Game Rules

Downright Shifty is played on a 6x6 grid. Two players (User vs AI) take turns shifting rows or columns to align symbols. Rows can be shifted to the right, and columns can be shifted down.

Objective

The goal is to maximize your score by creating solid lines of your symbol and occupying diagonals with your symbol.

Player	Symbol	Name	Color
First	◆	Diamond	Blue
Second	●	Circle	Purple
Neutral	★	Star	Red

How to Play

1. Shift a Row: Click and drag horizontally to shift a row to the right. The element that falls off the edge wraps around to the start.
2. Shift a Column: Click and drag vertically to shift a column down. The element that falls off the bottom wraps around to the top.

"Think ahead! Every move you make changes the board for your opponent as well."

Forming Lines

The grid starts out like this:

If we shift the top row to the right, it will look like this:

Notice that if we shift two more rows, the third and the fifth rows from the top, that we'll get this position:

Now the game grid (board) has 3 vertical lines, which are outlined in black:

Position	Symbol	Column
Leftmost	●	1
Second	◆	2
Rightmost	◆	6

The neutral (★) cells prevent the formation of three vertical lines on the 3rd 4th and 5th columns.

Occupying Diagonals

Diagonal positions below are marked with a grey circle.

You can see that there are always twelve diagonal positions. As rows and columns are shifted during the game, the diagonal posisions do not move.

Notice that the game starts with four of each symbol in a diagonal position. However, if we shift the 3rd column down, the game grid (board) looks like this:

This breaks the symmetry. Now we have

Piece	Count
◆	4
●	5
★	3

Here's an interactive board to see how moves can be made:

Scoring

There are two ways to earn points:

• Lines: Create solid lines of your symbol.
• Diagonals: Occupy diagonals with your symbol.

Since forming lines is more difficult than occupying a diagonal cell, each line earns 18 (3 x 6) points.

Each diagonal cell occupied earns one point.

Points are awarded each turn to both players. Make sure to pay attention to how many points your opponent earns each turn as well as your own.

At the end of the game, the player with the most points wins.

Turns

Turns alternate between the first player (◆) and the second player (●). The first player makes the first move.

The game favors the second player, so the first player gets 5.5 points added to their score at the beginning of the game. They are also allowed to make the final move (turn 41).

The game ends early if one player is at least 200 points ahead of the other.

The game allows for resignations, but the A.I. has not been trained to resign.

Repeating the previous move is not allowed, and will forefit the game. During real game play, there's a warning message asking for confirmation.