TecnoballZ

About the game

TecnoballZ is a brick breaker that TLK Games first made for the Commodore Amiga and later brought to Linux as free software. The basics are the classic ones: keep the ball in play with your paddle and break every brick to finish a level. Around them it builds a lot more.

The 50 levels are spread over five areas, and every few levels a guardian blocks the way: a large enemy that moves around the top of the screen and fires back, and that you beat by hitting it with the ball until its energy runs out. Bricks drop capsules and money as they break, and the money pays for the shop between levels: a longer paddle, fire power, extra balls, stronger or bigger balls, glue, a wall that keeps the balls in play for a while, a robot paddle, ten bricks less to break, extra lives, and paddles on the left, top and right of the table, each lasting three levels. With those you defend the table from four sides at once.

Then there is the Gigablitz, a charged blast fired from the paddle that wipes out the bricks above it, and the tilt, which nudges a ball stuck in a loop. The music, written on an Amiga 500 in 1989, changes from area to area.

Playing it here

This is version 0.93.1 of TecnoballZ, the last release by TLK Games, compiled for the browser from the source code they published. The download is about 5 MB, and your settings, player names and high scores are kept in this browser. The game is in English. A mouse gives the finest control of the paddles, but the keyboard works too.

Controls

Getting started

Options first. In Options you can set the number of players (up to six, taking turns), each player's name, the number of lives and the difficulty: Easy, Hard, Madness or Suicidal.

Start the game. The first level of the first area starts with the ball glued to the paddle; release it with the right button or Space. Break every brick to move on. A level can also end in a guardian fight.

Spend in the shop. Between levels you enter the shop with the money you collected. Point at an item to read what it does and click to buy it; the extra paddles stay for three levels, so plan for them.

Area codes. Area Code, in the main menu, takes a password that starts the game in a later area.

Tips

Collect the money. Money falls from the bricks along with the capsules, and it is what pays for the shop. Moving under it is often worth a small risk.

Watch the capsules. Not every capsule helps: some shrink the paddle or invert the controls. Learn their pictures and let the bad ones fall.

Save the Gigablitz. Its gauge, on the panel at the right, has to fill before it can be fired; keep it for the bricks that are hard to reach.

Use the tilt. When the ball bounces in the same loop for too long, the middle button or Left Alt nudges the table and breaks the pattern.

Score for lives. Every 25,000 points gives a bonus life.