sKion

sKion is the Splice mode of Kinopy. Each word grows into new words that start with its last letters. A new daily puzzle grows every day.

The rule

A word branches to words that start with its last three or more letters. Kinopy highlights the last letters of a word, so you can see where a splice can happen.

Every Kinopy puzzle has two boards that share one seed. The Rootlet grows down from the soil line. The Sapling grows up from it. The seed is the hidden word that starts both boards, and a line of words in the sky hints at it.

A worked example

PICNIC connects to NICKEL and to NICHE. Follow it step by step.

• Look at the end of PICNIC. Its last three letters are NIC.
• Look for a word that starts with NIC. NICKEL does, and so does NICHE.
• Tap the branch between PICNIC and NICKEL to link them. Tap the branch between PICNIC and NICHE to link that pair too.
• Press Submit. A right branch turns green. A wrong branch is cut.

The Sapling

The Sapling uses the same rule as the Rootlet, so you read its tails the same way. It grows up from the same seed, so it asks more of you. It also gives you one guess fewer.

The Sapling unlocks when the Rootlet ends. A loss on the Rootlet never keeps you from the Sapling.

Three tips

• Read the tails. The last three letters of a word show at full strength. A fourth or fifth letter from the end can show faded, because a splice can share more than three letters.
• Start with a word that has a clear tail. A word of three letters or fewer shows no tail. A word at the end of a branch shows no tail, because it has no child. Look at the tails of the words above it to find the splice.
• Use the sky hint. It points at the seed on the soil line. Once you know the seed, work outward one splice at a time. Use your Graft lifeline when you are stuck. You get one per date, and it spends no guess.

Where the name comes from

A scion is a cut shoot from one plant. A gardener grafts it onto the stem of another plant, and the two grow as one. In sKion, each word grafts onto the end of the word before it.

The name sKion is scion with a K in place of the C. Every Kinopy mode name hides the same K.

Play and learn more

Guests play today's daily in every mode. Sign in with Google to play past dailies from the Calendar and to play Endless.

See how the moves work in How to play.

Kinopy is a personal take on Pyralinks by TMBoyz LLC.