Skylark Stunt Show

What is Skylark Stunt Show?

It's a stunt jump game built on real jump physics. Your speed at the lip and the angle of the ramp decide the arc, gravity bends it back down, and the way your bike is tilted when the wheels touch decides whether you ride away smiling or tumble across the dirt. There is no auto-pilot and no lane to stay in. One jump takes about fifteen seconds, and a retry is instant.

You ride as Skylark, a showman in a bright jumpsuit, on a tour that starts at a county fair and ends over a desert canyon. The crowd cheers when you land clean and gasps when you don't. Crashes are cartoon tumbles with a dust cloud and a dizzy moment, and Skylark always pops back up and waves.

It's free, it plays in your browser on a phone, tablet or computer, and there's nothing to download.

How to play

• Hold GAS to speed up on the run-up. BRAKE slows you down.
• Watch the strip at the top of the screen. The gap is red, the landing ramp is green and the gold star is the bullseye. The white dot shows where you will land if you let go right now.
• Too slow and you come up short on the obstacles. Too fast and you overshoot the landing ramp and slam into the flat. Keep the dot on the green, ideally on the star, and ride up the ramp.
• In the air the same two pads tilt the bike. GAS leans back and lifts the nose. BRAKE leans forward and drops it.
• Tip the bike to match the slope of the landing ramp and touch down with both wheels together.
• After landing, brake so you stop inside the white box for a bonus. If you don't, the hay bales at the end catch you.

The lean in the air is how real riders do it too: revving the back wheel pushes the nose up, and braking it pulls the nose down. Most jumps need a long, steady lean forward, because you leave the ramp nose high and the landing ramp slopes down.

Controls on phone and computer

If you're left handed you can swap the pads in Settings. The landing guide, the ghost rider, crowd sounds and screen shake can all be switched off there too.

Landings and scoring

Every landing gets a grade. A Perfect needs the bike within about 7 degrees of the ramp's slope with both wheels touching almost at once. Great, Good and Rough follow as the angle gets worse or the hit gets harder. Land more than 45 degrees off, nose first into a bus or still posing for a trick, and it's a crash.

One landed jump earns one star. Each jump also shows two target scores, and beating them earns the second and third stars. A crash scores nothing, but costs nothing either.

Tricks and flips

Hold TRICK in the air and Skylark strikes a pose. Points keep counting for as long as you hold it. Let go and it takes about a third of a second to grab the bars again, so plan your release before the wheels come down. Landing mid-pose is a guaranteed tumble.

Each new hold in the same jump is a fancier trick, and the second and third are worth 1.5 and 2 times as much. The tricks are the Heel Clicker, No Hander, Can-Can, Superman, Cliffhanger and Lazy Boy. You learn one more at each venue on the tour, and the Daily Show lets everyone use all six.

Keep leaning in one direction and the bike will go all the way around. A full flip is worth 300 points if you land it, which is a big if on a short jump.

The tour

The tour has six venues with eight jumps each: Pumpkin County Fair, Sunset Speedway, Seaside Pier, City Rooftops, Neon Palace and the Big Canyon. Each venue opens once you have enough stars (12, 28, 46, 66 and 88), so three-star landings on early jumps are how you move along.

• The fair starts with hay bales, barrels, tractors and pickups.
• The speedway brings rows of buses and the first wind. Flags show its direction, and the landing dot already counts it.
• The pier has gaps over open water and a shark tank. The sharks wear party hats.
• The rooftops send you roof to roof over the street below, with a parachute if you come up short.
• The Neon Palace has the fountain and rings of fire to fly through.
• The Big Canyon ends the tour with gaps up to about 120 feet.

Every tour jump has a ghost: a see-through copy of your best run that rides alongside you, so you can see exactly where you lost time or angle.

Daily Show, Spectacular and Bus Record

The Daily Show is three jumps that are the same for everyone on the same day (it changes at midnight UTC). Rehearse each one as often as you like. When you're ready, go live: you get one shot at each jump, and your live total goes on the daily leaderboard. Only your first live show of the day counts, and a daily streak builds up as you come back. Missing a single day once a week won't break it.

The Spectacular is one big jump each week, a little wilder than the tour. Three stars on it earn that week's stamp for your poster wall and 500 fans.

Bus Record is the old record chase. We start with 6 buses and add one every time you land clean. Faster bikes can go further, so it's a good place to try each new bike.

Bikes, suits and the poster wall

Five bikes unlock as you earn stars: the nimble Sparrow 250 you start on, the steady Thunder Twin (24 stars), the twitchy Comet 500 (54), the soft-landing Ivory Cruiser (84) and the Rocket Special (120). They differ in top speed, how fast they spin in the air and how much a rough landing is forgiven. Every tour jump can be landed for three stars on the Sparrow, so a new bike is a change of feel, not a requirement.

Fans come from your best score on each jump, your live shows and weekly stamps, and they only grow when you do better. More fans fill the stands and unlock suits, from Sunburst at 600 fans to Golden Showman at 15,000. Finishing each venue earns a helmet. The poster wall keeps a show poster for every venue that colors in as you earn its stars, plus pennants for feats like your first flip, a 200 foot jump or a 20 bus record.

Tips and strategy

• Set your speed before the ramp, then let go of the gas. The landing dot assumes you coast up the ramp, so holding gas on the ramp will carry you further than it shows.
• Start leaning forward right after takeoff. A slow, steady lean is easier to stop at the right angle than a late, hard one.
• Aim to be level with the ramp a little before touchdown. The last few degrees are easier to fix early than at the last moment.
• A Perfect landing is worth more than most tricks. On a new jump, land it clean first and add tricks once you know the timing.
• Hold tricks only on the way up and over the top. Let go once you start falling toward the ramp.
• Headwind shortens the jump and tailwind stretches it. Trust the dot, it includes the wind.
• Start braking as soon as both wheels are down. The stop box comes up quickly on long jumps.
• Watch your ghost. If it lands further down the ramp than you do, it carried a little more speed.

Questions