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Powerups

Page history last edited by Steror 6 years, 5 months ago Saved with comment

Powerups

By Dave470003

 

 

What are powerups? 


Powerups are special bonuses that drop from shattered bricks. Powerups are only dropped from regular bricks, they are not dropped by mineral bricks, ferrous congolmerates, steel bricks etc. When caught, they can help (or hinder) your gameplay in various ways. Powerups are very common in each level, and although they all have different effects, there are only 5 out of 25 powerups that really hinder you.

 

Powerups either effect the bricks, the ball or the envelope, and it is important to know which ones affect what, as many powerups tend to cancel each other out. For instance, a [Y] powerup would take the place of a [V] powerup, as they both affect the ball, so you would not end up getting an electrifying ball getting faster towards the top of the screen. But an [A] powerup and a [Y] powerup could take place together, as the [A] powerup affects the envelope, whilst the [Y] powerup affects the ball.

 

 

Types of powerups


There are 25 different types of powerup, each of them beginning with a different letter of the alphabet (except U):

Note: The % chance of getting a powerup per level is estimated

 

  

Attraction

Helpful powerup

Fairly commonly found (10% chance per level [10% c/l])

Affects Envelope

To use: hold down left mouse button (or Ctrl key)

Effect: When activated, the ball is attracted to the envelope. This is negated as soon as the player stops holding the button, or when the envelope runs out of charge.

Useful Situations: If the ball is at the top of the screen, you can hold down the button, and the ball will power through the bricks to get to the envelope. You can also use it to move the ball at sharper angles.

Beware of: The ball does not change direction instantaneously; it swerves around quickly and then goes for the bat. This means that it may not always hit the bricks you want it to. Also, if held down for too long, the ball can lose control when it is repeatedly hitting the bat, and may swerve off and fall off the bottom of the screen.

 

 

 

Boost

Unhelpful powerup

Rarely found (5% c/l)

Affects Bricks

To use: Automatic use

Effect: Increases the armour of the bricks and conglomerates by 1. This means, in effect, that it takes 1 extra hit to break each brick.

Useful Situations: In the case that you want to give your drone(s) more time to convert sentinels and/or collect minerals.

Beware of: This!

 

 

 

Control

Helpful powerup

Commonly found (50% c/l) 

Affects Envelope

To use: Automatically collects the ball; left-click to shoot. [Holding down the mouse button essentially prevents the ball from sticking to the bat]

Effect: Lets the ball stick to the envelope for a short amount of time, so that the player has more power to decide where to aim it at. Unlike other powerups which affect bats, this effect does not have to be recharged.

Useful Situations: Tricky aiming can be simplified by this powerup. Also, more control can be excecuted on fast-moving balls, as these can be easily 'controlled'. The delay before the ball is automatically launched is useful for charging your auto-javelin, or for giving your drones time to dismantle sentinels.  You can also use this powerup as insurance if you have two active drilling balls.  If you catch them on separate parts of your paddle, and launch one by moving it off of the screen, the other will stay on for a full hold cycle (until it would normally be launched on its own).  If you catch and launch the first one again in the same manner, it will reset the cycle, essentially allowing you to hold on to one of the balls until you're no longer able to catch the first one.

Beware of: The ball is launched if you try to push it off the screen while stuck to the envelope, and the ball will eventually get launched without you clicking. Also, a 'halo' ball (obtained by the [H] powerup) never gets stuck to the bat.

 

 

 

Diminuation

Unhelpful powerup

Fairly commonly found (33% c/l)

Affects Envelope

To use: Automatic use

Effect: Very simple: shrinks the bat.

Useful Situations: When there are many bricks that can destroy your envelope in addition to being able to handle its smaller size.

Beware of: Getting this power-up when you would prefer a larger envelope.

 

 

 

Extension

Helpful powerup

Commonly found  (60% c/l) 

Affects Envelope

To use: Automatic use

Effect: Basically, the opposite of [D]; this enlarges the bat.

Useful Situations: Pretty much any situation can be enriched by the help of an [E] powerup.

Beware of: This bigger bat can make it much more difficult to dodge sentinels, nuts, or anything that shoots at you. Also, note that there is a maximum length the bat can be, so after about 3-4 [E] powerups, there is no need to acquire more of them.

 

 

 

Flame

Helpful powerup

Fairly commonly found (33% c/l)

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic use

Effect: This adds '1' to the strength of the ball, allowing the ball to drill through conglomerates and boosted bricks quicker. When used with the Asphalt Ball, it also adds 1 to the number of bricks the ball can hit before beginning to recoil again. Also, some players have notice that the speed of the ball is slightly decreased (this effect is most pronounced on slower computers, as this ball appears to be more processor intensive to display than other balls).

Useful situations: There are many situations when this could be helpful. When you accidentally acquire a [B] powerup, a [F] powerup (in effect) negates the effect. When there are lots of conglomerates to destroy, this can be a valuable time-saver. Also, the effect of the 'boosting' molecule is lessened by this powerup.

Beware of: Acquiring this power-up if your drilling balls are already imbued with another property that is preferred.

Additional Notes: A Flame Capsule can be bought from Merchants.

 

 

 

Glacial

Helpful powerup (usually)

Fairly uncommon (25% c/l)

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic use

Effect: A [G] powerup has the unusual effect of destroying any bricks, but it takes two shots to do so. Any bricks destroyed with this powerup in play will not get their effects.

Useful Situations: Comes in handy when many sentinels, nuts, conglomerates, etc. are around. Also can be quite useful to destroy 'steel' bricks.

Beware of: Destroys minerals, extra-life bricks, mission objects, and other helpful objects without collecting them. Also, these can be very time consuming, annoying, and even unhelpful if you just have a level filled with normal bricks.

Additional Notes: A Glacial Capsule can be bought from Merchants.

If you freeze a molecule brick, the molecule will still be released upon the brick being broken.

Also a common misconception is that regular bricks destroyed by a glacial ball won't drop their power-ups however, that is not true.

 

 

Halo

Helpful powerup

Fairly uncommon (20% c/l)

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic use

Effect: This powerup allows your ball to travel through any brick when hit with your envelope. However, the ball becomes 'solid' again once it touches the top.

Useful Situations: Can be very useful when there are lots of bricks, as the ball has to work its way down through the bricks to the envelope. It can also be used to avoid sentinels that may be lurking at the bottom of the level.

Beware of: This ball can become a hinderance at the end of a level, as when you are aiming the ball to get that last brick, you will find that the ball just passes straight through it. It is often easier just losing a life to get these few bricks. Also, the Halo ball does not stick to a Control'd envelope. According to this page, this is intentional.

Additional Notes: Your ball can easily be trapped. For instance, if there are three steel bricks blocking off a top corner off of a level, your Halo ball could become trapped, with no way of getting out, or even dying. (If the Halo ball gets trapped, you may want to wait for auto-javelins to easily complete the level, one column at a time.) Also remember that Halo ball can act strange sometimes, like mixing powers with another powerup.

 

 

I.gif

Indigestion

Unhelpful powerup

Uncommon (10% c/l)

Affects Bricks

To use: Automatic use

Effect: Creates an extra brick in all empty spaces adjacent to every single brick remaining on the level.

Useful Situations: Early in the level, you may trap the ball at the top of the screen, (if you made a narrow path to the top, and the ball is already there as you catch the [I],) making it destroy many bricks before you need to catch it again. You may also get a useful powerup where the new bricks appear (not likely, though).

 

 

J.gif

Javelin

Helpful powerup

Fairly common (40% c/l)

Affects Envelope

To use: Move with mouse, click mouse button to activate (after a few seconds, if it has not been manually used, it will automatically fire)

Effect: A [J] powerup temporarily enables your envelope to shoot a powerful laser beam once. This beam is sure to destroy everything in its path, however, it will only affect one column of bricks at a time. Therefore, this means that any other Envelope powerup will be kept.

Useful Situations: It destroys everything, so therefore you should aim it at molecules, ferrous conglomerates, sentinels, etc. It will also conviniently provide a small channel for the ball to reach the top of the screen with. Also, whilst it destroys minerals, they are actually added to your overall mineral count.

Beware of: It will go off by itself, if not manually used, so aim it carefully.

Additional Notes: An automatic javelin powerup (called 'auto-javelin') will be obtained when the ball has gone a long time without destroying any normal bricks. The time it takes for the auto-javelin to start to build up (you can see this happening buy the little circle where your cursor is) depends on how many normal bricks you have left in the level. (The smaller the number of bricks, the quicker it starts to build up.) The auto-javelin behaves just like a normal javelin.

 

 

 

Kamikaze

Helpful powerup

Extremely rare (.5% c/l)

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic use

Effect: This powerup is considered by many players to be the most useful powerup in the game. The ball is automatically aimed at any normal bricks, destroying them without requiring any effort from the player.

Useful Situations: When there are lots of normal bricks, or when you have very few lives left, a [K] powerup can come in handy as it destroys the bricks with minimum risk.

Beware of: As the ball is only aimed at normal bricks, it can get trapped if there is a wall of steel bricks. Also, as the ball is slightly out of control, it is possible that it could go off the screen when destroying bricks near the bottom of the level.

Additional Notes: Levels with this powerup are marked on maps.

 

 

 

Laser

Helpful Powerup

Rare (15% c/l)

Affects Envelope

To use: Click the mouse button

Effect: Shoots a laser from each end of the envelope, destroying a brick above it. Cannot destroy steel bricks, deals regular damage to others, e.g. ferrous conglomerates. Needs to charge up and so you cannot fire constantly.

Useful Situations: Whenever the level is not blocked off by many steel bricks.

Beware of: Laser beams will set off sentinels without destroying them. Sometimes it's easy to get distracted by lasering a huge area and consequently forget to catch the ball!

 

 

 

Multiball

Helpful powerup

Very Common (50% c/l)

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic

Effect: This powerup will split all balls on the playing area into two.

Useful Situations: Anything really if you want to get rid of bricks fast.

Beware of: Can be difficult if many balls going very very fast. Also basically useless if collected while the ball is on the way down, as you're bound to lose one in the split. Becomes more helpful the more [E] powerups you have collected. It may also force you to be more aware of other harmful bricks such as sentinels.

 

 

 

New Ball

Helpful powerup

Common (40% c/l)

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic

Effect: This powerup creates one new ball on the envelope, ready for you to use.

Useful Situations: When you have a ball that is going very quickly. It's essentially as good as a safety because the new ball is similar to acquiring a new life.

Beware of: When there are too many balls in addition to bricks such as Kashuats that can harm you.

 

 

 

Opening

Helpful powerup

Rare (15% c/l)

Affects Bricks

To use: Automatic

Effect: This powerup "opens" a gap in the middle of the playing field (effectively pushing the furthest three columns of bricks on the left and right sides of the screen out of play)

Useful Situations: It is usually beneficial to remove up to 6 columns from the level in one powerup, generally reducing the number of bricks left. It's also sometimes possible to trap your ball with this and then use the time to charge up loads of javelins and end the level that way.

Beware of: Any Mineral & '?' bricks/etc that may get pushed off the screen with this, as you will lose them. (Any '?' bricks will only be lost this way will only be gone for the remainder of that play)

 

 

 

Provision

Helpful powerup

Very Rare (1.2% c/l [This is an exact number extracted from the Minemap])

Affects Envelope

To use: Automatic

Effect: Completely refills your missile capacity

Useful Situations: When you're low on missiles. Levels with this powerup are marked on maps for if you are far from a merchant but in need of a missile refill.

Beware of: Not catching the ball if you're too concentrated on the [P] powerup, you may fail the level and not even catch [P]. But if you see it falling and you have lots of missiles, you may as well try and use a few before getting it.

 

 

 

Quasar

Helpful powerup

Rare (15% c/l)

Affects Bricks

To use: Automatic

Effect: This powerup creates a black hole (or a quasar, whatever you want to call it) in the middle of the screen and will "suck" the surrounding bricks into it, destroying them.

Useful Situations: When you have lots of bricks!

Beware of: Do NOT let ? Bricks or Minerals get sucked in, because you will not get the benefits.

Additional Notes: A Quasar Capsule can be bought from Merchants.

 

 

 

Regeneration

Helpful powerup

Rare (10% c/l)

Affects Envelope

To use: Click the mouse button

Effect:  This powerup causes your envelope to generate a new ball each time the red bar goes across the envelope.  Basically, a permanent [N] powerup as long as you don't lose all of your balls.

Useful Situations:  Whenever you could use multiple balls.

A good way to make the most of it, is to only click once, once the red bar is complete. This way the ball stays on the envelope and leaves it automatically when the bar is red again, which is your sign to click again for a new ball. This way you always have a ball attached to the envelope in case you miss the moving one, thus making the R-powerup a perfect life insurance.

Beware of:  The extra balls hitting any sentinels and/or guardians, which will make the level harder.

 

 

 

Safety

Helpful powerup

Rare (15% c/l)

Affects Envelope

To use: Simply grab it.

Effect: Adds an extra life.

Useful Situations: If you don't have many extra lives or have lost almost all of yours on a level, this can help you avoid losing.  If the ball is moving exceptionally fast, it may be worth choosing to grab this powerup and let the ball fall if you are in a situation where you have to choose one or the other.

Beware of: If you have many useful powerups in play (Extensions, ball powerups, etc) It is best to stay on the envelope you're on and don't waste your current life on trying to get the Safety. Otherwise you will lose your powerups.

 

 

 

Transformation

Helpful powerup

Rare (15% c/l)

Affects Envelope

To use: Hold down the mouse button. Only works if there are special bricks on the level.

Effect: Transforms abnormal bricks into regular bricks (Such as conglomerates, metal bricks, etc). Also collects any minerals on the stage, rather than transforming them into regular bricks. (Faded minerals are not 'collected'; rather, they are also transformed into regular bricks)

Useful Situations: If the level you are on has many conglomerates or metal bricks that are a pain, this will take care of them for you.

Beware of: When using transformation, huge beams come out of your envelope and hit the brick. This will block your sight of the ball, so be careful when using it. Do not use on ? bricks either as you will lose the item inside.

 

U Powerup

Currently nonexistent.

 

 

 

Volt

Helpful powerup

Uncommon (25% c/l)

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic

Effect: Your ball becomes yellow and has sparks surrounding it. After the ball has spent enough time near a brick, the brick will be destroyed.

Useful Situations: When you have a lot of sentinels in a level, because a ball imbued with the power of Volt cannot activate sentinels.

Beware of: When there's a death brick () in the level, the ball will be destroyed as soon as the sparks touch the death brick. (The death brick also won't be destroyed!)

Additional Notes: A Volt Capsule can be bought from Merchants. A volt ball will not set off sentinels or other special effect bricks, such as Jumpers. The Jumpers' "health" will be reduced and the triangles will turn red, but the jump effect will not be triggered. A Volt Ball can pass backwards through the one-way bricks and can instantly destroy a regenerator brick - passing straight through it (provided it has been fully electricuted before).

 

 

Whisky

Unhelpful powerup

Rare (10% c/l)

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic

Effect: Your ball becomes yellow-ish and leaves trails of bubbles. Your ball's path wiggles and curves as if it was drunk.

Useful Situations: When you feel like making things more random and possibly fun.  Can also be useful if you're able to grab this powerup when the drilling ball has only a narrow (or no) path back to the paddle, as the unpredictable course of the ball can make it less likely to find its way down without breaking a large number of bricks.  It is, of course, unpredictable, so results are no guaranteed.

Beware of: Unusual turns.

 

 

 

Xanax

Helpful powerup

Somewhat rare (20% c/l)

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic

Effect: Your ball is slowed down.

Useful Situations: When you want the ball to slow down.

Beware of: The change in speed between the drilling balls and any offensive bricks, such as Guardians or Kashuats.

 

 

 

Yoyo

Unhelpful Powerup

Rare (10% c/l) 

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic

Effect: When your ball(s) are near the paddle, they slow down, and the farther away from the paddle they get, the faster they go.

Useful Situations: With a super-fast ball, use [Y] and then if you use a ball-changing capsule or collect a ball-changing power-up when the ball is near your paddle, and then the drilling ball will become slow.

Beware of: Using a pre-bought capsule when the ball is far from your paddle, the ball will become very fast.

 

 

 

Zeal

Unhelpful powerup

Somewhat rare (20% c/l)

Affects Ball

To use: Automatic

Effect: Your ball is sped up.

Useful Situations: When the ball is going infurinatingly slow.

Beware of: Getting this powerup, if the ball is already moving quickly for you, as it will get even faster.

Comments (24)

Nukedoom said

at 3:21 am on May 16, 2008

Maybe we should have a color coding system. Like blue for rare and green for common power ups.

interguy1 said

at 11:53 pm on May 27, 2008

I say alphabetical makes the most sence. Anyone got a pic of the R powerup? I added the section about it, but I don't have a picture. Missing sections: S- Saftey, T- Transformation, V - Volt, W - Whisky, X - Xanax, Y- yo-yo, Z - zeal. Just for refrence for anyone else.

Snakeman said

at 12:32 am on May 30, 2008

Okay, well, I filled in the rest of the powerups. But I never got a few of them, so whoever knows them, fill them in. Then all that remains is pictures and we can all say that this page is complete!

ANS1 said

at 12:38 am on May 30, 2008

I fixed Yoyo, but [U] we probably will never know. There's a thread where people have been speculating what [U] may be.
http://www.alphabounce.com/forum/thread/34258

Fr4nk0 said

at 10:21 am on Jun 4, 2008

I just finished the page by filling in the remaining pictures.

pip31319 said

at 10:39 am on Jun 4, 2008

This page looks pretty good now :) good work everybody lol

Joozey said

at 2:45 am on Jun 10, 2008

Nice work :)

Lavos said

at 9:16 am on Jun 25, 2008

A couple things I've noticed, but don't want to add without confirmation:

-I believe Auto-javelins charge at a speed of exactly one second per remaining normal brick.
-[K] targets any brick, not just normal ones. After striking a brick, it targets a different one, regardless of whether it destroyed its target or if the brick it hit was actually its target in the first place.

If anyone can confirm these, that'd be great. Thanks =)

Joozey said

at 2:36 am on Jun 28, 2008

I'll watch out for it :)

Cort said

at 3:58 am on Aug 14, 2008

I think a Volt ball doesn't have the normal effect when hitting a brick. For example, I think it doesn't trigger Reducines. Anyone got more information than that?

If this is true, I think it's important to add to the powerup description.

Cort said

at 8:50 am on Aug 14, 2008

I just tested it again. Volt balls have in fact no effect on Reducines. No idea how the other Sentinels react.

(Just don't do what I do and free a regular ball with your Volt ball, or you're screwed... ;) )

Hrainian said

at 8:46 am on Sep 14, 2008

Should we talk about Unification from KadoKado here?

JohnAtMC said

at 2:48 am on Jan 16, 2009

I noticed this page seems to be complete, but it is still in the "Pages WIP (work in progress)" section of the FrontPage/Home Page.

JohnAtMC said

at 12:02 am on Mar 23, 2009

I just tried to add a way to scoll to a particular powerup, but it wouldn't save the <a name="letter"></a> codes. ;-(

So, I reverted back to the previous revision. (Now the image for the D won't appear.)

JohnAtMC said

at 7:48 am on May 17, 2009

I just checked this page for the first time since March, & the image for the D appears correctly. :-)

Ashvio said

at 1:58 am on Jul 11, 2009

i just added an approximate % chance per level of getting the powerups. please edit this and improve it if you can =)

JohnAtMC said

at 11:58 am on Jul 11, 2009

I corrected some typos, and improved the wording of the "Beware of" note for Regeneration.

laurentiu_victor2001@... said

at 9:17 am on Aug 22, 2009

am gasit un K la [132][30]

JohnAtMC said

at 5:48 am on Oct 19, 2009

When I started to edit this page just now, a note appeared, (above the editing area,) saying that since this page is larger than 50KB, it recommends splitting the page into 2 pages.

If anyone thinks it would be ok to split it, I'd suggest splitting it into A-M & N-Z, and putting the "What are powerups?" section on both pages.

LayzAyzn said

at 4:18 am on Oct 24, 2009

I think that splitting it like that would not be visually pleasing. Perhaps omitting information such as: color, whether it's a helpful or unhelpful power-up [it should be objective], , and how common it is is unnecessary. The power-ups are mostly distinguished by their name/first-letter.

JohnAtMC said

at 9:59 am on Oct 24, 2009

"I think that splitting it like that would not be visually pleasing."
I agree. I just mentioned it because of the note I mentioned in my last comment.

"Perhaps omitting information such as: color, whether it's a helpful or unhelpful power-up [it should be objective], , and how common it is is unnecessary."
I agree about color, especially because the powerups' images are right above the corresponding name. But, I think we should keep the other parts you mentioned.

LayzAyzn said

at 12:09 am on Oct 27, 2009

Regarding how common it is:
It just seems unnecessary to note as players have no control over it, and they will eventually realize power-ups' rarity on their own.

Regarding helpfulness:
The effect already explains it enough, in my opinion. For example, Glacial says "Helpful powerup (usually)". However, Glacial's description has enough detail to cover that the fact that it is 'usually helpful'.

Steror said

at 6:18 pm on Oct 25, 2010

I've got an idea about creating a new page just for Halo power up. What do you think?

LayzAyzn said

at 7:58 pm on Oct 25, 2010

Seems viable; perhaps leave a short description here and link to it from its section.

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