推箱子

Crate Push: rules and solving techniques

Plan each move and push every crate onto a glowing goal. This guide reflects the controls and win conditions in the current browser build. It is reviewed by the PocketJoy game-testing team and maintained by Long-Term New Media Limited.

How it works

You move around a warehouse pushing every crate onto a glowing target square. Move with the arrow keys, WASD or the on-screen buttons, all three being equivalent. There is only one core rule, and it defines the whole game: crates can be pushed but never pulled. You must stand on the opposite side of a crate to push it forward, once pushed it cannot be brought back, and any mistaken push may be irreversible. You yourself move freely as long as walls and crates do not block the way, but every push deserves consideration. The game records steps, pushes and time — keeping the two counts separate is meaningful — and offers unlimited undo. Levels increase in difficulty and completing one leads automatically to the next.

Tips for clearing levels

Work backwards before you move. For each crate, decide which target it will finish on, then reason backwards about which direction it must be pushed from, and only then work out how to walk yourself into that position. Order matters enormously: pushing one crate into the middle of a corridor early can permanently block another crate's only route, and a crate blocking a crate has no remedy because you cannot pull it aside. Generally, deal with the innermost and most cornered targets first and the ones near the entrance last, so completed crates never sit in the way; fill the target by the door first and you may lose your own route inside. When a crate must travel along a wall, confirm that a target actually lies in that direction, because a crate against a wall can only slide along it and never leaves. There is a practical test for dead positions beyond the obvious corners: watch for parallel-wall corridors, since a crate pushed into a passage between two walls with no target in it can only shuttle back and forth, which is equally fatal.

Common pitfalls

The fatal mistake is pushing a crate into a corner. Once a crate meets two walls it can never move again, and if that corner is not a target the level must be restarted or undone. By the same logic, a crate pushed against a wall can only slide along it, so confirm there is a target on that wall line before committing. The second mistake is ignoring undo and restarting the level after a single error; Crate Push's undo is thorough and unlimited, using it saves a great deal of time, and it also lets you probe safely to see what a push would produce. The third is thinking only about the crates and forgetting your own position: in many layouts the crate's route is clear but you cannot reach the side you need to push from, so planning must cover both paths at once. The fourth is working several crates at the same time so that they block one another; concentrate on one crate at a time unless the level explicitly requires alternating pushes.

Great for

Suited to players who enjoy pure logical planning and do not mind repeated attempts. Crate Push is widely regarded as a hard puzzle genre requiring several moves of foresight, since one error can make a level unsolvable, so it genuinely tests planning. It has a definite place in complexity theory: the generalised problem has been proved PSPACE-complete, which is harder than NP-complete, and that is the mathematical reason some very small-looking levels are extraordinarily demanding. The game was designed by Hiroyuki Imabayashi in Japan in 1981 and published by Thinking Rabbit in 1982, its name meaning warehouse keeper. There is no time pressure and the early levels are gentle enough for learning the rules and building the habit of reasoning backwards.

Highlights

Levels grow progressively harder. The run panel tracks three figures at once — steps, pushes and time — and separating steps from pushes is meaningful, since Crate Push efficiency is measured chiefly in pushes, each of which is an irreversible decision, while your step count reflects the quality of your route planning; only both together evaluate a solution properly. Undo has no limit and can walk all the way back to the start of a level, which matters enormously here because a crate pushed into a corner can never be recovered, and without unlimited undo every error would mean replaying the level. In practice you can use it to probe safely: make a push, see how the position looks, and step back if it is wrong, which turns Crate Push from a game where you must think everything through before daring to move into one where you can think as you go. A restart resets the current level, and completing one shows steps and time before moving on.

Controls and local records

Three inputs are supported: arrow keys, WASD, or the on-screen direction buttons, so phone players can play in full with no external keyboard. You can only push, never pull, and the game judges legality automatically — a direction that cannot be pushed, because a wall or another crate sits behind, simply does not respond, so there is never confusion about whether a push registered. Your own movement is unrestricted along any clear path and does not require tapping cell by cell. Undo is unlimited, making mistakes free to reverse and exploratory pushes safe. Level progress is stored in the browser's local storage on your own device, with no account required and nothing uploaded; clearing browser data removes it. The language button switches between Traditional Chinese and English instantly. Once loaded, the game itself plays offline.

FAQ

Deadlock diagrams live in Crate Push Deadlocks and Backward Planning.

Reviewed by the PocketJoy game-testing team · Operated by Long-Term New Media Limited · hklongtermad@gmail.com