Crowns Game

Crowns is a logic puzzle with a memory twist. The board is split into coloured regions, and you place one crown in every row, every column and every region, with no two crowns touching. The colours only show for a few seconds before they fade, so you have to hold the shapes in your head while you work. The memory techniques on this site help you keep them.

How to play

1. The board is split into coloured regions, one region for every row.
2. Place one crown in each row, each column and each region. No two crowns may touch, not even at a corner.
3. Study the colours while they show. When they fade, the cells go plain, and the clock starts. Press Ready, fade now if you have the shapes sooner.
4. Tap a cell once for a cross, to rule it out, twice for a crown, and a third time to clear it. Your crowns and crosses stay when the colours go.
5. Stuck on a shape? A peek brings the colours back for two seconds. Press P, Space or PEEK.
6. Letters along the top of the board and numbers down the side name every cell, so C5 is column C, row 5. Use them as pegs for the shapes.
7. Rows, columns and touching crowns are checked as you go. A second crown in one region is only caught once all the crowns are down.

Choose a level on the start screen. Easy is a 6 by 6 board with the colours for ten seconds, then a faint tint that keeps the shapes, and three peeks. Normal, the default, is 7 by 7, with eight seconds of colour, then plain cells, and two peeks. Hard is 8 by 8, with six seconds of colour and one peek. On a keyboard, the arrows move, Enter cycles a cell, X crosses one out, and P or Space peeks. Escape pauses.

Scoring

Your time runs from the moment the colours fade until the last crown is down, peeks included. Each level keeps its own records.

• Your best time.
• How many puzzles you have solved.
• Your longest run of puzzles solved in a row without a peek.

Next puzzle deals a fresh board at once, as many as you like, and every board has exactly one solution. Your records are saved in this browser only.

To hold shapes in mind, read How to Use the Mnemonic Link System and How to Create Mnemonic Images. Or try our other free memory games.