Rocket Breaker: a brick breaker game with 60 levels

What is Rocket Breaker?

Rocket Breaker is a free brick breaker game that runs in your browser. You fly a small rocket ship along the bottom of the screen and bounce a glowing ball up into walls of neon bricks. Where the ball lands on your ship decides where it goes next: the middle sends it straight up, the edges send it off at a steep angle, so with a little practice you can aim at the last brick in a corner instead of hoping for a lucky bounce.

The campaign has 60 hand-made levels across six worlds, from the Launch Bay to the Event Horizon of a black hole, and every tenth level is a boss fight. Along the way you meet tough bricks that take several hits, steel plates that never break, explosives that set off chain reactions, rows that drift from side to side, bricks that grow back, and portals that fold the field in two. When the campaign is done there is an endless mode, a new daily stage for everyone each day, leaderboards, and a level editor that turns any level you build into a short code a friend can play.

How to play Rocket Breaker

1. Move your ship with the mouse, by dragging a finger anywhere on the screen, with the left and right arrow keys (or A and D), or with a gamepad's stick. Your finger can stay below the ship, so it never covers the ball.
2. Click, tap or press Space to launch the ball. Bounce it off your ship to break bricks; if every ball falls past your ship you lose a ship, and the round ends when you run out.
3. The ball leaves your ship at an angle set by where it hits: near the centre it goes almost straight up, near the ends it flies off sideways. Use that to aim.
4. Catch the capsules that fall from broken bricks for power-ups. Bricks marked with a ? always drop one.
5. Clear every brick to finish a level (steel doesn't count). Each level gives up to three stars: one for clearing it, one for not losing a ship, and one for beating the par time shown at the top.
6. Press P or Escape, or the pause button, to pause. The game also pauses by itself when you switch tabs.

Rocket Breaker tips and strategy

• Hit the ball with the edge of your ship to send it into gaps and corners, and with the middle when you want it to come straight back.
• Break through to the top of a wall early. A ball bouncing between the ceiling and the back of the bricks clears them fast, and it scores big combos.
• Combos grow while the ball keeps breaking bricks without touching your ship, and every fifth brick in a row raises the multiplier.
• Leave the Narrow capsule (grey, marked N) alone if you can: it shrinks your ship for twelve seconds.
• Fireball burns straight through bricks without bouncing, so it is perfect for tough bricks but can carry the ball deep into a wall. Keep an eye on where it comes out.
• Against bosses, watch for the warnings: a flashing lane or a glowing column means something is about to fall there. A hit only stuns your ship for a moment, but that can cost you the ball.

Six worlds and six bosses

Each world brings new bricks and new music. The Launch Bay teaches the basics, the Lunar Quarry adds drifting rows and three-hit moon rock, the Nebula Gardens bring portals and regrowing bricks, the Ice Rings have four-hit frozen bricks and steel mazes, the Solar Forge is full of explosive chains, and the Event Horizon throws everything at you at once.

The tenth level of every world is a boss: the Gantry Hauler drops bolts as it rolls along its rail, the Crater Crab throws fans of rocks and piles up rubble, the Nebula Jelly fires spores that home in on your ship, the Frost Warden hides behind a spinning ring of ice and calls down icicles, the Forge Titan pours columns of fire, and the Void Eye bends the ball toward itself and slips through space. Beating a boss opens the next world and unlocks a new ship.

Nine power-ups

Multiball splits every ball into three. Lasers fit your ship with twin cannons that fire on their own for ten seconds. Wide stretches your ship, Slow calms the ball down, and Fireball lets it burn through anything that isn't steel. Catch makes the ball stick to your ship so you can line up the next shot, Shield puts a glowing floor under you that bounces the ball back up, and Extra ship gives you another life. Only one capsule is bad news: Narrow shrinks your ship for a while.

Level editor and share codes

The editor gives you the same 13 by 16 grid the campaign levels use, with every kind of brick, portals, two speeds of drifting rows and a mirror switch for symmetric designs. Pick a colour theme and a ball speed, test your level straight away, and save it on your device. Every level becomes a short code that starts with RB1, and the Share button makes a link that opens your level for whoever you send it to. Codes are checked before they load, so a mistyped code never breaks the game.

Endless mode, the daily stage and leaderboards

Endless mode builds stage after stage for as long as you last. The stages get tougher and faster, every fifth one is a boss, the score multiplier climbs, and you earn an extra ship every three stages. The daily stage is the same for every player on the same day (it changes at midnight UTC), and it scores for speed and for the ships you have left, so you can compare with friends. Your best endless score, your best daily score and your total campaign stars go on the Rocket Games leaderboards.

Playing on phones, tablets and computers

Rocket Breaker is built for touch as much as for a mouse: drag anywhere to steer and tap to launch, with a choice of drag speeds in Settings. On a computer the ship follows the mouse exactly, and the keyboard and gamepads work too. Full screen gives the game the whole screen in portrait or landscape, and the graphics quality adjusts itself so the game stays smooth on older phones. Progress, stars and saved levels are kept in your browser.

Rocket Breaker FAQ