Whack-a-Mole Madness
Smack the moles as they pop up, avoid the bombs and stack the combo multiplier before the clock runs out.
About this game
Whack-a-Mole Madness is forty-five seconds of pure reflex built on a nine-hole board. Moles surface at random, stay up for a little over a second, and duck back down. Tap one and you score; miss and nothing happens except a wasted swing.
Two specials change the maths. Grey bombs surface occasionally and cost you thirty points plus three seconds if you hit them, so restraint matters as much as speed. Golden moles appear about one time in ten and pay 120 points, which is the single biggest reward on the board and worth crossing the whole grid for.
The combo system is the reason to keep a rhythm instead of jabbing randomly. Each consecutive hit multiplies the next score by up to four, so a run of eight clean hits in a row is worth vastly more than eight scattered hits. Hitting a bomb resets the multiplier to zero, which makes bomb discipline the highest-value skill in the game.
The board speeds up continuously: the spawn interval starts at 900 milliseconds and drops by 16 with every mole. By the final ten seconds, holes are popping about twice as fast as at the start.
How to play
- Build a rhythm — consecutive hits multiply your score up to four times.
- Let a bomb go past rather than risk the penalty; a reset combo costs more than the miss.
- Golden moles are worth 120 points: cross the board for them whenever it is safe.
- Scan the whole grid in a Z pattern instead of staring at one hole.
- In the last ten seconds the spawn rate doubles — be ready to tap faster.
Questions
What do bombs do?
Hitting a grey bomb costs 30 points, removes three seconds and resets your combo multiplier.
How long is a round?
Forty-five seconds, with the spawn rate increasing the whole time.
What are golden moles worth?
120 base points — about ten times a normal mole — and they appear roughly one hole in ten.
Does the combo carry between rounds?
No. Each new round starts at a multiplier of one.