Levels 1-5 are free. Levels 6-30 need a $3 licence key. About the full pack
Driftquartz is a quiet puzzle for an autumn or fall evening: a small board, one piece to slide and no hurry at all. It plays online in a browser tab, on a laptop or a phone, with nothing to install and no account.
To be plain about it: there is no autumn mode. No leaves fall across the screen, there are no seasonal levels, and the game has no music or sound. It is the same 30 levels all year. What suits the season is the look and the pace: the piece is amber, the colour of a turning leaf, on a board as dark as an early evening, and the gems are a cold blue.
Level 1 at the start: the amber piece, a blue gem, grey walls and the shut exit (the crossed ring).
Why it is a calm game
Nothing in Driftquartz moves unless you move it. There is no timer, there are no lives and nothing chases the piece. The game counts your moves and nothing else, so you can look at a board for as long as a cup of tea lasts before making a slide. Undo takes back one move at a time and Restart puts the board back to its first position. The game shows no ads, so nothing interrupts a level.
The sliding rule
A move is a slide up, down, left or right. Once the piece sets off it keeps going in a straight line until the next cell is a wall or the edge of the board; you cannot stop it halfway. Any gem on its path is collected. The exit stays shut until every gem is collected, and until then the piece slides over it as if it were floor. When the last gem is picked up the exit opens, and the next time the piece reaches it the level is solved.
A first level to settle in with
Level 1 is a 5 by 5 board with one gem and three walls. The piece waits in the bottom left corner. Slide it right and it runs four cells to the edge. Slide it up and it goes three cells, over the shut exit, to rest on the gem against a wall; the exit opens. Slide it down two cells and the exit catches it. Three moves, which is the par for level 1. Par is the smallest number of moves that solves a level, and each level shows its own. The how to play page has a drawing of this route.
Small boards first, bigger ones later
The five free levels use boards of 5x5 and 6x6 with 1 to 3 gems, and their par runs from 3 to 7 moves. They are short enough to finish in one sitting. The 25 levels of the full pack are for longer evenings: boards from 7x7 to 10x10 with 3 to 6 gems, and par from 8 to 20 moves. The rule stays the same throughout.
Picking it up again
The game remembers the level you are on and your best move count for each level, in this browser only. Come back on another evening and you can replay any level you have, to look for a route that matches par.
What is free and what costs $3
Levels 1-5 are free: no account, no key, no time limit. Levels 6-30 are the full pack and need a $3 licence key, sold on Gumroad.
Gumroad shows the key after the purchase and on your receipt. You enter it on the unlock page and the 25 extra levels are stored in this browser.
Buy the $3 licence key on Gumroad
Refunds and support go through Gumroad: use the contact link on your Gumroad receipt. Refunds follow Gumroad's refund policy.
More about Driftquartz
How to play, Free logic puzzle, No-download gem puzzle, Ice sliding puzzle, Short puzzle for a break, Puzzle with no ads and no sign-up, Halloween puzzle