What the Taiji?! works a little differently from most Taiji editors and readers, which might confuse some players. So, I’d like to take the time to address some of the common restrictions What the Taiji?! has, and why these restrictions exist.

Board sizes

What the Taiji?! can support puzzles as large as 22x12 tiles. However, any sizes bigger than this will be rendered off screen, and it would be incredibly difficult for players to play these types of puzzles without a form of scrolling.

To maximize puzzle readability, What the Taiji?! tries to automatically pick the best scaling resolution for puzzles, based on the board’s width and height. In testing, I’ve found that puzzles rendered at 1x scale are difficult to read on device, requiring you to use Mirror or the Playdate Simulator to see and play these puzzles. As such, puzzles designed for What the Taiji?! try to go no bigger than 11x6 tiles, as these will be rendered at a more comfortable 2x or even 3x scaling.

“But why not just scroll around?”

I strongly believe that seeing the entire board at once is critical to solving Taiji puzzles. While supporting a form of scrolling would allow board of completely arbitrary sizes, it puts a lot more work on the player to remember what they have done off-screen, which doesn’t make for a good user experience.

Furthermore, larger board sizes tend to carry a lot go cognitive load on them. Most puzzles in the game proper don’t go beyond 12x12 tiles or even 13x13 tiles. While some custom puzzles from the community may exceed those sizes, those puzzles often require you to think long and hard on them and trying to accomplish them on a small device would be an incredibly frustrating experience.

Colors

Taiji symbols can support multiple colors, which can play into specific mechanics. However, the Playdate’s screen only supports black and white. While some symbols, such as diamonds, could be rendered with some dithering techniques, not all symbols would be readable.

So, rather than trying to wrangle additional colors, What the Taiji?! ignores them, treating everything as the same color. Likewise, because of this behavior, any additional constraints from colors are not checked for, which can allow for some interesting solutions to puzzles in the game.

“But what about putting some number or letter next to it?”

While adding some characters next to symbols would work for larger scales, such as 2x or 3x, it wouldn’t work well on the worst-case scaling, 1x, because of how small the board would be. While this could be fixed with scrolling, scrolling also presents its own set of technical and design issues discussed above.

How will I know my puzzle won’t be supported?

For puzzles that exceed the maximum board size or use unsupported colors, the game will display an alert message, saying the puzzle couldn’t be loaded with the specific issue in question.

Puzzles that render at 1x will receive a warning, but players will be able to still play them.

I know these restrictions might be a bummer for experienced Taiji players that want a fully unrestricted experience in What the Taiji?!, but I strongly believe that these restrictions have some silver linings that make the overall What the Taiji?! experience more pleasant:

• The core symbolic mechanics of Taiji are fully supported, regardless of color, so the overall experience isn’t completely compromised.
• Furthermore, all the puzzles in What the Taiji?!‘s main campaign take these restrictions into account, so they’re carefully crafted to still provide a fun experience.
• Color restrictions give puzzle creators a creative challenge to come up with interesting situations.
• These restrictions offer a more streamlined and simplistic Taiji experience suitable for both Taiji veterans and newcomers unfamiliar with Taiji.