Comb: Fit the clusters, fill the comb

A honeycomb puzzle. Drag clusters of hexagons onto an irregular board and fit them together until every cell is filled. A hundred levels, three stars each, and one puzzle a day that everybody gets.

How to play

Each level gives you an irregular honeycomb board and a tray holding every cluster you will need. A cluster is three to six hexagons stuck together. Drag one onto the board and it seats only if every one of its cells lands on an empty cell. Fill the board and the level is done.

• Drag a cluster from the tray. It is held above your finger so you can see where it will land, and a ghost shows the exact cells it will take.
• A refusal costs nothing. If it does not fit it goes straight back to the tray and no move is counted, so you can try a fit as often as you like.
• Pick a seated cluster back up any time. That does cost a move, and so does Undo, because otherwise the move count would mean nothing.
• Fill every cell to finish. There is no timer and no way to lose.

Your progress is saved in your own browser, so you pick up where you left off. There is no account and nothing is uploaded, which also means clearing your site data clears your stars.

Why it is clever

Comb sits on a hexagonal lattice rather than a square one, and that is structural rather than decorative. On a square grid any four connected cells is a tetromino and the eye recognises the L, the T and the S instantly however they are coloured. A hexagon has six neighbours instead of four, so the clusters read as pieces of honeycomb and the fitting problem is genuinely different from the block games you already know.

The reasoning the game asks for is a single habit: fill the tightest gap, not the nearest one. Play that way and roughly three placements in five are forced, meaning exactly one cluster in exactly one position will close the hole. You are reading the board rather than guessing at it. Pack from the top left instead and the later boards defeat you more often than not, which is the difference the game is built around.

Every board is generated by tiling it completely first and then taking that tiling apart into the clusters you are given, so a solution always exists and par is simply how many pieces that solution used. Nothing is put in front of you that cannot be finished.

Tips

• Look at the hole a cluster leaves behind, not the one it fills.
• Never strand a gap of one or two cells. The smallest cluster is three, so nothing can ever fill it and the level is spoiled without telling you.
• Work inwards from the ragged edge of the outline. The awkward notches are the informative part.
• Place the big awkward cluster while it still has somewhere to go. The small ones are flexible and can wait.
• If a level feels harder than the last, count the different shapes in the tray. That is the dial that moved, not the size of the board.

Frequently asked questions

Is Comb free? Yes, completely free to play, with no account or download, in any modern browser on phone, tablet or desktop.

Does it work on mobile? Yes. Comb is built for touch as well as mouse, and the phone layout is designed separately rather than scaled down.

How do I win? Cover every cell of the honeycomb with the clusters in the tray, leaving nothing empty and nothing left over.

Is every level solvable? Yes, always. Each board is built by tiling it first and handing you the pieces of that tiling, so a solution is guaranteed by construction rather than checked afterwards.

How are stars awarded? Three for finishing in par, which is the number of clusters the level was built from, two for within two moves of par, and one otherwise. Picking a piece back up and using Undo each cost a move.

What is the daily puzzle? One extra board generated from the date, so everybody gets the same one on the same day. It does not affect your progress through the hundred levels.

Can I get stuck? You can reach a board where nothing fits, but you cannot lose. Pick clusters back up until it comes apart, or press Restart. Neither is ever taken away from you.

Stuck? Read the Comb strategy guide →

More games with a run to chase are in the arcade. If you would rather something calmer, try Bloom or Kaleido, or browse all Zamborin games.