Why a ladybug?

Most brick-breaker games are about smashing a wall. When we sat down to make one, the question we kept asking was what’s behind the wall. That settled it. The bricks became garden hedges, and some of them have a critter stuck inside. Break the hedge open and a frog, a hedgehog or a snail hops out and heads off home.

The ball is a ladybug because it’s the friendliest bug in any garden, and the paddle is a big leaf for it to land on. If you’ve played our Minesweeper Rescue, you’ll know these critters. Same gang, new garden. You never have to catch them. Setting them free is the reward.

A bit of real brick-breaker history

The brick-breaker started at Atari with an arcade game called Breakout, released in 1976. Nolan Bushnell and Steve Bristow came up with the idea. They took Atari’s own Pong, made it a game for one player, and swapped the other player’s paddle for rows of bricks.

Atari offered a bonus for a design that used as few chips as possible. Steve Jobs, then a technician at Atari, took the job and brought in his friend Steve Wozniak, who had a day job at Hewlett-Packard. Wozniak built the prototype in four nights, using fewer than 50 chips. It was packed so tightly that Atari couldn’t make it in a factory, so its engineers redid the game with about 100 chips. Wozniak later said, “A lot of features of the Apple II went in because I had designed Breakout for Atari.”

In 1986, Taito released Arkanoid in Japanese arcades. The paddle became a little craft called the Vaus, and some bricks dropped capsules you could catch for power-ups, like a longer paddle or extra balls. Our game borrows the idea of something coming out of a brick, but nothing falls for you to catch. The critters hop away on their own.

What’s in the garden

• Hedge: light green. One bounce clears it.
• Thick hedge: dark green with little pink flowers. It takes two bounces.
• Critter hedge: you can see who’s hiding inside. Clear it and the critter hops out.
• Stone: grey and solid. It never breaks, so bounce around it.

How to play

• Drag anywhere on the garden, move your mouse, or use the arrow keys (or A and D) to slide the leaf.
• Tap, click or press Space to launch the ladybug.
• Where the ladybug lands on the leaf decides where it goes next. The middle sends it straight up. The ends send it off at an angle.
• Clear every hedge to finish the level. Stones can stay.
• You get 3 hearts per level. If the ladybug drops past the leaf, you lose one and the ladybug comes back to the leaf.
• There are 30 levels in 3 gardens. Finish with all 3 hearts for 3 stars. Levels unlock in order, and your stars save on this device.
• Sound is on to start. Tap 🔊 to mute, or 🎵 for music.

Tips

Use the ends of the leaf. A hit near the tip sends the ladybug off at a low angle toward the side. That’s how you reach the hedges in the corners.

Get behind the wall. Open a gap in the bottom row and aim the ladybug through it. Once it’s up top, it bounces between the hedges and the sky and clears a lot on its own.

Watch the ladybug, not the leaf. Your hand will follow your eyes. Look at where the ladybug is going to come down and get there early.

A lost heart slows things down. The ladybug speeds up a little every time it lands on the leaf. Lose a heart and it goes back to its starting speed, so take a breath before you launch again.

Your turn

The garden is at the top of this page, and there’s a frog waiting in the first hedge. Scroll up, slide the leaf, and play.