Fruit Merge

You drop fruit into a container. Two of the same touching become the next one up, bigger: two cherries make a strawberry, two melons make a watermelon. The container, however, does not grow, and that is where the real game starts.

How it works

You drop fruit into a container from above. When two fruits of the same kind touch, they vanish and one of the next level appears in their place, larger. Fruit has weight and rolls: where it ends up is not entirely your decision, and that is half the game.

The chain runs to eleven fruits: cherry, strawberry, grape, clementine, orange, apple, pear, peach, pineapple, melon, watermelon. The watermelon is the finish line: there is no bigger fruit after it.

The dropper only produces the small fruits, never the big ones: big fruit can only be built. The game ends when the container overflows, meaning a fruit comes to rest above the rim.

On Pocket Games

Put your finger on the container and the fruit follows it sideways, with a dashed guide showing where it will land; lift your finger and it drops. A mouse works the same way: press, move, release. There is a pause of about a third of a second between drops, so you cannot fire fruit in a burst.

The dropper only produces the first five fruits, cherry to orange, chosen at random. The Next box at the top shows what comes after.
Along the bottom of the screen runs the row of all eleven fruits: the ones you have already made this game are lit, the others stay faded.
Two watermelons that touch both vanish and are worth a 100-point bonus. It is the only way to clear the biggest fruit out of the container.
The limit is the dashed line at the top: the game ends when a fruit at rest stays above the line for one second. Fruit that is still falling does not count.
The game is saved on every drop, with the position of every fruit: if you leave, you find it as it was on the Game in progress card.
Your best score syncs with your account, and it is the only data from this game that travels between devices.

Scoring

Points come when a fruit is born from a merge, and they grow as triangular numbers: 1 for the strawberry, 3 for the grape, 6 for the clementine, then 10, 15, 21, 28, 36, 45, 55, and 66 for the watermelon.

The interesting sum is a different one: making a watermelon takes two melons, that is four pineapples, that is eight peaches — and along the way all those merges have already paid out. So the score is not something you chase: it is built from the bottom, and it arrives on its own if your merges fit together.

Strategy

Big at the bottom, small on top. This is the rule that decides games. Every big fruit left near the top blocks space and stops the cherries from reaching each other. Drop the big fruit to one side and keep a zone of small ones on the other.

Sort by size, like a pyramid. The ideal is a staircase: watermelons and melons at the bottom, then progressively smaller. You never quite get there, but it is the direction every single drop should push towards.

Do not leave cherries scattered. Small fruit is what gets lost in the corners, and four stray cherries take up as much room as a peach while being worth nothing. When you see two close together, close them: it costs one drop and frees space.

Mind the bounce. Fruit dropped onto a sloping pile rolls away, and often ends up exactly where it should not. If the pile leans one way, drop from the other side to even it out.

Look at the next fruit. The game shows you what is coming: two drops planned together are worth more than ten drops optimised one at a time.

Chain reactions are free. One merge can trigger another below it, which triggers another again. Setting them up is the only route to genuinely high scores, and you set them up by lining fruit up in order of size, side by side, so that each merge lands next to the fruit that comes after it.

Why you lose

Nearly always for the same reason: one or two medium fruits stranded on top of the pile with no way to meet their twin, because everything else is underneath them. From that moment the container has less usable space with every drop, and the game closes quickly.

The cure is preventive and it is all in the big-at-the-bottom rule.

Frequently asked questions

What happens when two watermelons touch?

Both vanish and you get a 100-point bonus, on top of the 66 you already earned when each one was born. Two watermelons side by side are not a dead end, then: they are space about to open up.

When exactly does the game end?

When a fruit at rest rises above the dashed line at the top and stays there for a full second. A fruit that is bouncing or falling triggers nothing, and if a merge drops it back down in the meantime the count starts again from zero.

Can I stop and resume later?

Yes. The container is saved on every drop, with the position of every fruit, the score and the next fruit. When you reopen the game you find Game in progress with the score you had reached.

Does my record survive if I change phone?

Yes, if you sign in with your account: the best score is synced and keeps the highest one across your devices. The game in progress, however, stays on the phone where you left it.

More games to try

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