Baba is You
By: Hempuli / Arvi Trikari
Baba is You is a ridiculously innovative puzzle game where you push words around like blocks and see how they interact with each other. Sadly, it’s not available on iOS yet, but it’s a testament to how much I’m enjoying it that I’m willing to play on my PC. I’ve been recording my playthrough, but I also started making straight walkthrough videos for those who don’t want to watch me figure things out. This page will explain all the different words and rules. Click on the links for the other areas if this isn’t what you’re looking for. If you need help with levels I haven’t added yet, feel free to ask for extra help in the comments section.
I’m still playing through the game, so this is a work in progress. You can ask in the comments section if a word you need help with a word that isn’t here yet.
Words & Rules | Overworld Levels 0 – 10 | The Lake | Solitary Island | Temple Ruins | Forest of Fall | Deep Forest | Rocket Trip | Flower Garden | Volcanic Cavern | Chasm | Review |
Words:
YOU: Something that exists on the board has to be YOU or you fail the level. Examples: BABA IS YOU, WALL IS YOU, LEAF IS YOU, etc.
WIN: Either YOU have to stand on whichever item is WIN or whichever item you are has to also be WIN. This is how you clear a level. Examples: BABA IS YOU and FLAG IS WIN — stand on the flag to win. Or BABA IS YOU AND BABA IS WIN.
PUSH: This means the object can be pushed. Example: If ROCK IS PUSH, you can push rocks.
STOP: This item prevents you from moving yourself or anything else through it. Example: If WALL IS STOP, you can’t go through walls or push any words or other objects through it.
SINK: Touching an item that’s SINK will make both you and it disappear. Examples: WATER IS SINK — If you touch water, you will both disappear. Or if BABA IS SINK, anything you touch will cause both of you to disappear.
DEFEAT: If you touch this item, you disappear. If there was only one of you, you also fail the level. Example: If SKULL IS DEFEAT, then you’ll die when you touch a skull.
HOT & MELT: If something is HOT, then it destroys things that are MELT. Example: If BABA IS MELT and LAVA IS HOT and Baba touches lava, he disappears.
MOVE: This makes an object move on its own in the direction it’s facing. If it hits an obstacle, it will turn around and walk the other way. You can make it move without you by pressing the spacebar (or A on Switch) to wait. Paired with YOU, it makes you do a double-move that allows you to walk over thinks that normally would kill you. Example: If KEKE IS MOVE, then Keke will walk on its own as you move or as you wait.
SHUT & OPEN: If something is SHUT, it will disappear when something that is OPEN touches it, and so will the other object. Usually SHUT comes with STOP, but pay close attention, as SHUT on its own doesn’t stop you. Example: If DOOR IS SHUT and KEY IS OPEN, then pushing the key onto the door will make both the door and key disappear.
RED & BLUE: These just change the color of the object. Example: If ROSE IS RED, the roses will all be red.
FLOAT: Floating objects can interact with each other but not non-floating objects. Text seems to have different behavior only in that non-floating Baba can still interact with floating text and vice versa. Examples: If BABA IS FLOAT, then Baba can float over any objects that aren’t.
WEAK: An object that is WEAK will break/die if it pushes against something that can’t be moved. Example: If BABA IS WEAK and WALL IS STOP, then moving Baba against a wall will destroy Baba.
HAS: This means that when one object is destroyed, it will leave another behind. Example: If BOX HAS KEY, then when the box sinks or melts or is destroyed in some other way, it will drop (or turn into) a key.
TELE: You need two or more of the same object for this to work. If something is TELE, it will teleport another object to the other teleporter. Example: If LOVE IS TELE, and Baba moves onto a heart, he will get teleported to the other heart. It works differently with LOVE IS PUSH and LOVE IS TELE, though. Because then Baba can’t get teleported. Instead, anything he pushes the heart onto will be teleported.
PULL: This is the opposite of PUSH. You can pull the item behind you. If TEXT IS PULL, you can both push and pull the text. Examples: If KEY IS PULL, you can pull the key behind you. If TEXT AND KEY IS PULL, you can pull the text and the key behind you in a long line.
SHIFT: If something is SHIFT, it moves whatever’s on top of it in the direction it’s pointing. Examples: If BELT IS SHIFT and the belt is pointing right, then moving Baba onto the belt will push him to the right of the belt. If BABA IS SHIFT, then Baba can pretty much push anything around, even objects that aren’t PUSH.
NOT: This changes the meaning to the opposite of what it would be otherwise. You can place it in front of rules, too! It’s a crazy word. Experiment with it. Examples: If NOT BABA IS YOU, then you’ll control everything except Baba. If WALL IS NOT STOP, then you can walk through walls. You can also use two NOTs in a row — WALL IS NOT NOT STOP would mean WALL IS STOP.
SWAP: If something is SWAP, it will change places with anything it touches. Example: If BABA IS SWAP, then Baba can’t land on the flag, because he’ll swap with it. He’ll also swap with any text he runs into.
UP, RIGHT, LEFT, DOWN: These make an object face a specific direction. Example: If KEKE IS RIGHT, then all Kekes on the board will face right.
EMPTY: This is a weird word that can work both before and after IS. It basically accounts for all the empty space on the board. Examples: EMPTY IS BABA would turn all the empty space into Babas. DOOR IS EMPTY would turn all the doors into empty space. EMPTY IS YOU would give you control of all the empty space on the board.
FALL: This means that an object is always falling until it hits an obstacle. Anything that is STOP would keep it from dropping further. So will non-floating text. Example: If KEY IS FALL, it will drop down when you push it off a ledge.
MAKE: This allows one object to create another object as it moves. Example: If BABA MAKE FLAG, then as Baba moves around, he’ll leave a flag in his place.
ON: This is usually used to make very specific rules. It means something needs to be on something else to meet a requirement. For example, if KEY ON ROCK IS FLAG, then you need to move the key onto the rock in order to turn it into a flag. It can also change the meaning of a phrase. For example, if you change WATER IS SINK to ROCK ON WATER IS SINK, then water will only sink things when there’s a rock on it. Otherwise it will be safe!
GROUP: Any items that are linked together as a group will have the same properties. Example: If ROCK IS GROUP and KEY IS GROUP and GROUP IS PUSH, then all rocks and keys can be pushed.
FACING: This is a weird one and hard to explain. It means if he object is directly facing something else, something will happen. For example, if BABA IS FACING WALL IS EMPTY, then when Baba walks up to a the space right before a wall, he’ll turn into empty space.
ALL: This is a weird one like EMPTY. You can turn all objects into one object or turn one object into all objects. Oddly, it doesn’t affect empty space from what I can tell, unless EMPTY is part of the rule. Examples: If ALL IS WATER, then any objects on the screen will turn to water. If WATER IS ALL, then any water on the screen will turn into all the other objects at once.
MORE: This multiplies an object each time you move or wait a turn. Example: If ROCK IS MORE, then one rock will push out another rock in every direction, as long as there’s room. This will continue as long as ROCK IS MORE.
WORD: This is perhaps the trippiest word of all. It allows any object to work as a word of that object. Example: If ROCK IS WORD, then (object) rock IS PUSH will act as ROCK IS PUSH.
SLEEP: I’ve only seen this used once so far, but I imagine there will be more uses for it. It just means the object is sleeping in place. You can wake it up by breaking up the rule. Example: If KEKE IS SLEEP, you’ll see him snoring.
LONELY: This has some crazy useS. But it refers to an object that doesn’t share its space with anything else. This includes decorations that don’t have any specific rules applied to them. Example: If LONELY BABA IS YOU, then you have to stay out in the open. If you move onto a tile or grass or anything else, you’ll lose the YOU property.
Other Rules:
X IS X: If there’s a rule of the same word sandwiched around IS, then you can’t change that item into anything else. Example: If BABA IS BABA, then you can’t make BABA IS WALL.
And that’s all for now! I hope it helps! I’ll add more as I encounter them. You can also ask in the comments section if you’re having trouble with a specific word.
Words & Rules | Overworld Levels 0 – 10 | The Lake | Solitary Island | Temple Ruins | Forest of Fall | Deep Forest | Rocket Trip | Flower Garden| Volcanic Cavern | Chasm | Review |
Actually, you can still succeed if object is not you.
In Cavern-2, you can write “Keke is Baba is Keke is You” which will cause you to transform from Keke to Baba and back to Keke with every passing action. When the object is Baba, there is no “You” but you can still make time pass with the arrow keys or waiting.
In theory, you should be able to make it so no object is you, but another object that is already moving will redefine you. I don’t know if any of the puzzles in the game make practical application of this, but it would be super cool.
Not text has different behavior regarding float but stop and push have. If an object is stop or push (and text is push) then it does not matter whether it or you float. Even when floating you can still push or be stopped by objects that are not floating.
DONE: The object or thing that is done just fades into empty. For example, if Keke is done Keke fades into thin air.
P.S. This word appears in the game just once in the final stage to reach the true ending.
Thanks for the LIFESAVING guide!
Just one little edit: if I understand correctly, you meant to say “WORD: This is perhaps the trippiest word of all. It allows any object to work as a word of that object. Example: If ROCK IS WORD, then (object) IS PUSH will act as ROCK IS PUSH.”
Thanks! Fixed.
Why do text words sometimes disappear when I move over them? I can’t figure out the rules for this.
Why do text words sometimes disappear when I have been on top of them? I can’t figure out why this happens or what the rule for it is.