Softmine

About Softmine

Minesweeper, the way it was always played, on a keyboard that is nicer to press than the one you have. The board is a pink case full of cream and blush keycaps; each one goes down with a thock when you tap it and sinks into the case to show its number. A mine you have found gets a cherry blossom.

Four board sizes stand in for the usual beginner-to-expert ladder, all of them tall rather than wide so they fit a phone held in one hand. The first tap always opens a field, numbers count the mines touching that tile, and tapping a number whose mines are all marked opens the rest around it. Pinch to zoom on the big boards.

Win, and a wave rolls out from your last tap and puts a key back on every tile, with blossoms on the mines. Lose, and the keys go down in a wave from the one that went off, showing where the mines were. Either way the board stays in view, so you can see what happened before you go again.

The sound is a mechanical keyboard with soft switches, synthesised in the app — no recordings. Everything stays on the device: best times, settings. There is no account, no sync, no analytics, and no ads.