How To Play Pips

In Pips, you have a grid of multicolored boxes. Each colored area represents a different “condition” that you have to achieve. You have a select number of dominoes that you have to spend filling in the grid. You must use every domino and achieve every condition properly to win. There are Easy, Medium and Difficult tiers.

Here’s an example of a difficult tier Pips:

As you can see, the grid has a bunch of symbols and numbers with each color. On the far left, the three purple squares must not equal one another (hence the equal sign crossed out). The two pink squares next to that must equal a total of 0. The zig-zagging blue squares all must equal one another. You click on dominoes to rotate them, and will need to since they have to be rotated to fit where they belong.

Not shown on this grid are other conditions, such as “less than” or “greater than.” If there are multiple tiles with > or < signs, the total of those tiles must be greater or less than the listed number. It varies by grid. Blank spaces can have anything. The various possible conditions are:

• = All pips must equal one another in this group.
• ≠ All pips must not equal one another in this group.
• > The pip in this tile (or tiles) must be greater than the listed number.
• < The pip in this tile must be less than the listed number.
• An exact number (like 6) The pip must equal this exact number.
• Tiles with no conditions can be anything.

In order to win, you have to use up all your dominoes by filling in all the squares, making sure to fit each condition. Sometimes there’s only one way to solve the puzzle. Other times, there can be two or more different solutions. Play today’s Pips puzzle here.

Today’s Pips Solutions And Walkthrough

Below are the solutions for the Easy and Medium tier Pips. After that, I’ll walk you through the Hard puzzle. Spoilers ahead.

Today’s Easy Pips

Today’s Medium Pips

Hard Pips Walkthrough And Solution

Here’s today’s Hard Pips:

Today’s Hard Pips is either the letter “S” (as in “Saturday”) or the number “5” and while mostly we’ve had letters lately, there are a lot of “5” conditions on the grid. Maybe it means S5, as in “Season 5” which would apply to a lot of shows right now, from The Boys to Invincible to Hacks (speaking of which, some of those are in my latest Weekend Streaming Guide!)

In any case, we have two 6’s and two >5 tiles, so we know that’s where they go. Since the 6/1 fits nicely with Orange <5 this is a good place to start. I’m starting here also because it’s right next to three free tiles, and it’s best to end your game on the free tiles. We’ll move around in a circle.

Step 1

Place the 6/1 domino from Pink > 5 down into Orange < 5 and the 1/1 domino in the next two Orange < 5 tiles. The 1/3 domino goes from Orange < 5 into Dark Blue 5 and the 2/5 domino goes from Dark Blue 5 up into Blue 5.

Step 2

The only other double we have is 2/2 so place that in the left two Green = tiles and the 2/3 domino from Green = over into Purple < 5. The 6/3 domino goes from Orange > 5 up into Purple 5 and the 2/1 domino goes from Purple 5 into Pink 1.

Solution

Place the 0/5 domino from Pink 1 into Blue 10 and the 5/4 domino from Blue 10 down into the first free tile. The 0/4 domino goes in the Dark Blue < 5 grouip and the 1/4 domino finishes things up in the remaining two free tiles.

I guess my assumptions were all correct today as I played this game exactly how it’s decsribed in this walkthrough, without having to swap anything around or make any changes. That’s why prep is so important in the beginning: Identifying the specific dominoes you have very few of that can only go in one or two spots, knowing what doubles you have, etc. Happy Saturday!

How’d you do on today’s Pips? Let me know!

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