Snowball Roll is an original browser platform game. The field is three stone ledges under a night sky with gaps between them, and foes patrol along them — all three of level one's are down on the floor, and only the busier levels spread them onto the ledges above. Your weapon is snow: each hit adds a layer of frost, and a foe packed in three layers turns on the spot into a snowball a size bigger than it was. The ball does not move on its own — you shove it by walking into it, and from then on it rolls straight ahead, flattening every foe it touches and relaying off any resting ball it meets, chain unbroken. So the real decision is never “how fast can I shoot” but “can I wait for one more”: clearing foes one at a time pays a fraction of what one well-timed ball does, and the gap between the two runs to ten times the score. Walking away half-done has a price, too — frost melts back layer by layer, and a foe that loses the last one turns furious and faster. Stall long enough and the storm picks up, then a single chaser that ignores the terrain comes to herd you into a corner; a snowball shoves it away for a while but can never kill it. Clearing the level means clearing every foe — and freezing the whole field does not count, because the ball has to actually be pushed and finished.

Home from school, bag on the floor, the television still warming up — and then a screen full of stone ledges in the dark. The fun of these games was never about shooting fast. It was about arguing with the kid at the next desk over which one to freeze first: he wanted to spray whatever he saw, you wanted to wait until two of them lined up. And when the ball finally went out and a whole row went over one after another, nobody said anything at all. The next morning you were still drawing those three ledges on the back of a notebook, marking where the gaps were and which end to push from.

Browse all 平台跳跃 games →

【机】 Living-room console · 1985–1997 →

1. 01

   Tap the playfield to start — no sign-up, no download. On a phone your left thumb drags the band at the bottom to walk and your right thumb holds the snow key; on a desktop use the left and right arrows or A and D, and Space or J for snow.

2. 02

   Snow fires while you hold it, so there is nothing to tap repeatedly. Three hits pack a foe full of frost and it becomes a snowball on the spot — a size bigger than a foe and the only white square on the field.

3. 03

   Pushing has no button: hold the direction that points at the ball and walk into it. Stand against it without holding a direction and the ball will not budge, and an arrow floats above it showing which way it would go.

4. 04

   Once shoved, the ball rolls on, flattening every foe it reaches with the score doubling step by step, and relaying off any resting ball it meets so the chain carries on. It bounces off walls and shatters once it has bounced enough.

5. 05

   Release the jump key early to jump lower — that is how you cross a gap or change layers. Esc or P pauses and the field really does freeze; the scheme, sound, reduce-flashing and rules keys sit on the gauge bar and are one tap away at any time.

Do not rush the first ball out: one more foe in the row the same ball can reach doubles what that ball is worth. On level one's three walkers, freezing one and rolling it through the other two pays 1800, while freezing each in turn and letting each shatter on a wall pays 650 — and once there are six foes on the field that gap is 3300 against 300. Either finish the frost or do not start it: stopping halfway lets the layers melt back, and the foe that loses the last one gets faster — you have handed yourself a harder level. Pick your side before you push: the ball rolls the way you walked into it, so standing left of it sends it right. That choice is what decides which foes this ball can reach. Keep a ball back if you want a relay: a rolling ball relays a resting one without breaking the chain, so a finished ball parked mid-corridor can be worth more than one pushed straight away. A furious foe is still slower than you at full stride, so never trade ground with one at a corner — give yourself a straight line and you are gone. When the chaser arrives, do not try to out-dodge it: it closes in through everything, matching your column first and only then coming down, but a snowball shoves it well clear, so keep a ball near you the moment the warning starts. Gaps are routes, not pits: a jump clears the widest of them, and walking off an edge only drops you one layer, because the drop between layers is always the same.

How do you play a snowball game like this on a phone and on a desktop?

Snowball Roll is about freezing foes with snow and shoving them through the row. On a phone your left thumb drags the band along the bottom to walk while your right thumb holds the snow key, with jump on the outside; on a desktop use the arrows or A and D, Space or J for snow, Up or W to jump, Esc or P to pause. Pushing has no button at all — you walk into the snowball — so one thumb on movement is enough.

Why won't the snowball move when I walk into it?

Walk round to the side of the ball first, then hold the direction that points at it. A push needs four things together: you overlap the ball, you hold the direction pointing at it, you are standing on the ground, and your feet and the ball's base are close in height. Two situations look like a bug: standing against the ball without holding a direction (an arrow floats above it to show which way it would go), and landing on top of it, where the height difference is too big. Pushing has no button, so “I pressed it and nothing happened” cannot happen here — it is always where you are standing.

How does scoring work in this snowball game, and how do you get a high score?

There is only one route to a high score: flatten as many foes as you can with one rolling ball. The first foe a ball flattens pays 100 and each one after that doubles — 200, 400, 800 — with no further doubling past the fourth; a ball that clears every remaining foe in one go adds a 1000 sweep bonus, and clearing the level pays 200 plus 100 for every life still in hand. A ball that flattens nothing and shatters on a wall pays 50. So on level one's three walkers, freezing one and rolling it through the other two pays 1800, while freezing each in turn and letting each shatter pays 650 — and at six foes that gap is 3300 against 300.

I froze every foe into a snowball, so why is the level not over?

Because a resting snowball and a rolling one both still count as foes on that level. Clearing is judged on the foe count reaching zero, and turning a foe into a ball does not take it out of the count — nor does shoving it. Only the moment a rolling ball shatters does the count drop. Freezing the whole field is not a route through: the ball has to be pushed and finished, which is exactly why this game is about pushing rather than freezing.

Does the frost melt in this snowball game, and what happens to a foe that thaws?

It melts, and not slowly: once you stop firing the frost drops one layer every 1.5 seconds, and a foe can only carry two layers (the third turns it into a ball on the spot), so it is bare again within 3 seconds. A foe that loses its last layer turns furious for 5 seconds — a fifth faster, turning to walk at you, with a thicker red outline so you can see it. That is the price of spraying half a foe and walking away. Hitting it while it is furious ends the rage at once and adds a layer as usual, so it is never too late to fix; it just costs more snow than finishing the job would have.

What is the chaser that turns up when the time runs out, and how do you get away from it?

Hit it with a snowball: one shoves it back for about 2 seconds, though nothing kills it. The hurry clock runs 60 seconds on level one and shortens to 40 by level ten; when it ends the storm thickens and the border flashes for about 2 seconds, and then this single terrain-ignoring chaser is released. There is only ever one per run, it cannot kill you for the first half second, and it moves slower than you at full stride — so run a straight line along one ledge and you gain ground, and never trade ground with it at a corner. The easy answer is to have a finished ball parked beside you the moment the warning starts.

How many levels are there, and do you start over from level one when you lose all your lives?

Ten levels to a round, and losing all three lives does not send you back to level one — the next run starts from the highest level you ever reached. A single death costs less than that: touching a normal or furious foe takes one life, the level restarts in place with your score intact, and you return with a stretch of invulnerable blinking. The foe count climbs from 3 on level one to 9 on level ten (3, 4, 4, 5, 5, 6, 6, 7, 8, 9), with walkers traded for trackers and armoured foes, the gaps going from 2 to 6, foe speed rising and the hurry clock cut from 60 seconds to 40; level eleven onward reuses level ten's numbers and only changes the layout, so from there it is a score chase on fixed terms.

Does a retro platform game like this need fast fingers, and will I mis-tap on a phone?

No fast fingers needed. The difficulty here is positioning and choice, not tapping: snow fires while held and pushing has no button. On a phone there is a clear gap between the snow key and the jump key, with jump on the outside, so the mis-tap you are most likely to make costs you a harmless jump rather than a wasted spray. Pressing snow during its cooldown, pressing jump in mid-air and tapping something inert all give you a visible receipt, so nothing ever looks unresponsive — and jumping is only ever used to cross a gap or change layers, with no gap in the game too wide to clear.

What was that old game where you freeze enemies into snowballs and roll them, and can you still play it in a browser?

People call that kind of game different things — snowball pushing, snowball platform climbing — and they all mean the same loop: a tall stack of stone ledges, snow that packs a patrolling foe into a snowball, and a shove that sends the ball flattening everything along the row. Snowball Roll is an original browser version of that core loop, with its own levels, art and sound, playable the moment the page opens, with no sign-up and no download. Your best score and the highest level you reached live in this browser, and a run in progress goes back to the start of the level if you refresh. On a phone, two thumbs in portrait take you from the first level to the settlement screen.