⏱️ Guide

Learn Chain Reaction in 5 Minutes

You do not need to read the rules to play this game. You need one sentence, one tutorial and one game. Here is the five-minute version.

Minute 1: the one sentence

A cell bursts when it has as many marbles as it has neighbours, sending one marble to each neighbour and turning them your colour. Corners burst at 2, edges at 3, inner cells at 4. That is the game. (If you want the formal version later: Rules.)

Minutes 2–3: the tutorial

Open PlayCascade and start the interactive tutorial. It walks you through placing, overflowing and a small cascade on a live board – about two minutes. You will see a burst before you have to think about one.

Minutes 4–5: one game on 6×6 against Easy

Start a game, Easy AI, 6×6 board. Follow three habits:

1. First marble in a corner, second marble in the opposite corner.
2. Before each placement, look at the enemy cells next to your target. If one is a single marble from bursting, place somewhere else.
3. When you have two or three nearly-full cells touching each other, fill one and watch.

Most people win this game. If you lose, use the step-by-step replay of the final cascade: the mistake is usually visible two moves earlier.

After the first win

• Beat Easy twice more, then switch to Medium.
• Read Opening Moves – it is short and explains why corners matter.
• When Medium stops being a challenge, Strategy Tips and the Hard AI are next.

Teaching someone else

Two-player mode on one phone is the fastest way to teach: play one game where you narrate your moves ("this cell is full, so I'm not touching the one next to it"). The second game, stop narrating. By the third, they will be counting your loaded cells. More on same-device play in Two-Player Games on One iPhone.