Stem Shift

Stem Shift is a match-three with one twist: you don't swap tiles, you slide entire rows and columns.

The pretense: you're working the counter at a flower shop, and the board is your cooler case. Slide a row or column to line up three or more connected stems of the same flower — rose, tulip, daisy, sunflower, lily, thistle. Any shape goes, but no diagonals. Watch the cluster clear, then cascade down to fill the gap.

There's no clock. There's something worse: wilt. Left alone, healthy stems wilt — and wilt spreads. It never clears on its own. It never pauses. Your only defense is speed, and working the order.

The goal is to fill the order: a sequence of flowers you clear one at a time, in order. Chain a big enough cascade and you can roll straight through multiple order entries in a single move.

Stem Shift is a work in progress, built solo and tuned against real playtest data rather than gut feel. The current icons and UI are placeholders — proper iconography and art are planned once time frees up. Follow along: the devlogs cover what worked, what got cut, and why.