Meowdoku Level 38 Walkthrough: One Butter Tile Starts It All

The Meowdoku Level 38 board

The ten colors are rose, apricot, butter, matcha, mint, soda, periwinkle, lilac, bubblegum, and latte. Butter is the smallest region on the board with one tile at row 3, column 7, ringed almost entirely by matcha. Rose has two tiles at the top, and mint and lilac each have three.

Apricot has seven tiles across the top left, latte has eight along the bottom, soda has eleven down the right edge, and matcha has twelve in the top middle and right. The two enormous regions are bubblegum with twenty-four tiles in the lower right and periwinkle with twenty-nine covering most of the left and center.

When one color takes up nearly a third of the grid, as periwinkle does here, it will almost always be among the last cats placed. That is good news, because it means your attention belongs on butter, rose, mint, and lilac, which is a much smaller board to think about in this cat puzzle game.

The opening move: butter is trapped as a single tile

Your first cat in Meowdoku Level 38 goes on row 3, column 7, because the butter region is exactly that one tile. This is technique T1, the last open tile in a color, and it is forced before you consider anything else on the board.

Placing a cat inside the matcha region has a double effect. It clears row 3 and column 7 for everybody, and it also removes several matcha tiles at once, since most of the tiles next to it are matcha and none of them can hold a cat.

Lilac then drops to a single open tile, so the second cat goes on row 8, column 6. Two cats down in a level of these animal games and the board is already noticeably thinner in the middle.

The key moment: rose reserves row 1 and column 5 empties out

The third cat needs a small deduction. Both rose tiles sit in row 1, so the cat in row 1 has to be the rose cat. That is technique T3, a color locked to one line, and it means nothing else may use row 1. Cross out the apricot tiles at row 1, column 1, row 1, column 4, and row 1, column 5, and the matcha tile at row 1, column 8. Matcha is now down to one option and the third cat lands on row 4, column 9, followed by mint at row 5, column 1.

Rose owning row 1 also removes the soda tile at row 1, column 10, and apricot has meanwhile become confined to row 2, which lets you cross the periwinkle tile at row 2, column 5 and the soda tile at row 2, column 10. Soda is then forced onto row 6, column 10.

Now comes the most interesting step in Meowdoku Level 38. Instead of a color running out of tiles, a line does. After five cats, column 5 has exactly one open tile left, the latte tile at row 10, column 5, so that column must put its cat there. That is technique T2, the last open tile in a row or column. The final twist uses the touching rule, technique T4: row 2, column 2 and row 2, column 3 each sit beside every open rose tile, so both are crossed out, which forces apricot onto row 2, column 4 and then rose onto row 1, column 2. Periwinkle and bubblegum finish the board at row 7, column 3 and row 9, column 8.

Strategy: watch the lines, not only the colors

Most Meowdoku cats are found by watching a color shrink, and it is easy to forget that rows and columns shrink too. Level 38 makes the point plainly: the latte cat is discovered not because latte ran out of options but because column 5 did.

These habits will help you spot the same thing on bigger and harder boards in these free online games.

• After every few cats, scan the rows and columns for one with a single open tile remaining.
• A lone tile sitting inside a larger region is a strong opening move, because it thins two colors at once.
• When a two-tile color shares a row, that row is reserved and every other color leaves it.
• Reuse a line lock more than once; rose owning row 1 supplies crosses for three different colors here.
• Save the huge regions, periwinkle and bubblegum here, for last, and do not waste effort on them early.
• If the sequence breaks down, a hint reveals the next forced cat without risking a fish on a guess.

What is the solution to Meowdoku Level 38?

In solve order, the cats go on row 3, column 7 (butter); row 8, column 6 (lilac); row 4, column 9 (matcha); row 5, column 1 (mint); row 6, column 10 (soda); row 10, column 5 (latte); row 2, column 4 (apricot); row 1, column 2 (rose); row 7, column 3 (periwinkle); and row 9, column 8 (bubblegum).

Where does the first cat go in Meowdoku Level 38?

Place the first cat on row 3, column 7. Butter is a single-tile region there, tucked inside matcha, so the butter cat is forced and it thins out the matcha region at the same time.

How is the latte cat found in Meowdoku Level 38?

It comes from a column rather than a color. After the first five cats, column 5 has only one open tile left, the latte tile at row 10, column 5, so the cat for that column has to go there.

What is the trickiest deduction in Meowdoku Level 38?

The touching rule near the end. The tiles at row 2, column 2 and row 2, column 3 each touch every open rose tile, so neither can hold a cat. Crossing them forces apricot onto row 2, column 4 and rose onto row 1, column 2.

Do I need an account to play Meowdoku?

No. Meowdoku is a free cat puzzle game that plays in your browser with no sign-up, which is part of why it works so well as a quick set of brain games during a break.