How to play
- Press Start. You get ten shots in a round. The ball waits on the left of the court and the basket is over on the right.
- Drag back from the ball. Press on the ball and pull backwards, the way you would pull back a catapult. Dragging further gives more power, and the angle you pull at sets the angle of the shot.
- Read the dotted line. While you hold, a dotted line shows exactly where the ball is going. Move around until it drops through the hoop, then let go.
- Keep a streak going. Three baskets in a row and the hoop moves further away and a little higher, so the shot you just found has to be adjusted rather than repeated.
Drag back and let go
The ball sits on the left and the hoop is over on the right. Press on the ball, drag backwards, and a dotted line shows the arc your shot will take. The direction you drag sets the angle, the distance sets the power, and letting go fires it. It is the same motion as pulling back a catapult, which means a child works out the controls in about two attempts without anyone explaining them.
A plain court, on purpose
There is nothing behind the ball but a clean court. That is a deliberate choice rather than an unfinished one: the whole skill in this game is reading an arc, and an arc is easy to read against plain space and hard to read against a busy background. Every colour on screen belongs to something that matters, which is the ball, the rim and the line showing where your shot is going.
Arc beats power
Almost every missed shot is too flat rather than too weak. A flat ball arrives at the hoop travelling sideways, so it has to pass through a gap barely wider than itself and clips the front of the rim instead. A high, looping shot drops almost straight down into a target that is suddenly much easier to hit. Aiming higher than feels natural is the single thing that turns a run of near misses into baskets, and it is just as true on a real court.
The hoop keeps moving back
Sink three in a row and the basket moves further away and a little higher. That is what stops the game becoming one shot repeated ten times: the moment you find a pull-back length that works, the target changes and you have to adjust rather than repeat. Adjusting by a small amount from something that nearly worked is a far better habit than guessing from scratch, and the game quietly rewards it.
Every basket is reachable
Wherever the hoop lands, a shot exists that goes in. That is checked rather than assumed: every position the game can produce is run through a solver that searches real angles and powers, and the game will not use a spot unless a shot is found for it. A sports game that occasionally places an impossible target teaches a child that missing is bad luck, when the whole point is that it is feedback.
Frequently asked questions
How do you play the basketball game?
Drag back from the ball and let go, the same way you would pull back a catapult. The direction you drag sets the angle and how far you drag sets the power, and a dotted line shows where the shot is heading before you release. You get ten shots in a round, and the hoop moves further away every time you sink three in a row.
Why did my shot bounce off the rim?
The ball has to drop through the hoop from above, so a shot that arrives too flat clips the front of the rim even when the aim looks right. A higher, slower arc drops more steeply into the basket and is far more forgiving than a fast flat one, which is true on a real court as well.
How do you get a better score?
Aim higher than feels natural. Most missed shots are too flat rather than too weak, because a flat ball has to pass through a narrow gap while a lobbed one drops into a wide one. Find a pull-back length that works from the near position, then adjust it a little at a time as the hoop moves back rather than guessing again from scratch.