Lantern Path Home

A portrait-orientation mobile game UI mockup for a cozy puzzle game called 'Lantern Path Home'. The screen shows a 6×6 grid of rounded square tiles set against a deep navy background, styled like a top-down sleeping village at night. The top-left tile holds a glowing amber lantern and the bottom-right tile shows a warmly lit cottage doorstep. A winding diagonal chain of amber-glowing tiles traces a partial lit path from the lantern toward the cottage, with several dark uncleared tiles blocking the route — one tile near the center has a subtle padlock icon indicating it is locked. Two tiles along the path emit a slightly brighter starburst glow hinting at hidden shortcut nodes. Surrounding tiles show hand-painted textures: cobblestone grey, sage-green garden patches, and cream cottage rooftops. Below the grid, a soft rounded pill reads '6 MOVES LEFT' in bold warm-white text on a dark amber band. The overall feel is warm, intimate, and painterly — like a storybook illustration rendered as a game UI, with gentle vignetting around the screen edges and no harsh outlines.

• Palette: deep slate-navy (#1C2340) for the unlit grid background, warm amber-gold (#F5A623) for the lit path tiles and lantern glow, soft sage-green (#7BAF72) for garden/grass tiles, and cream-white (#FFF8EC) for cottage roof tiles — all muted and slightly desaturated to feel hand-painted and cozy rather than neon.
• Tile shapes should be gently rounded squares (corner radius ~18% of tile width) with a faint embossed border to suggest cobblestone texture; locked tiles use a slate-blue padlock overlay with a subtle cross-hatch pattern to signal 'not yet clearable' without feeling punishing.
• The lit path itself should render as a continuous warm amber glow connecting cleared tiles, using a soft radial bloom effect that bleeds slightly into adjacent dark tiles — evoking a real lantern casting light rather than a clinical line.
• Typography uses a rounded serif or warm slab-serif for chapter titles ('Chapter 2 · Mill Lane') and a clean bold sans-serif for the move counter, reinforcing the cozy-but-legible balance.

• Center the 6×6 village grid in the upper 60% of a portrait phone frame, leaving clear breathing room on all sides so the tile topology reads instantly at a glance.
• Place a glowing amber lantern icon in the top-left grid corner and a warmly lit cottage doorstep icon in the bottom-right, creating a strong diagonal visual tension that communicates the start-to-end goal in under one second.
• Anchor a move-budget pill (e.g., '8 MOVES LEFT') in a soft banner directly below the grid, wide enough to dominate that zone without crowding the tiles above.
• Reserve the bottom 20% of the screen for a single large CTA button labeled 'CLEAR TILE' or a passive chest-progress bar, keeping the action layer visually separated from the puzzle layer.