Games and pets
The arcade
Section titled “The arcade”SUPER G opens a shelf of eleven games, and the island becomes the board. The arrows slide the shelf, Home and End go to either end, and Enter or Space plays the game in the middle; a click on a side tile brings it to the middle. The shelf reopens on the game played last, and the line under it is that game’s best, or “Not played yet”.
While a game is on, the strip over the board carries the score — or the moves — and the best, and nothing else.
| Key | |
|---|---|
| Escape | Back to the shelf; from the shelf, closes the island |
| R | Starts the round again, at any moment |
| Enter or Space | Plays again once the round is over |
A finished round is washed over with “Game over” — “Solved” for the puzzles — and Play again; a click on the wash does the same. Closing the island leaves the game, and the round with it.
The arcade is also on the wallpaper, as the Games widget, and in the control centre, as a block: both show the latest bests and open the shelf.
The eleven
Section titled “The eleven”Where the arrows steer, W A S D do the same, except in Lights Out.
| Game | What it is | Controls |
|---|---|---|
| Whack-a-Mole | Nine holes laid out like a phone keypad, in 45-second rounds; a miss costs two seconds | 1…9, or click |
| Snake Sprint | Ten points an apple, and a little faster with each one | Arrows |
| Flood Colors | Flood the board from the top-left corner in as few moves as you can | 1…6, or click a colour |
| 2048 Mini | 2048 on a 4 × 4 board, until nothing can merge | Arrows |
| Lights Out | A press flips a light and its four neighbours; turn all 25 off in as few presses as you can | Arrows and Space, or click |
| Hextris | Slabs fall onto the sides of a hexagon; three of a colour touching clear, and a stack nine deep ends the round | ← → rotate, ↓ or Space drops; click the outer thirds to rotate, the middle to drop |
| Bot Bash | Robots march down five lanes; three reaching the floor end the round, and a bash on an empty lane costs a life | 1…5, or click a lane |
| Target Smash | One shrinking target at a time — three for the bullseye, two for the middle ring, one for the outer — and three lives | The pointer only |
| Space Blaster | A formation of twenty invaders that speeds up as it thins; three lives | ← → move, Space fires |
| Tetris | A 10 × 20 well, falling faster every ten lines | ← → move, ↑ rotates, ↓ soft drop, Space hard drop |
| Solitaire | Klondike, dealt one card at a time; click a card to pick it up and click where it goes | The pointer; Space turns the stock |
The games follow the palette like everything else: each one’s colours are the wallpaper’s.
One best per game, kept in ~/.local/state/quickshell/games.json: the
highest score, or the fewest moves for Flood Colors, Lights Out and Solitaire.
A round that scored nothing is not recorded. A beaten best says so over the
board and, when it was not the first, on the island. There is one number per
game and nothing else — no history, no names.
The pets
Section titled “The pets”A family of five small creatures lives on the bar: one out at a time, the rest asleep on a shelf. Each one hatches from an egg, earns levels from being fed and played with, and never dies. The five are Dot, Sprout, Ember, Sol and Drift, each in one of the palette’s colours, and each can be given a name of its own.
Looking after one
Section titled “Looking after one”SUPER SHIFT P opens the pet’s panel: the one that is out, its mood, how far it is to the next level, and Feed and Play. Its name is edited in place. The Pet chip on the bar has the same Feed and Play in its detail.
| Experience | |
|---|---|
| Feed | 25, once every 90 minutes |
| Play | 12, once every five minutes, plus three for every hour since the last game, up to 18 more |
| Being out | 1 every five minutes, while the pet is on the bar and awake and the screen is unlocked |
An egg hatches at its first meal or its first game, and never on its own. Each level takes a little more than the one before; ears arrive at level 5 and a star at level 15.
The mood is read off when it was last fed and played with: Beaming, Content, Peckish — a snack is owed — Lonely — nobody has played today — or Fast asleep. None of them costs anything.
The family
Section titled “The family”Under the pet that is out is the family, each with its level and Bring out. Only the pet that is out earns anything; the others sleep on the shelf, and the time asleep does not count against them.
Another egg is laid when the family’s levels added together reach 6, then 16, 30 and 50, and it hatches into one of the species the family does not have yet — so the five are found by taking turns rather than by playing harder with one. With all five found, a star waits at level fifteen for each.
Nothing dies, and a week away costs nothing. A neglected pet is hungry,
lonely or asleep, and nothing is ever reset. The family is kept in
~/.local/state/quickshell/pet.json and is the same in every profile. The
games earn it nothing.