How to play Mendwick

What is Mendwick?

Merge games are about turning small things into big things. Two tea leaves become a tea bag, two tea bags become a cup of tea, and so on up the chain until you have a whole garden tea party. Your neighbors ask for particular things, and filling those orders is how you earn your way forward.

Ours takes place in Mendwick, a village that went quiet the day the old mill wheel stopped. Maple the fox wants her tearoom open again, Hazel the hedgehog wants her oven busy, and little Pip the duckling wants a bit of everything. As you help them, the village wakes up one roof, door and lantern at a time. Mendwick is free and plays in your browser on phone, tablet or computer, with no download and no energy to wait for.

How to play

• Tap a generator (the kettle, the oven, the seed tin and others) and a new item hops onto the board. Tap as often as you like.
• Drag an item onto an identical one to merge them into the next item in the chain, or tap one and then its twin. Every chain has 8 levels.
• Tap any item to see its name, its level and what it turns into next. On a computer the whole chain is shown beside the board.
• Neighbors at the top of the screen place orders. Items you already have get a green tick. When a whole order is ready its card glows, and one tap serves it.
• Tap an order that isn't ready to see what it needs. The items you should merge light up on the board.
• Orders pay acorns, mend stars and village experience. Stars restore the village. Acorns buy decorations.
• Now and then a butterfly drifts across the board. Tap it before it flies off for a few acorns, a mend star or festival ribbons.

Dusty crates on the board hold an item. Drop a matching item onto a crate to open it, and you get the next item up. Brambles along the bottom rows clear as you mend The Tearoom and The Old Bridge.

Ripples: our twist

When a merge makes an item that already has an identical twin touching it (up, down, left or right), the two merge again on their own. If that makes another twin, it keeps going. We call it a ripple, and every step of one pays bonus acorns.

Ripples never eat something a neighbor is waiting for. If an order wants two Cups of Tea and you have exactly two, they stay put. And if a ripple ever takes something you wanted, the Undo button puts your last move back for free.

No energy, no waiting

Generators in Mendwick never rest and never run out. Tap the kettle fifty times in a row if you like. The only limit is room on the board, and merging, serving, the pantry and selling all make more of it.

Generators level up when you finish certain restorations in the village, which are marked in the list. A better first item is called a lucky drop and gets a little sparkle.

When the board fills up, a Tea Break is the fun way out: the neighbors pitch in and every pair of matching items on the board merges at once. It keeps back anything an order is still waiting for.

Restoring the village

Mendwick has 10 places to mend, each with its own neighbor and 8 restorations: The Tearoom, Riverside Garden, The Old Bridge, Thimble & Co., The Orchard, The Boathouse, Market Square, The Bandstand, The Windmill and The Clock Tower. Each restoration costs mend stars and changes the picture, from sweeping the tearoom steps to winding the clock.

Some restorations let you pick a style, like the color of the tearoom door or the flag on Otto's boat, and you can change your mind later for free. Every restoration plays out in the picture with a little sparkle, and the neighbors move in and potter about the places you mend, chatting about what you fixed. Finishing a place brings a new generator or neighbor, more pantry room, and a gift box. The Boathouse brings the Tackle Box and its river chain, and The Bandstand brings the Beehive and its honey chain. After the clock tower rings, a Seasonal Fair lets you decorate the whole village for each season of the year.

You can also spend acorns on decorations for every place (benches, planters, lamps, birdbaths, barrels and signposts) and on helpers at the village stall: a Tea Break for 150 acorns, a Twin Charm for 120 or a Gift Box for 90.

Helpers

Every helper is earned in play. Nothing is sold.

The weekly festival

Once The Tearoom is mended, Fern the travelling deer arrives with a festival. There's a new one every week (weeks start on Monday, UTC), rotating between the Lantern Festival, the Harvest Fair, Blossom Days and the River Regatta.

Every order you serve earns festival ribbons: one for the order and one more for each item from that week's two featured chains. Fern places her own orders too, worth 3 extra ribbons. Butterflies give a ribbon each and your first Morning Market of the day gives 3. Ribbon counts show on each order card.

The Events button shows the festival track: 12 rewards between 3 and 102 ribbons, including acorns, mend stars, Tea Breaks, Twin Charms and gift boxes. The last one pins that festival's ribbon in your book. Your errands for the day live on the same page.

Morning Market and leaderboards

The Morning Market is our daily puzzle. Everyone gets the same board, the same three generators, the same ten orders and even the same items from every generator tap, and it changes at midnight UTC. You have a set number of baskets (generator taps) for the day, usually around a hundred.

Your first finished market of the day posts to the Daily leaderboard and pays a Tea Break, 40 acorns and 3 festival ribbons. Replays are practice. Every market is checked by a computer player before it opens, so all ten orders can always be served with baskets to spare. The all-time Stars leaderboard counts every mend star you have ever earned.

Collections

• The item book: 72 items across nine chains. The first time you make each one, it pays acorns, and the finest item in each chain gets a cheer from the neighbor who loves it most.
• Stamps: now and then a served order comes with a stamp. There is a set for each season plus riverside finds that turn up all year. A full set pays a Big Gift, a Twin Charm and a Tea Break.
• Festival ribbons: one for each festival whose track you finish. Finish the same festival again on its next turn and the count goes up.
• Neighbors: every order raises that neighbor's friendship. Each of their five hearts brings a gift, and some hearts tell you a little more about them.
• Today's errands: three small jobs a day, like merging 50 times, making two ripples or catching a butterfly. All three together pay a Big Gift.

Controls

• Phone and tablet: tap generators, drag items or tap two matching items, tap orders to serve. Drag an item onto the Pantry button to store it.
• Mouse: click and drag the same way.
• Keyboard: arrow keys move the cursor, Enter picks an item up and drops it, G taps a generator, 1 to 5 serve an order, U undoes, V opens the village and Esc opens the menu.

Your village saves on your device as you play. Sign in on the site and it follows you to your other devices.

Tips and strategy

• Keep twins apart until you want them merged. Two matching items side by side will ripple the next time you make their pair.
• Line items up on purpose. Put a Teapot next to the spot where you are about to finish a second Teapot and you get a Tea Tray for free.
• Serve small orders often. Each one earns festival ribbons and brings a new neighbor along.
• Save a Tea Break for a crowded board. The more pairs you have lying around, the bigger the party.
• Use the pantry for things a future order might want, like spare Cups of Tea, instead of letting them crowd the board.
• Open crates early. They give you the next item up for the price of one match, and the space they free up is worth even more.
• Restorations that level up a generator are worth doing first. They are marked in the village list.
• In the Morning Market, plan before you tap. Every basket you save is 15 points, and all ten orders are known from the start.

Questions