How to play Breakout

Breakout is the timeless brick-busting arcade game, and this version runs right in your browser with nothing to install. A wall of coloured bricks sits at the top of the screen. A ball bounces around below it, and a paddle waits under your control. Your job is simple to describe and wonderfully tricky to master: keep the ball in play and chip away at the wall until every brick is gone.

The goal

Clear all six rows of bricks without running out of lives. You start with three lives, and you lose one each time the ball slips past your paddle and falls off the bottom of the screen. Knock out the last brick and you win the round.

How to play

• The ball starts stuck to the paddle. Launch it to begin — it flies up at an angle.
• Move the paddle left and right to catch the ball and send it back up into the bricks.
• Each brick the ball touches is destroyed and adds to your score.
• Where the ball strikes the paddle changes its angle: hit it near an edge for a sharp shot, hit the centre for a steeper rebound. Use this to aim at stubborn corners.

Controls

On a desktop you can move the paddle with the ← → arrow keys or A / D, and press Space to launch a stuck ball. You can also just move your mouse across the play area and the paddle will follow. On a phone or tablet, drag your finger left and right to steer, and tap the board to launch. Press N any time for a new game.

Scoring and strategy

Bricks in the higher rows are worth more points than the ones near the bottom, so a full clear rewards patience as much as reflexes. Be warned: the ball speeds up a little every time it bounces off the paddle, so a long rally gets faster and faster. Your best score is saved on this device. Try to carve a channel up one side of the wall — once the ball gets trapped above the bricks, it can clear a whole cluster on its own while you simply keep the paddle ready underneath.