How to play
Move your mouse or finger to slide the paddle. Tap to launch the ball. You have 3 lives.
About Brick Smash
Brick Smash is a brick-breaking game in the classic arcade mould. A wall of forty coloured bricks hangs at the top of the screen, a paddle sits at the bottom, and a ball bounces between the two. Keep the ball in play, knock out every brick and the board is yours.
How to play
Move your mouse or drag your finger left and right to slide the paddle. Before each launch the ball rests above the paddle and follows it, so you can choose where to start from. Tap or click to send it up.
The wall is five rows of eight bricks, each row a different colour. A brick disappears when the ball touches it and adds one point to your score. The ball rebounds off the side walls and the ceiling. If it drops past your paddle you lose one of your three lives and the ball returns to the paddle for another launch. Clear all forty bricks and you win. Run out of lives and it is game over. Either way, a tap sets up a fresh wall.
The paddle is not flat
This is the one thing that separates a good player from a lucky one. The ball does not simply bounce off the paddle like a mirror. Where it lands decides where it goes. A hit in the centre sends it almost straight up. A hit towards the left end sends it off to the left, and the further out it lands, the sharper the angle. The same goes for the right.
That means you can aim. If the last few bricks are over on the right, catch the ball with the right-hand part of the paddle. If the ball has settled into a boring up-and-down pattern that keeps missing everything, take the next one near an edge to shake it loose.
Tips for clearing the wall
Try to open a channel through one side of the wall early. Once the ball gets above the bricks, it rattles around between the top row and the ceiling and clears a lot of bricks without any help from you. It is the most satisfying moment in the game and the quickest way to a high score.
Watch the ball, not the paddle. Your hand knows where the paddle is. Your eyes should be tracking the ball from the moment it turns back downwards, so you have time to get underneath it.
Be careful with extreme angles. A ball sent off very flat takes a long time to climb and zig-zags across the screen, which makes it hard to read when it comes back. Save the sharp shots for when you need them.
The last three or four bricks always take the longest. Be patient, keep the ball alive, and nudge the angle a little with each return until it finds them.
Why it is still fun
Brick breakers have been around since the 1970s for a simple reason: hitting things with a ball feels good, and a wall slowly falling apart is a clear picture of progress. A round of Brick Smash takes a few minutes, has a real ending, and gives you a reason to try again if you finish with thirty-eight.
It runs in the browser on phones, tablets and computers, free and with no download needed.