Chris' Puzzle Game

A classic 4×4 sliding tile puzzle game, built with MonoGame for Windows and Linux.

This project is a MonoGame port of Chris' Puzzle Game, originally released for Windows Phone 7 using XNA.
The original XNA project is available at: christianhelle/xnapuzzlegame

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Project Status

✅ Fully Playable — The desktop port is complete and runs on Windows and Linux.

Feature	Status
Main menu with keyboard, mouse & Tab navigation	✅ Working
New game / random puzzle selection	✅ Working
4×4 sliding puzzle gameplay	✅ Working
Arrow keys, WASD, and click-to-move controls	✅ Working
Live preview (hold Enter or F1)	✅ Working
Win screen with time and move count	✅ Working
Play Again / Main Menu flow	✅ Working
In-game options (Esc to pause)	✅ Working
Session persistence (save/restore on exit)	✅ Working
Credits screen	✅ Working
Resizable window with layout scaling	✅ Working

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Build & Run

Prerequisites

• .NET 10 SDK (or later)
• Windows or Linux (uses MonoGame DesktopGL — OpenGL + SDL2)

Build

dotnet build PuzzleGame.slnx

Run

dotnet run --project src/PuzzleGame/PuzzleGame.csproj

The game window opens at 1200×720 by default and is resizable.

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Website

The repository's static site lives under site/ and is deployed to GitHub Pages with .github\workflows\pages.yml.

• Pushes to main that change site/ (or the Pages workflow itself) trigger a deployment.
• You can also run the Pages workflow manually from the Actions tab.
• The committed site\.nojekyll file keeps Pages publishing the static files as-is.

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Controls

Menus

Input	Action
↑ / ↓ / Tab / Mouse Wheel	Navigate menu entries
Enter / Left Click	Select
Esc / Right Click	Back / Exit

Gameplay

Input	Action
Arrow Keys / WASD	Slide tiles
Left Click	Click an adjacent tile to move it
R / F5	Reshuffle the puzzle
Enter / F1 (hold)	Preview the solved image
Esc	Open in-game options

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Gameplay Overview

The goal is to rearrange the scrambled tiles to recreate the original image. One tile is missing—slide adjacent tiles into the empty space until every piece is in its correct position.

When you solve the puzzle, a Congratulations screen shows your completion time and total moves. From there you can play again with a new image or return to the main menu.

Included puzzle images: Chrysanthemum, Desert, Hydrangeas, Jellyfish, Koala, Lighthouse, Penguins, and Tulips.

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Repository Layout

puzzlegame-mono/
├── PuzzleGame.slnx                # Solution file (VS 2022+)
├── site/                          # Static website published with GitHub Pages
└── src/
    └── PuzzleGame/                # Main game project
        ├── Content/               # MonoGame content (images, fonts, puzzles)
        │   ├── Fonts/             # Bundled TTF fonts (Liberation family)
        │   ├── Puzzles/           # Puzzle image assets
        │   └── Content.mgcb       # MonoGame Content Builder manifest
        ├── Gameplay/              # Puzzle board logic
        ├── Persistence/           # Save/load session state
        ├── Screens/               # Menu, gameplay, win, credits screens
        ├── StateManagement/       # Screen manager and input handling
        ├── Program.cs             # Entry point
        └── PuzzleGame.cs          # Game class

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About the Port

This MonoGame version preserves the spirit of the original Windows Phone 7 game while adapting the UI and input handling for desktop play:

• Mouse and keyboard first — menus respond to clicks, wheel scrolling, and Tab navigation.
• Resizable window — layouts scale smoothly across different display sizes.
• Session persistence — the game saves your progress on exit and restores it on next launch.

The original XNA codebase serves as the behavior reference for gameplay parity decisions.

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Author

Christian Resma Helle
christianhelle.com

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License

See the original xnapuzzlegame repository for licensing details.