Fickerage.

Since I blogged about playing Skee-Ball on my iPhone for hours upon end, I've been asked two questions:

1) How?

2) Why?

Although this might prove to be a most boring post, I'll answer.


The blue thing that looks like a rocket flying out of the 30-cup is a ball you can buy when you've acquired enough tickets. I have all of them, and my favorite is the Cow Ball, which doesn't have a tail, but which shows spin very well. The 40- and 50-cups are obscured by the ball, but probably all of you have played RL Skee-Ball.

Each game consists of 9 balls, which count down on the scoreboard (ergo, the 9-ball is the first ball to play). The award for each ball, if any, is multiplied by the bonus, which ranges from 0 to 10 (maybe higher, but I don't go there). The bonus is increased when you reach various score plateaus, and also if you sink a shot in a lit cup - the cups light randomly, from 0 to 4 times a game.

HOW: The factors determining the success of a flick are finger pressure (affects range and bounce, if the ball hits the edge of a cup), direction, speed (range), starting and ending points (range and speed), and curvature (spin). The hardest shot for me is the left 100-cup, because I'm right-handed. The right 100-cup is my money shot, where I aim almost all the time.

WHY: At first it was just fun. I learned the various shots and tried to increase the bonus, as you would if playing at an arcade. I also tried to earn tickets so I could buy things - balls and/or trinkets. The tickets you spend still appear in your overall score for ranking purposes.

Later I decided I wanted to get to the #400 ranking, so I had to develop a strategy. Currently my ranking is #641 and I have won 488,928 tickets. Making what I think is the best estimate of my average score (which of course improved over time), that equates to just about 63,000 flicks. People pass me every time I take a break, and at this level I assume I am competing with idle teenagers who spend all day flicking and texting simultaneously. I, however, am a responsible, hard-working adult with a wife, so I can only flick three or four hours a day. It is a big disadvantage, and I had to maximize my rate of winning tickets.

Leaving out all the deliberations and trials, my current strategy is to flick continuously. I aim for my money shot, the right 100-cup. Often I find my shot going astray, but I keep flicking and adjust on the fly. All of the factors come into play, so the adjustments are subtle and interesting. I can hit 20 shots in a row or miss 7 in one game.

Since the maximum bonus at the start of a game is 6, I had to decide when to attempt a lit cup. A cup is never lit for the first shot, so at the moment I'll shoot for a lit cup that appears on the 8-ball or 7-ball, unless it's the left 100-cup, which I don't hit often enough. Sometimes I don't take those shots because the ball is taking too long rolling around, or because I'm flicking too fast, or because I'm in a rhythm and don't want to interrupt it.

Whew, that's it. Time to rack up a few more tickets.