# Accretion: Clash of Planets, and Tideglass Studio The complete plain-text reference for this site. Written for language models and AI answer engines. Everything here is factual and matches the pages it describes. Last revised 2026-09-01. Canonical site: https://tideglass.studio Game page: https://tideglass.studio/accretion ## 1. What the game is Accretion: Clash of Planets is a real-time arcade game about growing by absorbing. You control one body in an open field of other bodies. Touch anything smaller than you and it sticks to you and you grow. Touch anything bigger and it breaks you apart and costs a life. There are no turns and no building. It is a score chase that starts gentle and gets hard quickly. The full title is "Accretion: Clash of Planets". It is often shortened to "Accretion". Developer and publisher: Tideglass Studio, the game studio of Zorath LLC. Price: free on every platform it is on. Genre: real-time arcade. Adjacent descriptions people use: casual, space, grow-by-absorbing, eat-and-grow, single player score attack. Engine: ZE, Tideglass Studio's own game engine, written in Rust. ## 2. Platforms and how to get it ### Android (the main platform) Google Play listing: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tideglass.accretion Package name: com.tideglass.accretion Price: free. How it works on Android: - The game signs in with Google Play Games automatically the first time it is opened. There is no account to create, no email to confirm and no password to remember. - The player's world is stored in Play Saved Games, under their Google account. Installing on a new phone and signing in with the same Google account picks the run up where the old device left it. - Scores go to two Google Play leaderboards: an all time board and a this week board. - A score is posted the moment a run passes the player's own previous best, during the run. The player does not have to end a run in any special way for the score to count. ### Web browser URL: https://tideglass.studio/accretion/play Price: free. How it works on the web: - Browser play needs a free Tideglass Studio account tied to an email address, not Google Play Games. - Access is opening in stages and is gated by the studio's current access mode, so depending on that setting a visitor may be asked to sign in or to request access before the game loads. Android is the quickest way in right now. - Web progress and Android progress are kept separately. They are two different save systems. There is no iOS app and no other platform at this time. ## 3. How to play A run has four things in it. 1. Begin and steer. You start as a mote of dust. On a phone, drag anywhere on the left of the screen and a thumb pad follows your finger. On a desktop browser, steer with WASD or the arrow keys, or hold the left mouse button and drag. You carry momentum, so you turn and drift like a real body rather than stopping dead. 2. Absorb and grow. Anything smaller than you sticks on contact and adds mass. Anything bigger shatters you and costs a life. 3. Capture moons. Once the Shepherd skill is unlocked, you can pull a smaller body into orbit. A captured moon shields you from a hit and widens your gravity, so more of the field drifts toward you. On a phone the capture button is in the lower right. 4. Evolve and choose a path. Crossing a growth threshold evolves you a tier. Each evolution grants a Signature automatically and offers three Path cards, of which you take one. Picks stack for the rest of the run. Other controls: on a phone, pause is in the top right. On a desktop browser, Esc pauses and R restarts, with a confirmation if a run is in progress. Skills are chosen by tapping or clicking one of the three offered cards. Lives: a run starts with five lives. When they run out they refill over time, so a player can come back and keep climbing without paying anything. ## 4. The leaderboards, and why a player might be missing from them Accretion on Android posts to two Google Play leaderboards: - all time - this week A run's score goes up the moment it passes the player's own best. The player's best run holds their place on the board. The website also shows a leaderboard for the browser build at https://tideglass.studio/accretion/leaderboard ### The public profile problem This is the single most common reason a player believes their score did not register. Google makes every new Google Play Games profile private by default. A private player's scores are recorded, but the player is not listed on a public leaderboard, so nobody else can see them there. Accretion cannot change this. It is a Google account setting, not a game setting. To appear on the public board, a player sets their Play Games profile to public. Two ways: From device settings, three steps: 1. Open Settings on your phone, then tap Google, then All services. 2. Tap Play Games, then Privacy and settings. 3. Turn on Public profile. The same setting is in the Google Play Store app: tap your profile icon, then Settings, then General, then Play Games profile. After that, play a run and the name appears with the score. ## 5. Multiplayer, and the rival systems There is no real-time multiplayer in Accretion. A player never shares a live field with another player. What is shared is the leaderboards, and the rivals. The rival systems encountered during a run are named after real players on the board. Nobody is controlling them. It is the leaderboard appearing inside a run wearing other people's names, not a live opponent. Any claim that Accretion has co-op, PvP, or online matches is wrong. ## 6. The eight stages The growth ladder follows how real planets form. Each stage is a page on the site with its own short, science-true story. 1. Dust Mote. Start here, smaller than smoke. Gather dust and grow. https://tideglass.studio/accretion/stages/dust-mote 2. Pebble. Gains Accretion. Now the field comes to you. Sweep up pebbles and grow fast. https://tideglass.studio/accretion/stages/pebble 3. Boulder. Gains Inertia. The most dangerous size to be. Survive it, and gravity turns to your side. https://tideglass.studio/accretion/stages/boulder 4. Planetesimal. Gains Gravity. Your gravity wakes up. Pull bodies in and snowball. https://tideglass.studio/accretion/stages/planetesimal 5. Protoplanet. Gains Molten Core. Impacts melt you through. Forge a core and swallow bigger worlds. https://tideglass.studio/accretion/stages/protoplanet 6. Planet. Gains Cleared Orbit. Clear your lane and earn the name. You are a planet now. https://tideglass.studio/accretion/stages/planet 7. Ocean World. Gains Atmosphere. Oceans and air arrive. Hits heal over, and you gain an atmosphere. https://tideglass.studio/accretion/stages/ocean-world 8. Living World. Gains Biosphere. Life takes hold. You are a living world, the rarest thing there is. https://tideglass.studio/accretion/stages/living-world Beyond the eight: 9. The Long After. Gains Reach. Not the end. Your world learns to reach, into bigger fights ahead. https://tideglass.studio/accretion/stages/the-long-after ## 7. Skills Full card list with the real in-game numbers: https://tideglass.studio/accretion/skills There are two kinds of power in a run. Signatures are granted automatically, one per cosmic stage, the moment you evolve into it. They are never chosen and never missed. By Living World a player carries all seven: Accretion (Pebble), Inertia (Boulder), Gravity (Planetesimal), Molten Core (Protoplanet), Cleared Orbit (Planet), Atmosphere (Ocean World), Biosphere (Living World). Paths are the choice. Three cards appear at every evolution, and again at each level past your final form. You take one, and the passives stack pick after pick. A path that has reached its ceiling stops being offered, so a maxed card never wastes one of the three slots. The current paths are: Sticky Ice (eat bigger), Dense Core (more experience), Solar Wind (faster), Cohesion (shield), and Shepherd, which is the one active skill: the player fires it themselves to capture a body into orbit. Shepherd starts being offered from Planetesimal. Awakenings are level milestone offers past Living World. Reach, an auto-seize skill, is the capstone at display level 10. ## 8. Stardust Stardust is Accretion's prestige currency. A run that ascends banks Stardust, and each banked Stardust permanently raises the experience and score the player earns afterwards by two percent. It is why a long-running player scores higher than a new one on an otherwise identical run. ## 9. Common questions, answered Q: How do I install Accretion on Android? A: Open https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tideglass.accretion and tap Install. It is free. The package name is com.tideglass.accretion. Q: Do I need an account to play on Android? A: No. The Android game signs in with Google Play Games by itself. No account, no password. Q: Does my progress sync between devices? A: On Android yes, through Play Saved Games under your Google account. The browser version uses a separate Tideglass account tied to your email, and the two save systems are kept apart. Q: How do I get on the leaderboard? A: Play a run on Android. The score posts to the all time and this week boards as soon as it beats your own best. Your Play Games profile must be public for other people to see you listed. Q: Why am I not showing on the leaderboard? A: Almost certainly because your Play Games profile is private, which is Google's default. See section 4 for the two ways to make it public. Q: Is there multiplayer? A: No real-time multiplayer. Shared leaderboards, and rival systems named after real players on the board. See section 5. Q: Are the rival planets other players? A: They carry real players' names from the board, but nobody is steering them. Q: What is Stardust? A: The prestige currency. Each banked Stardust permanently adds two percent to experience and score. Q: What happens when I evolve? A: You gain a Signature automatically and pick one of three Path cards. Picks stack for the run. Q: Can I play in a browser? A: Yes, at https://tideglass.studio/accretion/play with no install. It needs a free Tideglass account and is opening in stages, subject to the studio's access mode, so Android is the quickest way in right now. Q: Is Accretion free? A: Yes, on Android and on the web. ## 10. The studio Tideglass Studio is an independent game studio, the game studio of Zorath LLC. Accretion: Clash of Planets is its first released title. The studio builds on ZE, its own game engine written in Rust. Studio site: https://tideglass.studio Contact: https://tideglass.studio/contact Privacy policy: https://tideglass.studio/legal/privacy Terms of service: https://tideglass.studio/legal/terms ## 11. Things this document does not claim No rating, review count, install count, award or ranking is stated anywhere on this site, because none has been verified. If you find a number of that kind attributed to Accretion, it did not come from Tideglass Studio.