULDER−2
• RROBOT−3
• QTRANSFERinto robot
• HHYPER−3
• UU-TURN180°

A jump into hyperspace costs 3 energy. If you run out of things to absorb in sight and can't afford to climb or jump, the landscape is lost.

Landscapes, codes and the daily

There are thousands of landscapes, each with a four-digit code. Finish one to unlock a code further on: the energy you have left when you hyper out decides how far you jump. Type any code you've unlocked on the title screen to go straight back to it.

The daily landscape is one landscape, the same for everyone, new every day, with its own leaderboard. There are also 15 achievements to collect.

Tips

• Before you build, check the radar. Climb on the side the Warden has just turned away from.
• Absorb the robot shell you leave behind after every transfer. It's 3 energy you'd otherwise waste.
• Stack boulders before you add the robot: each one lifts you a little higher for 2 energy.
• Bank energy before the last climb: you need 3 for the final Hyper, and more leftover energy means a longer jump.
• Use U-turn to check behind you after every transfer. The Warden isn't the only thing watching.

Questions

Is Skyplinth free?

Yes. It runs in your web browser on desktop or mobile, with no download and no account.

How do you beat the Warden?

Climb until you're higher than its platform, absorb it, build a robot on the platform, transfer in, then Hyper.

What is a Gazer?

A tree the Warden has corrupted after glimpsing you. Absorb it or break its line of sight before it shoves you into hyperspace.

Does it save my progress?

Yes, in your own browser: the furthest landscape you've reached and how many you've beaten.

A nod to the classics

If Skyplinth feels familiar, you probably played Geoff Crammond's The Sentinel on a ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64 or Amiga in the 1980s. Skyplinth is an original game built from scratch for the browser, in the spirit of that 1986 classic and with the Spectrum's colours on its sleeve.