← Blog · Changelog · September 25, 2026

Five Games, Five Touch Schemes — and a Pause Bug We Just Fixed

Every game in the arcade works on a phone, but no two of them use the same touch controls. That is on purpose: a control scheme has to fit the game, and what works for a paddle is wrong for a snake. Here is how each one works, and a bug in two of them that we have just fixed.

Hold a side to steer: Neon Drift and Dust Rally

Both racing games only ask you to steer, so the screen is split in two. Hold the left half to steer left and the right half to steer right. In Dust Rally the whole height of the screen counts, so your thumbs can rest wherever is comfortable, and holding both sides at once cancels out rather than jerking the car.

A hold-to-steer scheme suits these games because steering in both is continuous rather than lane-by-lane: the car slides for as long as you hold, so a short press nudges it and a long press swings it across. That is the same fine control a keyboard gives.

Drag with an offset: Sector Seven

In a shoot-'em-up, you need to move precisely in every direction, so Sector Seven uses dragging. The ship follows your finger, but it sits 110 px above the touch point. Without that offset your thumb would cover the ship and every bullet about to hit it.

Drag to position: Shock Breaker

Shock Breaker puts the paddle directly under your finger. Unlike the keyboard, which moves the paddle at a fixed speed, touch (and the mouse) moves it instantly, which is the better way to play once the ball speeds up. Tapping launches the ball, or fires the laser when you have it.

Swipe to turn: Volt Serpent

A snake only ever needs a direction, so Volt Serpent uses swipes. A movement of 24 px counts as a swipe, and you don't need to lift your finger between them: sweep up and then left in one motion and you get both turns, queued in order.

Fixed: tapping now resumes a paused game

Every game pauses itself when you switch away — to answer a message, say. On a keyboard you resume with P or Esc. On a phone, you tap. That worked in three of the games, but in Shock Breaker and Volt Serpent a tap did nothing while the game was paused. On a phone, with no keyboard, the game was stuck until you reloaded the page and lost your run.

Both games now resume on a tap, the same as the other three. In Shock Breaker a mouse click resumes too, and in Volt Serpent the Enter key does as well.

If you find a bug in any of the games, the Contact page says how to report it. Fixes will appear here.