Minesweeper

About this test

Minesweeper became a universal game because it shipped with Windows 3.1 in 1992, alongside Solitaire, and ended up installed by default on hundreds of millions of office machines. Part of its purpose was educational: teaching new users to handle left and right clicking.

Behind the unassuming look it's a real deduction game. Each number says how many mines sit among the eight neighbouring cells, and most of the board resolves through local logic: if a cell marked 2 already touches two identified mines, all its other neighbours are safe; if a 3 touches exactly three closed cells, those are the three mines. A weak player uncovers cells on instinct; a strong player only clicks once a deduction is established.

The real gap in skill comes down to pattern recognition. Recurring configurations along an edge — a 1 then a 2 then a 1, or a 1 followed by a 1 — have known solutions you apply without thinking. That said, on a small grid the endgame sometimes leaves two equivalent cells and one mine: at that exact point there is no deduction left, only a coin to flip.

How it works

The clock starts when the board appears and stops when all seventy-one safe cells are uncovered. Your first tap can never be a mine. Hitting a mine or giving up counts as a failure and scores zero regardless of elapsed time. For a won game, the 0-100 score starts at 300 seconds and maxes out at 25 seconds.