Parking Jam: free car parking puzzle with 50 levels

How to play Parking Jam

1. Look at the parking lot: every vehicle is parked in a lane and can only leave the lot driving forward, the way its headlights point.
2. Tap a vehicle to drive it forward. A vehicle whose lane is blocked has to wait until the cars ahead of it have left.
3. Drag a vehicle forward or back along its lane to slide it into an empty space. Use this to make room when cars block each other in a loop. Slides are limited to the fewest the lot needs plus three, so plan them.
4. If the lane to the edge of the lot is clear, the vehicle drives onto the road and leaves through an exit gate.
5. If another car, a traffic cone or a fence is in the way, the vehicle bumps into it and rolls back. Every bump costs a star, and the third bump loses the lot, so look before you drive.
6. Watch the clock: every lot has a time limit that starts with your first move. Clear the lot before it runs out.
7. Find the right order and drive every vehicle out. Clear the lot without bumps and without hints for three stars.

The puzzle is all about order. A car facing a wall of other cars may be stuck now, but free in two moves once its neighbours have left. The trickiest ones are the decoys: cars with an empty space behind them that look free, but whose lane ahead is blocked. From level 5 on you will also meet loops: cars that block each other, so that no order of exits works until you slide one of them into an empty space. Every lot has a perfect solution in which each vehicle drives out on the first try, with no bumps at all. You can afford two mistakes; the third bump means the lot stays jammed and you start it again.

Controls

• Touch: tap a vehicle to drive it forward. Press and drag it along its lane to slide it forward or back; it stops at the next obstacle and snaps into a space when you let go. Flick it forward to send it out when its lane is clear.
• Mouse: click a vehicle to drive it forward, or drag it along its lane to slide it.
• Keyboard: the arrow keys pick a vehicle, Enter or Space drives it forward and Shift with an arrow key slides it one space. H shows a hint, R restarts the lot and N opens the next one.
• Phone held sideways: the buttons move to the sides and the lot turns to use the whole screen.

Game modes

Campaign: 50 levels in 5 districts

The campaign starts with a three-car tutorial and grows into big city lots with more than 20 vehicles. The difficulty rises a little with every level, and every ten levels you move to a new district with its own scenery and bigger, busier lots. Levels unlock one by one, and you can replay any of them to improve your stars. If you would rather explore, Settings has an option to unlock every level.

Daily Journey: five lots a day

Each day brings a fresh journey of five lots, from a quick warm-up at stage 1 to a big jam at stage 5. Everybody plays the same lots on the same day, so you can share your stars without spoiling the solution. Complete the journey on consecutive days to keep your streak alive; streaks of 3, 7 and 30 days earn badges.

Classic: endless random lots

Classic mode creates a brand-new lot whenever you want one, in four difficulties:

Vehicles and obstacles

Stars and scoring

The bump counter at the top turns red when you have one bump left. The clock at the top counts down the time left for the lot and turns red in the last 10 seconds. Losing a lot costs nothing but time: tap Try again and the lot starts over with a clean counter. The campaign has 150 stars to collect. Your best time for every level and every difficulty is saved too, and quick chains of exits score combos.

Badges and achievements

There are 25 badges to earn. Some come naturally as you play; others take skill, speed or dedication. Open the trophy button in the game to see your progress towards each one.

Strategy: how to clear any lot without bumps

1. Break loops with a slide. When nothing can leave, look for two cars in each other's way. Slide one of them back or forward into an empty space, just far enough to open the other's lane.
2. Count your slides. You get the fewest slides the lot needs plus three. Before you slide, check that it really opens a lane; a slide that helps nobody is one fewer for later.
3. Look for the free cars first. Any vehicle with an empty lane to the edge of the lot can leave right away. Driving it out never hurts: it only makes room.
4. Watch the headlights, not the gaps. A car with empty space behind it is not free: only the lane in front of its headlights counts. These decoys cause most bumps.
5. Follow the lanes to the edge. Before you tap, trace the lane all the way to the edge of the lot, including fences on that edge and cones in the middle.
6. Work from the outside in. Cars along the edges of the lot usually have the shortest way out. Clearing them opens lanes for the cars in the middle.
7. Free the big vehicles early. A truck or bus that leaves opens three spaces at once, which often unblocks several cars.
8. Find the blocker of the blocker. If car A is stuck behind car B, ask what B needs. Working backwards through the chain shows you the right order.
9. Use the edges of fences. When most of one side is fenced off, the open gaps become the only ways out on that side.
10. Plan first, then drive fast. The clock only starts with your first move, so look over the lot before you touch anything. Once you see the order, keep the cars moving: a bump costs a star and a second or two.

Why every lot can be solved

In Parking Jam a tapped vehicle that cannot get out bumps the obstacle and rolls back to its own bay, a slide can always be slid back, and a vehicle leaving only ever makes room for others. So you can never paint yourself into a corner: if a lot can be cleared at all, it can be cleared from any position you reach. Our level builder checks every lot before you see it with a solver that tries every useful slide, step by step, and drives out every vehicle that can leave after each one. It also works out the smallest number of slides a lot needs. The first levels can be cleared just by finding the right order; from level 5 on, every campaign lot has at least one loop that needs a slide. To make the campaign rise smoothly, the level builder generates several candidate lots for every level, rates each one by the slides it needs, the rounds of blocked cars, the number of vehicles and how few are free at the start, and puts levels 3 to 50 in order of rating, so no level is easier than the one before.

A short history of parking puzzles

Parking puzzles belong to the family of sliding block puzzles, in which pieces can only slide along their own direction. The best-known ancestor is the 15 puzzle, which caused a worldwide craze in 1880. In the 1970s the Japanese puzzle designer Nob Yoshigahara created a traffic version in which cars and trucks slide in a grid to free one red car; it became famous as Rush Hour, sold in the United States from 1996 by ThinkFun (then called Binary Arts). Mobile games later turned the idea around: instead of freeing one car, you have to empty the whole car park. This version, written from scratch for Util.Ninja, adds sliding, cones, fences, five districts, a steadily rising difficulty curve and a daily journey, and it guarantees that every lot can be solved.

Puzzles like this are a pleasant way to practise planning and spatial reasoning: you have to picture lanes, predict what each move frees up and think several steps ahead, all in short sessions that fit a coffee break.

Frequently asked questions