Timeless
Connect Four
Same board. Same four in a row. But you don't play move 1, then move 2, then move 3 — you fill in any move of the game, in any order you like, and the board sorts itself out as the record fills up.
The core idea, in three beats
Write a move anywhere
Player 1 claims move 30 in column 4. It's the only disc in that column, so its ghost rests on the floor.
How to play
The sheet is the game
You play on a 7 × 42 grid — the notation sheet for a full Connect Four game. Each of the 42 rows is one move of that game: row 1 is the opening move, row 42 is the last. The 7 columns are the 7 columns of the board.
On your turn, fill one square
Click any empty square on the sheet — any move number, any column. Two limits: one disc per row (a move belongs to exactly one player and one column) and six discs per column (a Connect Four column only holds six).
Your disc appears as a ghost
The moment you write a move, a translucent disc appears on the board in that column. Ghosts in a column stack in move order — lowest move number on the bottom. So a ghost is never safe: an opponent who claims an earlier move in the same column slides in underneath and bumps yours up.
Moves lock in from the top
As soon as rows 1 through n are all filled with no gaps, moves 1…n are settled forever. Those discs turn solid and can never be bumped again — anything played afterwards has a higher move number, so it can only stack on top of them.
Four solid discs wins
Four in a row — horizontal, vertical, or diagonal — among locked discs wins the game. Ghost lines don't count; they can still be rearranged. If all 42 moves lock in with no four in a row, it's a draw. However it ends, you'll watch the finished game drop into place move by move.