How to play Fact Garden
The goal
Master each of the 16 categories, from Geography to Pop Culture. A fact is learned once you have answered it right three times, a few days apart. Learn every fact in a category and it is mastered 🌼.
The garden
Each tile is a category. Once you have played one, it shows how much of it you have mastered and, when some facts are ready to come back, a gold to review label. Tap a tile to choose a mode and a difficulty, then Start round. When facts are waiting, the first mode offered is Review: a round of up to ten of those facts, from every difficulty.
Learning a fact
A fact is learned once you have answered it right three times, a few days apart: once, again a day or more later, and again a few days after that. Answering it again sooner still counts as right; it just doesn’t hurry the fact along. When a fact becomes learned, it blooms 🌼.
Miss a fact (or run out of time) and it slips back one step, marked Back for review. One slip never wipes out your progress: its category shows a gold to review label, Review plays just those facts, and answering it right there wins the step back. Learned facts also come back about once a week to stay fresh.
A category’s % mastered grows with every one of those right answers, so it moves from your first round.
Modes
- Study. Up to ten cards with four choices each, all from the difficulty you chose. Facts at that difficulty that are ready to review come first, then new ones. Each card has a timer: 20 seconds on Easy, 15 on Medium, 12 on Hard. Running out counts as a miss and shows the answer. After each card you see the answer and sometimes a fun note; press Next card to go on.
- Match pairs. Cards lie face down: each question has one answer card. Flip two at a time; a question and its answer stay up. Two that don’t match stay up for a moment; your next tap turns them back over before you flip again. Clear the grid in as few moves as you can for up to three stars. Match pairs is for fun and memory: it doesn’t change how well you know a fact.
- Sprint. Sixty seconds of quick cards. Each right answer scores 1 point times your streak: ×2 from five right in a row, ×3 from ten. A miss costs three seconds and ends the streak. Your best score is kept for each category and difficulty.
- Today’s deck (the Daily button). Ten cards from ten categories, the same for everyone, once a day, at Medium with 15 seconds a card. A new deck arrives at your local midnight.
- Mixed draws cards from every category you have started (from all 16 until you have started two).
Difficulty
Wrong choices are always the same kind as the answer: a capital for a capital, a year for a year.
Each fact belongs to one difficulty. Study and Sprint use that difficulty’s facts whenever available. A small tier makes a shorter Study or relaxed Sprint, rather than mixing in easier facts.
- Easy: well-known facts, with well-known wrong choices that are easy to rule out.
- Medium: a step up, sometimes with one wrong choice that’s close enough to make you think twice.
- Hard: the deep cuts, with the hardest wrong choices of the same kind.
Today’s deck mixes easy and medium facts.
In Match pairs, difficulty also sets the grid: 6, 8, or 10 pairs. Match may include other difficulties when needed to fill its grid. If a category has no facts at the chosen difficulty, it uses the available facts.
Match pairs stars
Three stars for clearing the grid within 10 moves (6 pairs), 13 (8 pairs), or 16 (10 pairs). Two stars within 14, 18, or 22.
Relaxed timers
Settings → Play → Timers: Relaxed turns off the clocks in your next round: Study and Today’s deck have no card timer, and Sprint becomes up to 20 cards at your own pace, scored the same way.
Keyboard
In the garden, use the arrow keys and Enter to open a category. On a card, press A–D (or 1–4) to answer, or Tab to a choice and press Enter, then Enter for Next card. In Match pairs, use the arrow keys to move and Enter or Space to flip.
Statistics
A round counts as played when it ends. It counts as a win when you clear a Match grid, get at least 80% right in Study or Review (8 of 10 in a full round), get 7 of 10 right in Today’s deck, or set or tie your best Sprint. Your records are the facts you have learned, your best Sprint, and your fewest Match moves.
Sharing
When a round ends, Share result shows exactly what will be shared: your score, and for Today’s deck a row of 🌼 (right) and 🟫 (missed), never the questions. Copy it, post it, or use your device’s share sheet.
Tips
- Start a category on Easy. New facts come in faster, and Medium and Hard are waiting once the easy ones stick.
- Come back for the gold to review labels. A short Study round on due facts does more for your mastery than a long one on facts you just saw.
- In Match pairs, flip a card you haven’t seen yet first. Then, if you remember its partner’s spot, go straight for it.
Questions
Do I need an account? No. Your game saves on this device automatically. An optional account adds cloud saves across devices.
Where do the facts come from? We write every card ourselves and check each fact against a public reference such as Wikidata. If you spot a mistake, write to support@goldensun.fun.
What if I’m offline? Each category’s cards load when you first play it and stay available during this visit. Offline play after reopening the site is not guaranteed. If a category can’t load, you’ll see Try again; Numbers always works.
