You’ve finished your morning Wordle. You breezed through Connections without a single mistake. Now, you’re staring at a grid of dominoes, trying to figure out why the "equal" region isn’t clearing even though you’ve placed two tiles there. Welcome to the world of Pips, the New York Times' foray into pure logic that has a lot of people scratching their heads.
It's basically dominoes, but without the matching-ends rule you learned as a kid. Honestly, it feels more like Sudoku met a jigsaw puzzle in a math lab.
Since Pips hit the NYT Games lineup in mid-2025, it has carved out a weirdly specific niche. It’s for the people who want a break from wordplay but still want to feel smart before their first cup of coffee. But once you finish the daily Hard level, what then? You’re left with a logic-shaped hole in your morning routine.
If you’re searching for games like Pips NYT, you aren't just looking for another tile game. You're looking for that specific "click"—the moment when a set of rigid constraints suddenly collapses into a perfect solution.
Why Pips Isn't Just Another Domino Game
Most people jump into Pips thinking they know how dominoes work. They try to match a 5 with a 5. Then they realize the board doesn’t care about adjacent matching; it only cares about the region rules.
The game uses "pips"—the literal dots on the tiles—to create arithmetic or logical hurdles. Maybe a region needs to sum to exactly 12. Maybe every square in a pink zone must have the same number of pips. It’s a constraint-satisfaction puzzle, and that's why it's so addictive.
The New York Times didn't invent this out of thin air, though. It’s actually a spiritual successor to "Queens," another logic game they’ve experimented with. But while Queens is about avoiding conflict (don't put two queens in the same row), Pips is about forced harmony. You’re fitting a limited set of dominoes into a space where every single dot has to justify its existence.
The Best Games Like Pips NYT to Play Right Now
If you’ve run out of daily puzzles, there are a handful of titles that scratch the exact same itch. Some are word-based, but most lean into that spatial, "if-this-then-that" energy.
1. Stitches (The Closest Relative)
If you haven't heard of Stitches, you're missing out on the closest thing to a Pips clone. In Stitches, you connect neighboring cells with—you guessed it—stitches. Each cell has a number telling you how many stitches must enter or leave it.
Like Pips, it’s all about the constraints. You might think a stitch goes one way, but then you realize it would break the rule of the neighboring cell. It’s a constant dance of "I know this must be true, which means that must be false."
2. Tile Trials (For the Steam Crowd)
For those who want something more robust than a browser game, Tile Trials is a newer indie gem on Steam. It takes the "placing shapes on a grid with rules" concept and adds a bit of a high-score chase. It’s less about a single daily puzzle and more about seeing how far your logic can carry you before the board gets too crowded.
3. Puzzmo’s Logic Suite
Puzzmo is basically the indie darling of the puzzle world right now. They have a game called Typeshift which is word-based, but their actual logic offerings—like Flit—require that same spatial reasoning you use in Pips.
The vibe there is much more modern. It doesn't feel like a legacy newspaper puzzle; it feels like something designed by people who grew up on The Witness and Portal.
4. Sudoku (The OG Logic King)
It’s the obvious answer, but it’s true. Pips is essentially Sudoku with dominoes. If you like the "sum" regions in Pips, you should specifically look for Killer Sudoku.
In Killer Sudoku, you have the standard 1–9 grid, but there are also "cages" (dashed lines) that give you a target sum for the numbers inside. It’s the exact same mental muscle as calculating pips in a region.
The Secret Strategy: How to Solve These Puzzles Faster
Most players start by dragging tiles onto the board randomly. Don’t do that. You’ll just end up frustrated.
Expert players look for the "toeholds." These are the regions that can only be solved one way. If a region has a single square and the rule is "< 1," you know that square is a 0 (blank). Period.
Watch for the overlaps. When a square belongs to two different regions, it’s the most valuable piece of real estate on the board. If one region says the square must be even and the other says it must be greater than 4, your options for that square are suddenly just 6.
Also, think about the "inventory." In Pips, you have a fixed set of dominoes. If you need a "6" for a sum region but you've already used all your tiles that have a 6 on them, you know you’ve made a mistake somewhere else.
Where to Find Unlimited Pips
The NYT only gives you three puzzles a day: Easy, Medium, and Hard. For the truly obsessed, that’s about five minutes of gameplay.
There’s a fan-made site called pipsgame.io that offers an unlimited version. It’s not officially affiliated with the Times, and the puzzles are procedurally generated, but it’s the best way to practice your tile placement without waiting for the midnight reset.
Just a heads up: procedural puzzles can sometimes be a bit "clunky" compared to the handcrafted ones from the NYT editors, but they’re great for training your brain to see patterns.
Beyond the Grid: Why We’re Obsessed with Daily Puzzles
There’s something deeply satisfying about a game that has a definitive "done" state. In a world of infinite scrolling and endless to-do lists, Pips gives you a small, manageable problem that you can actually solve.
It’s not just about the numbers. It’s about the tactile feel of the tiles "snapping" into place. It’s about that little jingle or "you did it!" message at the end.
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Whether you're playing Stitches, Killer Sudoku, or just waiting for tomorrow's NYT drop, these games satisfy a basic human need for order. We take a mess of random dots and turn them into a solved board. It’s a small win, but sometimes that’s all you need to start the day.
Actionable Next Steps:
- Try "Killer Sudoku": If you enjoy the math side of Pips, download a Sudoku app specifically with "Killer" variants to practice mental sums.
- Master the "Inventory" Check: Next time you play Pips, count your available 6s and 5s before placing any tiles; it prevents mid-game dead ends.
- Explore Puzzmo: If you’re bored with the NYT interface, head to Puzzmo to see how modern designers are reinventing the daily puzzle.