How to play Brick Breaker

What brick breaker is

Brick breaker is an arcade game of a paddle, a ball and a wall of bricks. The ball bounces off the side walls and the top; you slide the paddle along the bottom to keep it in play and send it back up. Every brick the ball touches breaks, and a level is cleared when no breakable brick is left. Miss the ball and it is lost. The genre began in arcades in the mid-1970s and has grown power-ups, special bricks and bosses since.

Playing Brick Breaker on AllFun

AllFun Brick Breaker has 100 levels in five worlds, from Glow Garden to Comet Foundry, and most levels are pictures made of bricks, such as a heart or a lighthouse. Drag anywhere low on the screen to move the paddle; it follows your finger's movement, so your finger never hides it. Tap to launch. On a computer the paddle follows the mouse, or use the left and right arrows and Space.

New ideas arrive along the way: a Charge shot from level 6, colour Prisms from level 21, warp gates from level 31 and sliding bricks from level 41. Every tenth level is a boss. Endless keeps lowering new rows until they reach the line. More arcade classics are on our arcade games page.

The rules

The paddle sets the angle

Where the ball meets the paddle decides where it goes. A hit near the centre sends it almost straight up; a hit near either end sends it out at a sharp angle towards that side. That is the only steering you have, so the paddle's position matters more than its speed.

Balls and the end of a level

You start with three balls. A ball that falls past the paddle is lost, and when the last one goes the level ends. Clear every breakable brick to win.

Kinds of brick

• Plain bricks break in one hit.
• Gems crack first and take two or three hits.
• Steel never breaks; you bounce the ball around it.
• Bombs blast the bricks next to them.

Power-ups and traps

Broken bricks drop crystals that you catch with the paddle. On AllFun they are Split (each ball becomes three), Stretch, Laser, Glue, Slow-mo, Blaze and Heart, an extra ball. Spiky red crystals are traps that shrink the paddle or speed the ball up: let those fall.

Stars

Clearing a level earns one star, keeping all three balls another, and beating the level's target time the third. The clock runs only while a ball is in play.

Six tips to clear a level

1. Get the ball above the bricks. Open a gap at one side, then send the ball through with the end of the paddle. Above the wall it bounces between the bricks and the top, breaking many at once.
2. Stay under the ball. Move early to where the ball will land, then make a small adjustment to choose the angle. Late lunges send it anywhere.
3. Use the ends for the last bricks. A lone brick in a corner needs a sharp angle; aim with the end of the paddle, not the centre.
4. Charge for steel and bosses. Hold the paddle still while the ball is in the air until it glows gold, and the next hit smashes straight through three bricks.
5. Split early. Three balls clear a full wall fast, but they are hard to keep alive when only two bricks are left.
6. Ignore the traps. A crystal is never worth losing the ball for. Keep your eyes on the ball first, the falling crystals second.

Brick breaker FAQ