How to play Clatterfall

What is Clatterfall?

Knockdown games are about weight and timing. You pull back, let fly, and watch a stack of planks, glass panes and stone blocks fall the way real things fall. A good shot doesn't have to hit the target. It hits the right support and lets gravity do the rest.

We wrote our own physics for Clatterfall, so every block has real weight, friction and a breaking point. Wood splinters, glass shatters, stone cracks slowly and fizz kegs go off and set off their neighbors. When a lot breaks at once the world slows down for a moment so you can watch it all come down. It's free and plays in your browser on phone, tablet or computer, with no download.

How to play

• Press on the launcher and drag back. The further you pull, the harder the shot. A dotted line shows the first stretch of the flight.
• Let go to fire. Drag the sky instead of the launcher to look around, or press the eye button to see the towers.
• Pick your next shot from the tray at the bottom. You can fire them in any order.
• Pop every Mope on the level to clear it. They pop when something hits them hard enough: your shot, a falling beam, a rolling log or a blast.
• If you run out of shots with Mopes still sitting there, just try again. There are no lives and nothing to wait for.

Each Mope you pop brings a little color back to the sky, and the flowers along the ground open as you go. The last pop brings the sun out.

Stars and points

Stars are about shots. The tag at the top of the screen tells you how many shots three stars needs on that level.

Points come from what you break and pop, and every shot you didn't need adds 10,000 at the end.

We check every level with a solver that plays it shot by shot, and each one can be cleared with at least one shot to spare.

Shots and their tricks

Some shots have a trick. Tap anywhere on the screen while the shot is in the air to use it, once per shot.

• Pebble: a plain river stone. Reliable and easy to read.
• Acorn Trio: tap to split into three acorns that fan out a little. Great against glass and wide towers.
• Iron Bell: heavy, and more than twice as strong against stone. Tap to slam it straight down onto whatever is below.
• Bounce Plum: very springy. It bounces off walls and the ground and keeps going into the next tower.
• Pepper Pod: tap to burst with a hot puff that pushes everything nearby and sets off fizz kegs.
• Zip Seed: tap to zip forward in a straight line at high speed. It slices through glass, ice and wood.

The eight valleys

There are 25 levels in each valley. The difficulty rises in waves, with an easier level every fifth one, and the last level of each valley is a keep where a Grand Mope in a gold crown lives.

• Meadowbrook (levels 1 to 25): the Willow Sling, pebbles, wood and a little glass. Acorns arrive at level 15.
• Kettle Quay (26 to 50): the Kettle Cannon, more glass and the first fizz kegs.
• Bellfoundry Hills (51 to 75): the Seesaw Flinger, stone towers and the Iron Bell.
• Plumtree Orchard (76 to 100): Bounce Plums and rolling logs.
• Pepperpot Mesa (101 to 125): the Bellows Puffer, Pepper Pods and lots of kegs.
• Zephyr Heights (126 to 150): you fire from a Balloon Basket, the wind bends every shot and Zip Seeds arrive.
• Frostfen (151 to 175): slippery ice blocks that slide off each other.
• Thunderhead Keep (176 to 200): every shot and every material together.

Mopes come in a few kinds. Big Mopes and Mopes wearing a cooking pot take a harder hit, sleepy ones snooze through it all until they pop, and a few levels hide a small golden Mope.

The village, the album and helpers

New stars, daily goals and the Daily Topple give sunbeams. Spend them in the village of Clatterfall to rebuild eight landmarks, from the windmill and the bell tower to the skating pond and the festival stage. Each one comes back in three steps, and every step gives you a helper.

Pop a golden Mope to keep the little treasure it carries. The album holds every keepsake, every kind of Mope you have met and a card for each shot and launcher.

There are three helpers, all earned in play and never sold: the Spyglass shows the whole flight path for one level, a Spare Shot adds a pebble, and Rumble shakes the ground once. You get them from daily goals, every 30 stars, your first clear of the day and the village.

Daily Topple and leaderboards

The Daily Topple is one new level a day, the same for everyone on the same day (it changes at midnight UTC), with the same shots in the same tray. Our physics is fully repeatable, so the same shot does exactly the same thing on every phone and computer. That keeps the board fair.

Your first run of the day counts. Look around before your first shot. After that you can practice it as often as you like. Helpers are off in the Daily so everyone plays with the same tools. If you close the page mid-run, your run picks up where you left it.

There are two boards: Daily for the Daily Topple score and Stars for your total stars across all 200 levels.

Controls

• Phone and tablet: press on the launcher and drag back, let go to fire, tap anywhere for the trick. Drag the sky to look around.
• Mouse: the same, with click and drag.
• Keyboard: Up and Down set the angle, Left and Right set the power (hold Shift for fine steps), Space or Enter fires and then uses the trick, 1 to 6 pick a shot, L looks at the towers and Esc pauses.

Settings can turn off the slow motion and the screen shake. Your progress saves on your device, and in your account when you sign in.

Tips and strategy

• Aim for the legs. A thin post near the bottom of a tower is worth more than the roof.
• Look at what will fall on a Mope, not just at the Mope. A beam dropping from above pops it as well as any shot.
• Glass is weak, so a glass wall in front of a Mope is a door, not a shield.
• Save the Iron Bell for stone. Against glass it is wasted weight.
• Fizz kegs set each other off. One keg next to another can clear half the level.
• Split acorns a little before they reach the tower, not on top of it, so the three spread across it.
• In the wind, check which way the dotted line bends before you trust a familiar angle.
• Your last shot's path stays on screen as faint dots. Nudge from there instead of starting over.

Questions