UFO Puzzle is a sorting game that features match-3 rules. The player's goal is to sort penguins into matching sets to clear grids and earn hammers that help them build items on floating landmasses.
The game breaks up play into three mini-game sub-levels per level. With each one, the player receives a grid of colorful penguins that wear construction hats, pilot caps, bunny ears and other headgear. They also receive seven spaces in a horizontal row below the grid. They must carefully sort the penguins into match-3 sets based on color and hat style.
The player typically needs to move non-matching penguins to the spaces to access matching ones, which can quickly fill up available slots. They lose a mini-game and must restart from the beginning of a level any time they fill all spaces without creating a set. If they finish a level, they receive coins and hammers and then build objects on the islands.
UFO Puzzle presents the player with many challenges, including dull-colored sleeping penguins, hidden penguin snow people, and mystery penguin elevator boxes. The player must use different strategies to reveal matches. For example, they might memorize the colors of sleeping penguins and then calculate the number of moves needed to reach one or more to complete a matching set.
As with other match-3 games, this one has boosters, including a backward arrow that reverses the last move, twisted double arrows that shuffle the penguins, and a magnet that auto-selects a matched set. It also offers a three-tile booster that creates a temporary placement area to free up spaces. The player can buy more boosters with coin winnings or view ads. They can claim additional coins and boosters when they finish renovating and participate in special events.
