Kalābux — three steampunk paint jars

Kalābux

A steampunk paint-mixing puzzle. Pipe the primary colours together, mix to fill every order, and build your paint works from a single machine to a colour empire.

Get it onGoogle Play Coming soon toApp Store

The Works

From a single machine on day one to a borough-renowned paint works.

Day one. Three vats, one machine, and Old Silas showing you where the pipe goes.
Day one. Three vats, one machine, and Old Silas showing you where the pipe goes.
The morning post arrives sealed — orders, notices, and the occasional inspection.
The morning post arrives sealed — orders, notices, and the occasional inspection.
A working shift: paint routed out of the vats, jars filling on the line.
A working shift: paint routed out of the vats, jars filling on the line.
The maintenance evening — the day's books, your commendations, and the targets you're chasing.
The maintenance evening — the day's books, your commendations, and the targets you're chasing.
A commendation from the trade board, signed by three hands. Old Silas hangs them himself.
A commendation from the trade board, signed by three hands. Old Silas hangs them himself.
The parts counter: buy new, recycle the old, and keep an eye on the clock.
The parts counter: buy new, recycle the old, and keep an eye on the clock.
Day 172 — a works grown from one machine, under the Borough Clock.
Day 172 — a works grown from one machine, under the Borough Clock.
Dense pipework, a full order book, and the clock that says you got there.
Dense pipework, a full order book, and the clock that says you got there.

How It Plays

Simple to grasp, deep to master: red, yellow and blue are all you start with, but route them cleverly and there's no colour you can't brew.

Mix with pipes

Tap to lay brass pipework linking the paint vats to the waiting jars. Join two colours to make a third, split one line to feed several orders at once, and fit it all into the machine's cramped grid. Get it right and the paint flows; get it wrong and you'll be mopping up leaks.

Shades, tints and tones

Research the black and white tanks and the whole trade opens up. A drop of black deepens a colour — dark red, bottle green. A drop of white pales it — pink, sky blue. Both together give a muted tone with the fire taken out. Forty-six colours in all, from three primaries and a steady hand.

Build your business

Fill orders to earn coin, then reinvest it: top up the vats, repair worn seals before they cost you a shift, upgrade your tanks, lorry and warehouse, and fund research into new parts — crow's-foot hubs, skew crosses and more.

A day at the works

The morning post arrives sealed, one letter at a time. Win the council's approval and take out a licence and the works runs a second shift, with Silas taking the floor at two. Come evening it falls quiet: a pot of tea on the shelf, dried splats to scrub off the parts, seals to mend before the whistle goes again.

A helping hand

Stuck on a tricky order? Ask Old Silas. His youth may have left him long ago, but he still knows every routing trick in the book, and he'll walk you through it one step at a time.

Something to work towards

There is a summit to this trade. Run the works well enough for long enough and word reaches the borough: an inspection you cannot fail, a commission from the mayor himself, and — if every jar is right — a ceremony, a certificate in his own hand, and a grand clock raised over your floor to stay there for good.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Kalabux?

Kalabux is a steampunk paint-mixing puzzle game. You pipe the three primary colours — red, yellow and blue — out of tanks and through a grid of pipework; where the streams meet, they mix. Fill each customer's order with the exact colour, jar it, and ship it out on the lorry.

How do you play Kalabux?

You lay and rotate pipe parts to route colour from the tanks, pull the big lever to run the mix, then dispatch the finished jars. Between shifts you maintain the works: buy fresh paint, clean up spilled-paint splats, and repair worn parts and leaking seals.

What platforms will Kalabux be on?

Kalabux is out now on Google Play. The iOS version is with Apple for review and follows shortly.

How much will Kalabux cost?

Kalabux is free to play, funded by optional rewarded ads — watch one for an emergency paint top-up. There are no accounts, and your progress saves on your device.

What colours can you mix?

Red, yellow and blue combine into orange, green, purple and brown, and proportional mixes make in-between shades. A researched black-and-white system adds darker shades, paler tints and muted tones, plus pure black, white and grey.

Is there a story or a guide?

Old Silas, the works foreman, walks you through a hands-on tutorial and chimes in with tips. If you get genuinely stuck on a layout, his pointing finger can work out a route for you.

Who makes Kalabux?

Kalabux is made by Jolly Good Apps, a UK-based independent software studio.