Cookies Match 3

This one is built around a hard constraint: ten moves per level. The level names which cookies it wants and how many, and you have ten swaps to deliver them. That is a short leash, and it changes how the board reads — a match that clears five of the wrong cookie is not progress, it is a move gone.

Every level shuffles the mix. The kinds of cookie on the board change, so does the count you are asked for, and a board that looks generous can be the one where the cookie you need appears three times. The right first move is usually the one that pulls your target cookies closer together rather than the one that scores biggest.

Because a level is over in a couple of minutes either way, restarting costs you almost nothing. That makes it an unusually good game for short breaks: you can lose, see why, and win the same level on the next try without having invested an evening in it.

1. Read which cookies the level wants and how many before touching the board.
2. Swap two neighbouring cookies to line up three or more of the same kind and clear them.
3. Count in tens — you get ten moves, so plan roughly two moves per cookie the goal asks for.
4. If the first three moves have not touched the goal, restart rather than play the level out.

Ignore the biggest cluster on the board unless it is the cookie the level named. On a ten-move limit, matching the wrong thing efficiently is still the fastest way to lose.