Grill Master

Grill Master is a backyard barbecue timing game. The grate has room for eight things at once and every one of them carries its own browning ring: pale at first, then a golden band where a flip earns a perfect sear, then a red stretch where the food turns to charcoal. Turn a patty inside the band and you get bonus sauce and a bigger tip. Miss the band and it lands pale or late. Miss it completely and the whole thing burns, which costs you a strike — and three strikes close the grill.

Where you put the food matters as much as when you turn it. Each grill has coals banked to one side, so the hot zone sears a sausage in seconds while the cool zone lets a corn cob take its time. Guests at the picnic table hand over tickets: a burger wants a patty, a bun and a sauce, a garden plate wants corn and a skewer, a big plate wants rather more than that. Buns come straight from the basket, sauce comes out of the bottle, and the bottle only refills when you nail a flip — so a run where you keep finding the golden band is a run that never stalls.

Rounds takes you through eight of them, from a quiet family lunch to a block party with tickets landing every few seconds and a second grill rolled in beside the first. The sun slides down as the evening rounds start and the lanterns over the table come on. Cook-off is the endless mode with your high score kept in the browser, and Practice drops the tickets entirely so you can learn the ring on its own. It is quick to pick up, quick to restart, and plays with a finger on a phone or with the number keys, Space and Enter on a desktop.