Skyscrapers
- Category
- Brain
- Players
- 1
- Controls
- Tap
- Grid
- 4 x 4
- Loads
- Plays instantly
Controls
| Tap a cell | Select it. |
| Tap a number | Place a building height. |
| Tap ✕ | Clear the cell. |
Next up
| Tap a cell | Select it. |
| Tap a number | Place a building height. |
| Tap ✕ | Clear the cell. |
Skyscrapers turns a Latin square into a city. Each number is the height of a building, and the clue outside every row and column says how many buildings you would see looking along it. A taller tower hides everything shorter behind it, so the counts constrain the arrangement far more tightly than they first appear.
It is a lovely puzzle because the clues encode something visual rather than arithmetic. Once you realise that a clue of one means the tallest building must come first, and a clue equal to the grid size means the whole line ascends, the openings become obvious.
A clue of one means the tallest building is nearest. On a four by four grid that places the four immediately, and it is always the first thing to look for.
A clue equal to the grid size forces the whole line. Four visible buildings on a four-wide row means the heights must ascend one, two, three, four in order.
A clue of two usually means the tallest is second. The first building hides everything until the tallest appears, so the tall one sits close to the front.
Work the extremes first. Clues of one and four pin down whole lines, and the middling clues only become tractable once those are in place.
How many buildings are visible looking along that row or column, where a taller building hides every shorter one behind it.
One to four, each once per row and column, as in any Latin square.
That the tallest building is nearest to that clue, hiding everything else.
Yes. Each is generated from a finished grid with the clues read off it.
Completely free, with no trial and no unlock. Skyscrapers loads with the page and plays immediately, without an install step or a video ad first.