Inkreach

Inkreach is a real-time strategy game played on an old cartographer’s map. Your realm starts as a small blot of blue ink. Spread it over the wildlands, outlast the rival realms around you and claim seven tenths of the world before anyone else does. A war takes about five to ten minutes.

How to play

Start by tapping any land to found your realm. Then tap the blank land beside your border to spread into it. The slider at the bottom decides how much of your army each order sends, and that army keeps marching cell by cell until it runs out.

The first minute is a land rush: the wildlands are cheaper and spread faster, so send big orders and claim all you can before your borders meet a rival’s.

Your army grows on its own, but it grows fastest while it is well below its limit. A full bar is wasted time, so keep your troops working. Once the wildlands are gone, every new piece of land has to be taken from a rival.

Reading the map

The colour of each realm tells you how strong it is right now. Dark, rich ink means many troops on every piece of land. Pale ink means the army is thin, often because the realm has just sent it away to fight someone else. That is the moment to strike.

Maps and ships

Choose between four kinds of map. Continent is one large land mass. Islands scatters the realms over several islands, so every war needs ships. Lakes adds inland waters, and Rivers cuts the land with rivers that armies cross at bridges. Choose ? to let fate decide.

To cross water, tap land on the far side. Your army boards ships at your nearest coast and sails there, and the landing costs a little more than crossing a border. Up to three fleets can be at sea at once, and the rival realms use ships too.

Towns, omens and truces

Towns are marked with a small house on the map. Each one you hold adds income and raises your army’s limit, and the walls around it make the nearby land harder to take. Arrows on the map show where every army is marching, so you can see who is busy fighting someone else.

Every 90 seconds an omen strikes. Plague can wipe out a third of the largest realm’s army, a storm halts every army for a few seconds, a golden harvest makes towns pay triple, and an uprising lets a town break free from the leading realm. Omens keep wars from being decided too early.

When two fronts are too many, tap a rival’s name in the list to offer a 60-second truce. A realm that is clearly winning will say no.

The campaign

The campaign is ten wars, each with its own map and task. In some you only need to win, in others you must survive six minutes in a corner, hold six towns at once or bring down a realm that has grown far too strong. Every war gives up to three stars: one for the task, one for speed and one for an extra challenge, and winning a war opens the next.

Your realm

Choose your realm’s name, ink and sigil under Your realm. Ten inks and eight sigils can be unlocked by winning wars and earning campaign stars. Your sigil is shown next to your name on the map.

Modes and glory

Choose Easy, Normal or Hard and fight 3, 5 or 7 rival realms. Today’s map is the same for every player until midnight UTC, so you can compare your glory with everyone else. Glory comes from the largest share of land you held, the realms you brought down and, if you win, how quickly you did it. Hard gives one and a half times the glory; Easy gives a little over half.

Tips

• Use the land rush. In the first minute wildlands are cheap, so send large orders and head for the nearest towns.
• Send a large share at once instead of many small orders. Big armies take land faster.
• When two armies meet on the same border they fight each other first. Answer an attack with a strong counter.
• Do not pick a fight with the biggest realm too early. Make a truce with one neighbour while you take land from another.
• On Hard, the rivals turn on whoever leads. Grow, but avoid standing out until you can finish the war.