Garden of Tiles: handling the obstacle boards without stress

Garden of Tiles stays gentle for a good long while, and then the obstacle tiles show up and ask you to actually think a move or two ahead. It's still relaxing, but a bit of planning goes a long way here.

The locked tiles clear when you make a match adjacent to them, so prioritize matches that touch the obstacles rather than clearing the easy corners first. It feels counterintuitive because those corner matches are tempting.

There's no timer, which is the whole point — use that. Sit and look at the board before you move. I found that the boards that stumped me at first were solvable in two moves once I stopped rushing.

Save your resources for the garden upgrades that speed up growth rather than the decorative ones. Watching the garden fill out faster is what kept me opening the app.