Puck Rush

Setup

A board split across the middle by a divider with a single gap in it. Two players, five pucks each, starting on their own half.

An elastic band runs across your own end of the board. Every shot you take leaves from somewhere along it, and it is the only way a puck gets moving.

The match is three minutes long. Nothing is hidden, there are no turns, and both players start shooting at the same moment.

How to play

Drag anywhere on your own half to pick up the nearest puck; it loads onto the elastic band across your end at the point you dragged from. Pull back to aim and set the power, and release to fire it.

The aim line and the pull are drawn on your phone instantly, but the moment a puck is moving it belongs entirely to the server — which is what makes both players see the same board.

There are no turns. Fire as fast as you can reload, subject to a short cooldown between shots, and both players are shooting at the same time. Pucks bounce off the rails and off each other.

Controls

Press anywhere on your own half and the nearest puck is picked up and loaded onto the elastic band across your end, at the point along the band that you pressed. Where you press is where the shot launches from, so the side you pick a puck up on is the side it leaves from.

Drag back from the band to aim and to set the power — the further you pull, the harder it goes — then lift your finger to fire. The aim line is drawn under your thumb as you pull.

The puck you touched is the puck that fires. The app names it to the server rather than letting the server pick the nearest one for you, so what leaves the band is never a different puck from the one you grabbed.

There is a short cooldown between shots and no turns at all. Both players fire at the same time, as fast as they can reload.

The pull and the aim line are drawn on your phone instantly so the shot feels immediate, but the moment a puck is moving it belongs entirely to the server. That is what makes both screens agree.

The board does not mirror in Arabic. Both players' shots are computed in one shared board space, so a mirrored board would aim every shot at the wrong half.

Scoring

There is no running score. What counts is how many of your pucks are still on your own half, and the only way to reduce that number is to get them fully across the divider.

The instant win looks for a half that is completely empty: every puck a full radius past the divider, so a puck sitting in the gap, or still travelling through it, has not cleared. When the clock runs out instead, each puck counts for the half its centre is clearly on, and one sitting right on the line counts for nobody.

Pucks your opponent fires can land on your half and are then yours to clear. Clearing is not a race you can run alone: the pile in front of you keeps being topped up.

On your profile a win pays 16 points, a draw 6 and a loss 3. Puck Rush is an arcade game, so it pays points, stats and achievements but does NOT move your rating — a three-minute reflex match and a chess game should not feed the same number.

Practice games against the bot and games on one phone score nothing at all.

Winning

Clear your half — get every one of your pucks fully across the divider — and you win, immediately, even while your opponent is still shooting.

If neither half is clear when the three minutes are up, the player with fewer pucks left on their side wins, and a level count is a draw.

Tips

The gap is narrow. A straight shot at it from a wide angle will hit the divider and come back to you.

Fire from the part of the band nearest the gap — where you pick a puck up is where it launches from.

Clearing beats scattering. A puck that stops in the neutral strip near the divider counts for nobody and still has to be moved.