Gameplay
Your mouse controls the Paddle. A Ball will be trying to escape off the left edge of the screen. You must intercept this Ball.
When your ball hits the paddle it speeds up.
You can left-click to shoot a bullet. Hitting the ball with a bullet makes it slow down.
All the while, rocks are hurling through space. You'll want to avoid them whilst using your bullets to break them up. If you do hit a rock your paddle will shrink in size, destroy rocks with your bullets in order to increase the length of your paddle.
Eventually, you'll get some powerups including Bombs, which you can fire with a right-click and then another right-click will detonate them destroying everything in its path. Powerups are released by small rocks when shot, so be sure to aim carefully.
Advanced Gameplay Tips
- You can "Auto-fire" by holding the left-mouse button down on the left-side of the screen. This will fire bullets as soon as they're available.
- See if you can stop the B.a.l.l. for extra points.
- If the B.a.l.l. starts going to fast, things may get a little blurry, don't worry just try and slow it down.
- If things get going too fast, you'll be at warp speed, what pretty purple stars
- In the "ShortCircuit" bonus mode things get a little crazy, more aliens, just fire away! You'll be able to collect money this way in order to purchase powerups in the store on the right edge of the screen.
Powerups
Bomb - This powerup can be launched with a right-click and then detonated with another right-click destroying anything in the blast radius. If the B.A.L.L. is caught in the blast, its speed will be halved.
Paddle Length Increase - Increases Paddle Length
Paddle Length Decrease - Decreases Paddle Length
Paddle Shield - Makes you invulnerable to rocks, lasers, and aliens
Psycho - Causes a weird sensation to effect your screen...
Extra Bullet - Increases your maximum number of bullets by one
Alien Call - Calls the Alien to come forth
TriBullet - Causes three bullets to leave your paddle at once
Rock Breaker Shield - Hitting rocks with your paddle will give you points for a limited time
Ball Bouncer Shield - The Ball will be unable to leave the screen for a limited time
Slow Motion Mode - Causes time to slow to a crawl, well for everyone but you...
Warp Speed - You'll be pushed to the envelope of speed for a short time
Orbital Shield - Orbital satellites will protect you from pretty much everything
Wild Ride - Take a surfers outlook on life
Homing Bullets - Will direct your bullets to the closest objects
Rapid Fire - Just hold that mouse button down
Lunchy Munchies - Collect Munchies for extra cash
Repeat Powerup - Boosts the time left of the left-most powerup you currently have obtained
No Fire - Prevents you from firing bullets for a limited time
Phase Bullets - Makes bullets only destroy lasers and rocks in lieu of enemies and powerups
Ball Lock - Prevents the ball from moving for a short time
Free Money - Gives you a small random lump some of cold hard cash
Cannon - One Large Super Strong Bullet
Strong Bullets - Makes your regular bullets stronger
Mirror Madness - Flips screen around
Renegade Rocks - Spawns some more rocks
Tardy Tortoise - Slows the B.A.L.L. down
Rabid Rabbit - Speeds the B.A.L.L. up
Future Sight - Shows line of B.A.L.L. travel
Burned - Causes screen to burn in
Bouncing Bullets - Bullets move more sporadically, bounce, and cause more B.A.L.L. movement
Point Bonuses
- Rock Spliter Bonus - If a rock is split on the left third of the screen and would cause the split pieces to avoid your Paddle (if it were to remain still), you'll get his bonus.
- Rock Destroyer Bonus - If you destroy every bit of a rock that has just been formed
- Lucky - If you kill the Alien before he appears on screen.
- Hungry Hippo - Collect a bunch of Munchies in a row without losing any off screen.
- Out of the Fire - If you survive an Alien's barrage of bullets.
- Close Call - If you manage to hit the ball just before it would have gone off screen.
- Alien Slayer - Kill a few aliens in a row without getting hit by their lasers and you may be able to get this one.
- Dainty Dodger - You'll get this if you manage to dodge enough rocks in a row!
- Crossfire Bonus - When there's a rock coming in between the paddle and the ball and you manage to shot the ball on the other side of the rock just as the rock starts blocking the path you'll receive this bonus.
- And More...
Keyboard Shortcuts
- F - Show Framerate / Debug info
- G - Turn grab mode on or off (prevents mouse from leaving window)
- S - Turn Sound on / off
- M - Turn Music on / off
- I - Iconify (Minimize) Window
- P - Pause Game
- Q - Force Game Over
- F10 - Toggle Fullscreen
- Esc - Go to Title / Quit
To change the defaults for the above options go to the options screen off the main menu.
Trouble Shooting / FAQ
Fullscreen doesn't work / looks weird
While PaddleSpace will work in fullscreen mode on most modern machines, due to it's initial development, it was not meant to be played fullscreen. Due to this fact it uses an non-standard resolution which can cause issues on some machines.
It's so Blurred...
If you don't like the fancy effects that are PaddleSpace's unique visual style, you can disable them in the options menu.
How do I get to the options menu?
The options menu button is the one on the bottom-right on the title screen. Here you can change many options, including online highscores, Mikeware™ introduction, tutorial mode, visual effects level, mouse grab mode, fullscreen, sound, music, and difficulty. Any options changed here will be saved for next time too!
The game's too hard for me, but it seems really fun.
If you're having a little trouble starting out, go into the options menu and change the difficulty to easy. Also, try playing with the tutorial messages on to gain some helpful tips.
How can I compare my Highscores?
If you entered your initials for a previous highscore, it will highlight your scores in blue on the highscore scroll and your current highscore in red.
How do I get rid of a tutorial message?
Hit the Spacebar on your keyboard or click on the 'x' in the upper-right corner. If you mean forever, make sure that tutorial mode always on isn't set in the options menu, or that you're clicking the "Start" button instead of the "Tutorial" button on the title screen.
Do I have to watch the Mikeware™ Intro everytime?
If you don't want to watch the intro every time, you can turn it off in the options menu (except in the demo).
How do I know what powerups I have?
The display on the bottom-left will always show how many bullets you have at your disposal. In addition when you collect bombs they will appear in a similar fashion. Any other powerups are timed and will appear with little timer bars when you collect them.
I'm getting really tired of clicking the left-mouse button all the time...
Have no fear, autofire's here! Just hold down the left-mouse button for about a second, and you'll start automatically firing bullets. It's not quite as good as rapid fire, but it can be useful at times.
How does this Speedometer work?
The speedometer dynamically adjusts its scale whenever you make a great decrease or great increase in speed. This usually occurs at the 1/4 and 3/4 points for the changes respectively.
What does the Speedometer keep track of?
The speedometer keeps track of your current speed in pps (Parsecs Per Second). The blue arrow shows what speed the ball is currently traveling at. The red line shows the boundary of the "Danger Zone". When your speed is in this zone, it means that an Alien friend will come along shortly to help his Ball buddy along, this is usually not a good thing. If the Alien's laser hits the Ball, it will speed up significantly. It's a whole power transfer thing...
Why does this damn *#$!@! Alien keep coming around?
It would help to read the answer to the question above
Why did everything get twice as blurry?
When you start to get going really fast, space just seems to warp... This usually occurs when you reach speeds in excess of 600pps.
Ahhh! The stars changed colors!
This occurs when you're going at maximum speed. You'll also notice your blue arrow "Flatlined" at the bottom. Nothing to worry about otherwise...
Is there a way to watch the game without playing it?
Yep, if you leave the game sitting alone long enough, it'll go into "DEMO MODE" where an AI player will allow you to watch the game being played without doing a thing. Clicking will bring you back to the title screen.
Is there a demo available?
Yep, checkout our download page.
What's in the full version?
Basically the demo is PaddleSpace's 'Easy Mode'. In the full version, they're twice as many powerups and you're not restricted to play only 10 levels. Also, there's the ShortCircuit Bonus Mode which occurs every three levels allowing you to pickup cash to purchase powerups in a handy dandy store. Also, you'll be able to fight the boss at the end of the normal game and after that, the possibilities are endless...
When will the full version be available?
Mikeware™ puts a lot of time, effort, and care into its products. We want to provide you with the best product we can provide. As of now, PaddleSpace is just in the final phases of development. If you've already downloaded the demo, you'll notice that it's quite polished. Currently, the final game mechanics are being tweaked and the game progression is being tested. But in terms of game play features, 99% of everything is all done! As for a general release... Mikeware™ is in the midst of looking for a publisher.
