12 Rules to Solve Any Puzzle

A Little to the Left never tells you what the rule of a level is. You have to read it from the objects, and almost every puzzle in the game is built from the same small set of ideas. These 12 rules cover the logic behind the base game and both expansions, with examples, so you can solve new levels yourself instead of looking up each answer.

Before you apply any rule

Three habits solve more levels than any trick:

• Listen for the chime. Correctly placed objects make a soft sound or a little snap. If you hear nothing, the object is not where the game wants it, even if it looks right.
• Touch everything once. Lift, rotate, click and drop each object at the start. You learn which items move, which open and which hide something underneath.
• Find the extremes. In any ordering puzzle, the biggest, smallest, lightest or darkest item belongs at one end. Placing the two ends first makes the middle obvious.

The rules

1. Size and length

The most common rule. Objects go from largest to smallest or the reverse. The trap is choosing the wrong measurement: height, width, area and the length of only one part are all used. In the jar level of Chapter 2, glass height and liquid height are two different solutions, and in Seeing Stars the forks can be sorted by total length or by tine length alone.

2. Colour and shade

Rainbow order or a smooth gradient between two colours. When the colours are close, compare neighbours in pairs rather than judging the whole row. Gradients often have solid-colour items at fixed points, such as the corners in the rock level of Chapter 4.

3. Counting details

When size and colour both fail, count something small: holes in buttons, gold bands on pens, ridges on leaves, facets on gems, stripes on a moth, berries on a plant. The count becomes the order. If the numbers seem to repeat, you are counting the wrong detail.

4. Continue the picture

Several objects together form one image: a scribble across sticky notes, a river across postcards, a label across cans. Look for the piece where the image touches only one edge; it is an end. Then follow the line.

5. Continue the pattern

Stickers on a calendar, stamps on envelopes, cracks across bowls. The first few items show the rhythm and you extend it. Count the gaps between existing items, not the items themselves.

6. Fit everything

Packing levels want every item inside a container with no overlap and no gap. Empty the container, place the largest irregular item first and fill small spaces last. Our symmetry and packing tips go through this method in detail.

7. Match the outline

Faint shadows, dents in foam, red drawings on a board or lighter wood under a whistle show exactly where each object goes. If a level has any printed outline, assume it is part of a solution.

8. Symmetry

Many duplicates and a few unique items usually mean a symmetry level. Unique items go on the centre line and pairs mirror each other. Plucking levels, where you remove leaves, use the same rule in reverse.

9. Group by category

Instead of a row, the game wants groups: gardening tools versus sports gear, meat versus vegetables, wood versus metal. Ask what the objects are used for or made of, not what they look like.

10. Hidden behaviour

Some properties only appear when you interact: how often a ball bounces, how many presses a digital pet needs to sleep, how often a moth flaps when held, what sound an object makes when dropped. If a level has an unexplained star left, test every object’s behaviour.

11. The messy answer

The game sometimes accepts the opposite of tidying: every coin fully tarnished, every topping off the pizza, every ice cube in one glass. If a level has an odd number of stars and you have found all the neat answers, try the consistent messy one. Our messy solutions guide lists them.

12. Follow the clue in the scene

Marks above pencil slots, a mirror, a laptop screen, tabs on folders: some levels contain their own instructions. Before experimenting, scan the background for anything that looks like a legend or a reference.

Quick reference