Guide
Shadow Memory: the 10-second blind walk, the tricks after the fade and how a maze is scored
You get a few seconds to study the maze, then the walls vanish and you have 10 seconds and 5 HP to walk out from memory. How maze size, study time and the lies after the fade change with each level.
Shadow Memory is a memory maze. Every maze starts fully lit: chalk walls, your walker and a glowing ember exit. A countdown gives you a few seconds to study it, then the map fades to black. From then on you move one cell per swipe (or arrow key) with nothing on screen but your walker, and you have to reach the exit before a 10-second countdown hits zero. You can play it in your browser.
HP, bumps and losing
You have 5 HP. Every move into a wall costs 1 HP and leaves you where you were. At 0 HP, or when the 10 seconds run out, the maze is lost. The game then lights the maze back up with your path and every bump drawn on it, which is the quickest way to see where your memory slipped.
The dark lies
After the fade, and before the 10-second countdown starts, the game briefly shows things that are not true: a confident-looking route to a dead end, walls where there is floor, gaps in real walls, a second exit on the edge, arrows pointing the wrong way, extra blocks, or the whole picture shifted by one cell. They are only pictures; the real walls never change. When arrows are among the tricks, the one on your start cell always points away from the exit. Trust the route you memorised, not what flickers.
| Level | Maze | Study time | Lies after the fade | |---|---|---|---| | 1–3 | 7×7 | 6.85 → 6.55 s | 1, for 1.0 s | | 4 | 9×9 | 6.4 s | 1, for 1.0 s | | 5–9 | 9×9 | 6.25 → 5.65 s | 2, for 1.3 s | | 10–19 | 11×11 | 5 s | 3, for 1.6 s | | 20–29 | 13×13 | 4 s | 4, for 2.0 s | | 30+ | 13×13, 15×15 from 40 | 3.5 s | 5, for 2.4 s |
Fake floors and portals
From level 20, some cells are fake floor: while you study they are drawn with their own tile, and once the map fades they are solid. There are 4 at level 20 and one more per level after that, so remember them as walls. From level 30, portal pairs appear; stepping on one in the dark sends you to its partner, so you have to remember where each pair leads.
Modes
- Play is an endless run from level 1. Each escape adds its score to the run and takes you to the next level; the first lost maze ends the run. Levels past 20 (fake floors, portals) are only reached here.
- Stages lets you pick any level from 1 to 20 to practise, and Continue moves you on to the next one.
- Daily is one shared maze per UTC day, built with the level 15 settings (11×11, 5 s to study, 3 lies).
How an escape is scored
Each escape gives 100 points, plus 12 per second left on the blind countdown, plus a step bonus of up to 80 that loses 3 for every step beyond the maze's width plus height (14 steps on a 7×7 maze), plus 50 for a run without a single bump. A fast, clean, direct escape is worth about 350. Run score also unlocks cosmetics only: a walker skin at 500, a maze theme at 1,500 and a footstep effect at 3,000.
Quick tips
- Memorise the route, not the whole maze: trace it from your walker to the exit and say the turns to yourself, like "right 3, down 2, left 1".
- A step takes about a tenth of a second, so 10 seconds is plenty for a route you know. Hesitating costs more than walking.
- A bump costs 1 HP and the 50-point clean bonus, but you stay on the same cell, so recount and carry on.
- On fake-floor levels, check the odd-looking tiles first; they are the walls you will forget.
More on the Shadow Memory page, or step into the dark.
