The pieces you will actually see
Jelly Rumble draws its pieces from a fixed set of twelve shapes, and which ones can appear depends on the level. Knowing the set tells you what a gap can and cannot take before you start dragging.
A one-cell piece exists but is a fallback: the generator only allows it after 30 attempts to cut the mold without it have failed, so in practice almost every tray is made of pieces of two to five cells. Every mold’s cell count equals the total size of its tray, which is the quickest way to check whether a pocket you are about to create can ever be filled.
- Soft: 2-cell bar, 3-cell bar, 3-cell corner, square, L, mirrored L and T.
- Chewy, Bouncy and Thrilling: the Soft set plus the 4-cell bar, S and Z.
- Legend: everything above plus the five-cell U.
How many turns a piece can need
From Chewy on, pieces arrive turned at random, so knowing how many distinct looks a shape has saves taps. The square looks the same in every direction and never needs turning. The three bars, S and Z have only two looks, so one turn is the most you will ever need. The L, mirrored L, T, 3-cell corner and U have four looks each.
With a mouse, a click turns clockwise and a right-click counter-clockwise, so no piece ever needs more than two clicks. A tap on a touch screen only turns clockwise, so a four-look piece can need three taps. Turning it while you drag (a second finger on touch, R or the wheel on a computer) saves going back to the tray.
On Soft, pieces come already turned the way the server’s cut uses them. If an unturned Soft piece does not fit where you tried it, look for another spot before you start turning it.
How molds grow with each level
Each level takes molds from a size range and cuts them into a set number of pieces. Of the 59 molds, 22 can appear on Soft, 18 on Chewy, 25 on Bouncy, 20 on Thrilling and 8 on Legend; many fit two neighbouring levels.
The three-star target is 3 seconds, plus a per-piece allowance (2.5 seconds on Soft, 3.5 on Chewy, 4 on Bouncy, 4.5 on Thrilling and 5 on Legend), plus 0.3 seconds per cell, rounded. The 6-cell Chocolate cut into two pieces on Soft has a 10-second target; the 29-cell Whale cut into eight pieces on Legend has 52 seconds.
- Soft: 5 to 10 cells, 2 or 3 pieces.
- Chewy: 9 to 14 cells, 3 or 4 pieces.
- Bouncy: 12 to 17 cells, 3 to 5 pieces.
- Thrilling: 15 to 21 cells, 4 to 6 pieces.
- Legend: 19 to 30 cells, 5 to 8 pieces.
Read the mold before you drag
Narrow parts of a mold decide more than wide ones. Look for cells with only one open neighbour, such as the bottom of the Mushroom’s stem or the tips of the Crab’s claws. Whatever piece covers such a cell must continue through that one neighbour, which usually rules out the square, the T and anything wider than the passage.
Then match passages to pieces. A corridor one cell wide only takes bars or the long side of an L; a single cell sticking out of a wall is a natural spot for the bump of a T or the foot of an L. Fill those first and leave the open middle of the mold for last, where most pieces still fit several ways.
Check the tray the same way. If it holds one 4-cell bar and the mold has exactly one straight run of four, that run is very likely the bar’s, because from Chewy upward the generator chooses cuts with few solutions.
The checkerboard check
For tougher molds there is a counting trick. Imagine the grid coloured like a chessboard. The 2-cell and 4-cell bars, square, L, mirrored L, S and Z always cover equal numbers of both colours, wherever they go. The 3-cell bar, the corner and the U always cover one more of one colour, and the T always covers three of one colour and one of the other.
So the colour imbalance of the mold has to be made up entirely by the T and the 3-cell and 5-cell pieces. The Fox has 15 cells, 10 on one colour and 5 on the other. When I cut it 600 times with the game’s own cutter at Bouncy and Thrilling sizes, the T and odd-sized pieces in the tray added up to exactly that difference of 5 in 598 cuts. In a typical Fox tray, then, every one of those pieces must lean toward the majority colour, and a single T placed the other way makes the mold impossible, however good the rest looks.
What the hint really does
The hint first checks whether every piece you have placed sits where the server’s own cut put it (pieces of the same shape count as interchangeable). If so, it points to the next piece of that cut. If not, it searches for a fill around the pieces you have already placed, so a hint never asks you to undo a layout that still works.
If no fill exists, the hint does not point anywhere. It removes a piece for you instead, trying your most recently placed piece first and taking out the first one whose removal makes the mold solvable again. That still uses a hint.
The hint panel lists three steps: which piece (① Choose piece N), how many clockwise turns (②), and the row and column to place it (③). In Relaxed play it opens with the first step only, and “② Show rotation help” and “③ Show placement help” reveal the rest, so you can take as little help as you need. In the other modes all three steps and an outline of the piece on the mold appear together for about three seconds.
The stuck alert in Relaxed play
After each placement Relaxed play checks whether the mold can still be completed. If some pocket has a cell count that no combination of your remaining pieces adds up to, it lights that pocket red. It highlights only the pocket that is smaller than your smallest piece if there is one, or otherwise the smallest pocket that cannot be filled, so you know which piece to move.
When every pocket has a workable size but no fill exists anyway, the problem is a shape conflict, and the alert says so with “Try moving one placed piece somewhere else.” instead of marking any cells. In both cases “Remove the blocking piece” does the same removal as a hint, and it caps that mold at one star.
Pacing Time attack and Daily molds
In Time attack the level rises every two molds, so molds 1 and 2 are Soft, 3 and 4 Chewy, 5 and 6 Bouncy, 7 and 8 Thrilling and everything after Legend. Each mold pays 10 points per cell, 20 per level above Soft, and 8 per second under 25. A Soft 8-cell mold filled in 7 seconds earns 224; a 25-cell Legend mold filled in 40 seconds earns 330. The early molds are where speed points are easiest, and they also start your three-star combo.
Daily molds are always Chewy, Bouncy, Bouncy, Thrilling, Legend, and only the total time counts. Each hint adds 10 seconds, so it is worth taking only when you have been stuck for longer than that. The three hints are shared across all five molds, so save at least one for the Legend at the end.
With a friend
In Play against a friend the round level follows the round number: rounds 1 and 2 are Chewy with 70 seconds, round 3 Bouncy with 80, rounds 4 and 5 Thrilling with 90, and rounds 6 and 7 Legend with 100. Winning a round adds that mold’s points plus 100 to your score. A timed-out round with equal cells filled goes to nobody, and if wins are level after seven rounds, the higher score takes the match. Your three hints are for the whole match.
In Fill together you hold only your share of the pieces, and your hint can only point at one of yours. Stars count both players’ hints together, so one hint from either of you limits the mold to one star for both. Talk through the narrow parts first; whoever holds the bar or L that fits a corridor should place it before the other fills around it.
Play it yourself
