Jezzball Winning Tips!
Starting off: you need to build a small trap that is only a quarter of the screen wide and only 2 squares high, or 1 and 2 half squares. This can be done even with out loosing a life. You can quickly start a safe line at the very bottom edge, but before it is done you need to start another line just a little above it. Just enough space to allow an atom to bounce in. You will find that the second line you build will only form in one direction towards the nearest wall. If done right you should still have 2 lives left.
After this it will be a lot harder to make your first trap with out losing a life. Good luck, but do try to remember that in the higher levels this will come in handy again, if you only have 2 atoms left to capture and you need to make a new trap. It will happen plenty often.
You then coral the atoms into your trap by carefully closing off the area they can occupy. Do not separate them until you have gotten them into your trap and closed them off tight in the trap. While corralling them in, be especially careful not to close off more than 72 to 74% of the area or you will lose your advantage of the high bonus points.
After you close off the first atom you should have a space so small that it is only bouncing in a strait line diagonally. You can then close it off safely by building a vertical or horizontal line inside this trap next to this atom. This may take some practice, as you need to be as far away from the atom as you can, while still being able to activate the line.
It should now have come to a stop, only slowly rotating. You will now be able to safely close it off even smaller by building a line beside the atom depending on where it stopped. You will need to pay close attention to the rotation of the atom, as the white side is the hot side. You will need to close it off as the red side is on the side you are attempting to close off, if you need to do the final close in a vertical manner. You will not be able to close the last atom off this tight, but after you do close off the last atom you should have cleared a good 98% of the field and have 2 lives left. The best part is that you should have over 22k in points because of the bonus points. Also here is a couple other examples of good early levels "2" & "3". Just click on the images below to get a clear look at the game boards.
If you are off to a bad start, it is easy to start a new game at this point. I will often start a new game if I dont like the way the atoms are bouncing in level #1.
Try to build the trap as long as you can so you can, to get lots of atoms in. this single trap may last you to the 5th or 6th level. Later you will need to be satisfied with 4 atom traps. Then you will be lucky to make 3 atom traps, 2 atom traps.
Then in to level 30 you will be lucky to build one atom traps early in the level, since there will be so many atoms flying around, it will resemble a wild bees nest, and their sting is deadly. I often will build 3 to 5 small traps up the left side, in these levels, before I even try to close them off.
Then in level 40, You will not even be able to close the traps off, as they will be so shallow. How do I trap the atoms them you asked? It couldnt be simpler. They will be flying around so furiously that they will wedge a pair of them in so hard that they will both lock each other into an open trap and just stay there slowly rotating. It is a sight to behold.
As you will see, I managed to close off 40 atoms on level 39 and still cleared off 92% of the field with 14 lives left, over 3k seconds remaining, and with a bonus of over 200k points.
If you would just like to see for yourself what level 49 looks like on your computer, you can press "Ctrl-Shift-F12" to advance to the next level without having to complete that level. If you keep doing this, you will reach the legendary level 49, and see what it really looks like. Here is a still sample of what it would look like. Take special notice of the score.
For more advice on achieving those high levels, I have posted copies of e-mail sent to me by other over achievers like George Thomas, David Beusterien, and Gerald Smalley who have generously taken the time out to write up their own personal best tips page for this site. Best luck!
Still screen captures of the higher levels dont do it justice. I got M. S. Camcorder, but the file will be several megs large, so it will be too much to keep on this web site. You will just have to see it for your self (with lots of practice), sorry. If you bribe me, I may send you a copy on several floppies, or a Zip disk that you send me. Lots of good looking pictures for my wallpaper are good bribes also.
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