Zellia: Tile Match Palace

Tap three tiles alike to clear them. Clear the board and a new arch goes up in a palace of zellige.

Zellia is a calm tile-matching puzzle made like real zellige, the cut-tile mosaic of Fes. No timer, ever.

How it plays
• Tap a free tile to send it to your tray
• Three alike clear on their own
• The tray holds seven tiles: if it fills up, the board is lost
• Empty the board to win

Every board can be won
Each board is dealt backwards from a solution, so a winning order always exists. The lower layers make you think: which tile frees the stack underneath?

Restore the palace
Wins pay tesserae. Spend them to raise the arches of eight palace areas, from the Courtyard Fountain to the Mosaic Gate. Every area you finish adds its own board shape to the game, such as the fountain, the khatam star, the riad garden and the hammam dome. Each arch comes with a short plaque about the real craft of zellige.

The tiles
Sixteen kinds of tile, each cut the way a maallem cuts zellige: a glazed square with a star piece set in lime grout, chips and pinholes included. The kinds differ in shape as well as colour, so none relies on colour alone.

Every day
• The Daily board is the same for every player that day, with a chest for your first win
• Your streak forgives a missed day: one freeze comes back each week
• The Courtyard deals endless boards with no way to lose

Good to know
• Clears climb a Hijaz scale; fountain and pool boards ring like water
• Four helpers: extra shuffle, hint, undo and the maallem's hammer
• Reduce motion in Settings, and an evening reminder if you want one
• Plays offline, in 8 languages
• Free with ads. There are no banners, and the only ads you don't choose come between boards. One purchase removes them for good and makes the helpers, revives and doubled rewards free

Recent changes:
What's new in 1.3.4
• Lantern Night (24 Oct to 2 Nov) gets an evening sky: a crescent moon, bats and fireflies
• A new icon from the game's own tiles: three alike, stacked the way the board stacks them
• Every tile is cut zellige now: a glazed square with a star piece set in lime grout, chips and pinholes included
• Eight new board shapes: fountain, khatam star, riad garden, hammam dome, arch, pool, gate and colonnade. Each palace area you restore adds one