Welcome to your guide to Pips, the latest game in the New York Times catalogue.

Released in August 2025, Pips puts a unique spin on dominoes, creating a fun single-player experience that could become your next daily gaming habit.

Currently, if you’re stuck, the game only offers to reveal the entire puzzle, forcing you to move on to the next difficulty level and start over. However, we have you covered! Below are piecemeal answers that will serve as hints so that you can find your way through each difficulty level.

How to play Pips

If you’ve ever played dominoes, you’ll have a passing familiarity with how Pips is played. As we’ve shared in our previous hints stories for Pips, the tiles, like dominoes, are placed vertically or horizontally and connect with each other. The main difference between a traditional game of dominoes and Pips is the color-coded conditions you have to address. The touching tiles don’t necessarily have to match.

The conditions you have to meet are specific to the color-coded spaces. For example, if it provides a single number, every side of a tile in that space must add up to the number provided. It is possible — and common — for only half a tile to be within a color-coded space.

Here are common examples you’ll run into across the difficulty levels:

• Number: All the pips in this space must add up to the number.

• Equal: Every domino half in this space must be the same number of pips.

• Not Equal: Every domino half in this space must have a completely different number of pips.

• Less than: Every domino half in this space must add up to less than the number.

• Greater than: Every domino half in this space must add up to more than the number.

If an area does not have any color coding, it means there are no conditions on the portions of dominoes within those spaces.

Easy difficulty hints, answers for July 3 Pips

Less Than (2): Everything in this space must be less than 2. The answer is 6-1, placed horizontally.

Number (10): Everything in this space must add up to 10. The answer is 6-1, placed horizontally; 4-3, placed vertically.

Less Than (2): Everything in this space must be less than 2. The answer is 1-3, placed vertically.

Number (3): Everything in this space must add up to 3. The answer is 4-3, placed vertically; 0-5, placed horizontally.

Number (10): Everything in this space must add up to 10. The answer is 0-5, placed horizontally; 5-6, placed horizontally.

Greater Than (5): Everything in this space must be greater than 5. The answer is 5-6, placed horizontally.

Medium difficulty hints, answers for July 3 Pips

Number (5): Everything in this space must add up to 5. The answer is 4-5, placed horizontally.

Equal (4): Everything in this space must be equal to 4. The answer is 4-5, placed horizontally; 4-4, placed vertically.

Equal (6): Everything in this space must be equal to 6. The answer is 2-6, placed vertically; 6-6, placed horizontally.

Equal (1): Everything in this space must be equal to 1. The answer is 1-1, placed vertically.

Less Than (2): Everything in this space must be less than 2. The answer is 0-4, placed horizontally.

Equal (4): Everything in this space must be equal to 4. The answer is 0-4, placed horizontally; 4-2, placed vertically.

Number (4): Everything in this space must add up to 4. The answer is 4-3, placed vertically.

Equal (3): Everything in this space must be equal to 3. The answer is 4-3, placed vertically; 3-6, placed horizontally.

Number (8): Everything in this space must add up to 8. The answer is 4-2, placed vertically; 3-6, placed horizontally.

Hard difficulty hints, answers for July 3 Pips

Equal (0): Everything in this space must be equal to 0. The answer is 4-0, placed vertically; 0-6, placed horizontally.

Number (12): Everything in this space must add up to 12. The answer is 0-6, placed horizontally; 6-5, placed horizontally.

Number (10): Everything in this space must add up to 10. The answer is 6-5, placed horizontally; 5-3, placed vertically.

Number (3): Everything in this space must add up to 3. The answer is 5-3, placed vertically.

Number (7): Everything in this space must add up to 7. The answer is 4-5, placed vertically; 2-0, placed horizontally.

Equal (0): Everything in this space must be equal to 0. The answer is 2-0, placed horizontally; 0-2, placed vertically.

Number (2): Everything in this space must add up to 2. The answer is 0-1, placed vertically; 1-5, placed vertically.

Number (5): Everything in this space must add up to 5. The answer is 1-5, placed vertically.

Number (3): Everything in this space must add up to 3. The answer is 3-1, placed horizontally.

Number (1): Everything in this space must add up to 1. The answer is 3-1, placed horizontally.

Number (5): Everything in this space must add up to 5. The answer is 3-4, placed vertically; 2-3, placed horizontally.

Number (6): Everything in this space must add up to 6. The answer is 3-2, placed horizontally; 3-6, placed vertically.

Number (12): Everything in this space must add up to 12. The answer is 3-6, placed vertically; 6-4, placed horizontally.

Number (10): Everything in this space must add up to 10. The answer is 5-5, placed vertically.

Equal (6): Everything in this space must be equal to 6. The answer is 3-4, placed vertically; 6-4, placed horizontally; 4-4, placed vertically.

If you’re looking for more puzzles, Mashable’s got games now! Check out our games hub for Mahjong, Sudoku, free crossword, and more.

By Brian Myers
| Published 1 hour ago

The 1988 film Heathers not only helped launch the careers of three of its stars but also captured the cynicism and black humor that grew to become two of the defining characteristics of Generation X. The film’s dark subject matter is remarkably lightened with Daniel Waters’ script and director Michael Lehmann’s touches, who both worked to produce a movie that was the polar opposite of the more optimistic teen films of the John Landis/John Hughes era.

Mean Girls Before Mean Girls

Heathers follows high school student Veronica Sawyer (Winona Ryder) who inadvertently falls into the popular girl clique at Westerburg High School. The three girls she runs with are snarky, cruel, and from wealthy families, and seem to revel in making life harder for anyone they believe is beneath their station in life. Heather Chandler (Kim Walker), Heather McNamara (Lisanne Falk), and Heather Duke (Shannen Doherty) are collectively known as “The Heathers,” and serve as a group that Veronica strives to separate from.

Enter a new guy J.D. (Christian Slater), who becomes the object of Veronica’s affection. His zany behavior includes firing a gun (loaded with blanks) at bully football players, and a fascination with explosives. He and Veronica quickly bond and concoct a plan for revenge on Heather Chandler after the snobby girl has a falling out with Veronica at a party.

In true black comedy fashion, Heathers has the worst-case scenario come to life multiple times throughout its 103-minute run. J.D. and Veronica end up killing Heather Chandler, setting off a course of events that lead to insane murder plots that culminate into an explosive ending.

Heathers follows the darkest of plotlines but successfully pulls off becoming a comedy with its quirky one-liners and outrageous plot twists. The film itself is the penultimate definition of irony captured on celluloid, as each action taken by J.D. and Veronica have the most unintended consequences imaginable. Though entirely unbelievable, the writing and the characters are able to make the environment and the vibe of the film familiar and leave you wanting a bit more.

Ryder and Slater Knew The Assignment

Heathers gives a great look at Winona Ryder’s jump from little Lydia Deetz (Beetlejuice) into teen comedy and drama roles that would be her mainstay in the years before her co-starring role on Stranger Things. The movie certainly made her a commodity in Hollywood and elevated her to elite status among Gen X audiences.

The same could be said for Christian Slater, who’s J.D. made it possible for the actor to be cast in offbeat comedy films Kuffs and Pump Up the Volume. He and Ryder play off one another without missing a beat and are truly one of the film’s components that shine the brightest.

Heathers proved to be well ahead of its time, but the cult status it quickly earned made filmmakers pay attention to a new subset within teen audiences who wanted so much more out of films than love stories and happy endings. Its legacy is far reaching, as Slackers, Reality Bites, and Jawbreaker would likely not have been made if not for the example set by this underappreciated 1988 film. Heathers gets 4.0/5.0-stars for its acting, hilarious screenwriting, and the overall vibe that Lehmann was able to capture with the project. 

As of this writing, you can stream Heathers for free through Tubi, YouTube, Pluto TV, and Amazon Prime Video.

By Robert Scucci
| Published 1 hour ago

Nature documentaries are incredibly informative if you want to learn how different species interact, feed, and mate in the wild. Taking a page from the National Geographic playbook, The Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human is the ultimate mockumentary about how humans interact with one another while trying to find a romantic suitor. If you’re familiar with Nathan W. Pyle’s Strange Planet comics, you’ll love how the unnamed alien narrator in this movie tries to make sense of human dating rituals through his limited understanding of life on planet Earth.

An Alien’s Explanation Of Human Interaction

Narrated by none other than David Hyde Pierce (Frasier), The Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human is an absolutely hilarious exploration of misguided anthropology. The film is framed as a nature special using humans as its subject of study, and Pierce’s dry delivery gives it a convincing nature documentary vibe. The Narrator’s long-winded attempts at explaining simple concepts, like shaving and phone call etiquette, are detailed to the point of agony and the primary source of humor in this film.

The Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human starts out in a nightclub, and we’re introduced to “The Male,” Billy Waterson (Mackenzie Astin), and “The Female,” Jenny Smith (Carmen Electra). Billy and Jenny immediately hit it off and start dating shortly after their initial exchange. As their romance develops throughout the film, The Narrator attempts to make sense of, and explain to his equally confused audience, the various human interactions he witnesses, highlighting the complexity of modern dating.

The Narrator’s Enthusiasm Will Win You Over

While I think Mackenzie Astin and Carmen Electra deliver flawless performances in this satire, The Narrator’s enthusiasm and curiosity in The Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human is what really got me laughing out loud. For example, when describing how women prefer romance movies and how men like action movies, The Narrator explains, “Human females enjoy stories about one person dying slowly. The males prefer stories of many people dying quickly.”

An equally hilarious observation made by The Narrator in The Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human involves Billy’s use of a computer mouse at his job, which is described as “a toy named after one of the small rodents of his planet.” Extrapolating his observation to the point of absurdity, The Narrator goes on to say that “He presses his fingers against the rodent’s buttocks and gently taps upon its cheeks. Still, he prefers the female of his own species.”

The Narrator’s descriptions range from making sense of human technology to the use of prophylactics, which is acted out by a bunch of actors dressed in white running into a wall to demonstrate how they’re being blocked from the female’s egg after the male and female engage in intercourse.

Fully committing to its bizarre nature documentary premise, The Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human is highly quotable and convincingly points out why and how human dating is such an exhausting ordeal on planet Earth. It’s also worth pointing out that there is some truth behind The Narrator’s assumptions, but his intelligence, coupled with his naivety, adds a layer of ridiculousness to the narrative that makes for a truly unforgettable movie-watching experience.

The Ultimate Anti Rom-Com

The Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human effectively uses satire to poke fun at romantic comedies while being a romantic comedy itself, which is easier said than done. Through its self-awareness, it lampoons every single trope found in the genre without wearing out its welcome. David Hyde Pierce’s ability to play it straight while reading The Narrator’s lines is nothing short of commendable, and I’m going to reasonably assume that he had to work through several takes in the voice-over booth to actually nail his lines without laughing out loud himself.

If you’re looking for a romantic comedy that doesn’t succumb to the usual genre trappings, The Mating Habits of the Earthbound Human comes with strong recommendations. This anthropological analysis of human dating as perceived by an intelligent alien life form can currently be rented or purchased on-demand through Apple TV+, Amazon Prime Video, and Fandango at Home.

THE MATING HABITS OF THE EARTHBOUND HUMAN SCORE