Paintpot Lane

What you do

Paintpot Lane is marble painting, the craft where a marble dipped in paint rolls across paper and leaves a trail, done at giant scale. The painters' fair has rolled a long paper runner down a country lane, and your marble rolls along it on its own while you steer. Roll over drops of your marble's paint to load it up, keep clear of the other paints, and pass under the wooden paint-pot arches, where a tipped pot pours a curtain of paint that dips your marble in a new color. The lane runs through Buttercup Meadow on a spring morning, Sunflower Fields at summer noon, Cider Orchard on an autumn afternoon, Harbor Road at golden hour by the sea and Lantern Village on a lantern-lit evening, past critters painting at their easels who look up and wave as you roll by. At the start line and at the finish easel stands Smudge, a stoat in a raspberry beret and a smock spattered with all five paints, who waves you off, gasps at a muddy splat and cheers when you arrive, then sets the trail you painted on his easel as your painting.

• Five paints, each with its own shape: Poppy hearts, Sky raindrops, Sunflower stars, Teal leaves and Plum moons. The drops are the shapes, and the same shape is on every arch banner, fence flag and pail, so you can play by shape alone.
• Relative drag steering anywhere on the lane: the marble follows your finger the moment it moves, a sweep across about two thirds of the screen crosses the lane, and lifting your finger never makes it jump. Gentle, Normal and Quick sensitivity.
• 30 levels in five places along the lane, six each, with new things to roll through as you go: split arches where you pick your next paint, picket fences with a gap for each paint, fence gaps that slide, and paint pails gliding on little tracks.
• Gentle, Classic and Brisk difficulty: no hearts at a slower pace, three hearts, or one heart at a faster pace.
• A Daily Lane that is the same for everyone on a date, and an endless Long Lane that cycles through all five places and keeps your farthest distance.
• Your painting at every finish: the whole trail your marble left, folded onto a sheet on Smudge's easel, muddy splotches and all.

How to play

1. Pick a difficulty and press Play. Your marble waits at the start line, dipped in one paint; the badge at the top right shows its shape.
2. Drag to start rolling, or press Start rolling. The marble rolls forward on its own and speeds up a little as the lane goes on.
3. Steer over the drops shaped like your paint. Each is worth a point, ten in a row in a streak doubles the points, and twenty-five in a row triples them.
4. Keep clear of drops in other shapes. Touching one muddies the marble, ends your streak and, on Classic and Brisk, costs a heart. A drop of your paint that you miss also ends the streak.
5. Roll under a paint-pot arch to take its paint, then collect that shape. Under a split arch, the side you take is your next paint. Roll through the fence gap flagged with your shape, and catch the pails of your paint while slipping past the others.
6. Reach the finish to earn stars: one for finishing, two for collecting at least 80 percent of your paint's drops, and three for every one of them with no muddy touch. Finishing a level opens the next.

Controls

• Touch or mouse: drag anywhere on the lane to steer. The marble moves with your finger, not to it, so you can start a drag anywhere and pick up again from where the marble is.
• Keyboard: Left and Right or A and D steer, quickly reaching full speed, so a tap is a small nudge. Space or Enter starts rolling, and Escape opens the menu.
• The menu pauses the run and has Settings for difficulty, steering sensitivity and the level 1 tips. The toolbar above the game pauses, restarts the lane, turns the optional sound on or off and goes fullscreen.

Tips worth knowing

• Look past the next drop. Drops of one paint run in lines, arcs and zigzags, so once you see the line you can ride it instead of chasing each drop.
• Read the arch banner early. The shape on it is your next paint, and the drops just past an arch are usually in that shape.
• Split arches are a choice: pick the side whose paint you can follow, since the lanes after them run apart.
• Small moves are enough. On Normal a sweep of two thirds of the screen crosses the whole lane, so for one drop over, a short slide does it.
• Sliding fence gaps and pails move with your progress down the lane, not with the clock, so the same lane always moves the same way. Line up early and hold steady.

Accessibility

• Every paint is paired with its own shape everywhere it matters, so color is never the only clue.
• The whole game plays with the keyboard: arrow keys or A and D to steer, Space or Enter to start, Escape for the menu.
• Changes of paint, muddy touches and finishes are announced for screen readers.
• Gentle difficulty has no hearts and a slower pace, and steering sensitivity can be turned down.
• Reduced motion keeps every pop, splash and sound but stops the screen nudge, the marble's wobble and the drifting particles. Sound is optional and never needed to play.

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