Breakanoids

also known as: Ball-and-paddle, bat-and-ball, ブロック崩し (block destuction), …

In a Breakanoid the player controls a paddle, which is used to juggle a ball. If the ball falls below the paddle (to the bottom of the screen) then a life is lost. If the ball hits the screen's top, its sides, or obstacles (bricks), it will bounce. The goal is to clear the screen of bricks. Variations include a paddle that is tiltable, balls which break through¹⁾ bricks, rather than bouncing off them, the ability to shoot, and so on.

Lineage

The genre begins in 1976 with Breakout, which was designed to be a single player response to pong. In 1986 Taito released Arkanoid, which added a variety of power-ups to the formula. These include: granting the ability to shoot blocks, change the length of the paddle, catch the ball, and so on.
After many clones, in 1994 Daniel Clav releases Starbop, which let's the player move the paddle freely round the screen, and encloses the play board so that the player will only loose a life if the ball or their paddle hit certain blocks.
Steve Moraff released Moraff's Blast in 1991, which includes a 'falling wall' mode, and an 'adventure' mode, where the completion of a level is not based upon the destruction of blocks, but striking the exit point.
The 1996 game Blockids added a Z-axis. Though there are 3D Breakanoids released before this, Blockids has the interesting distinction of stacking blocks in three axes; one of those effected by gravity. The player is also able to 'jump' the ball.
Increpare's Paddle Ball²⁾ features a ball that shrinks as the player progresses, as opposed to speeding up. As the ball gets smaller, smaller pieces of the wall are removed. Eventually creating quite striking patterns.
RDBK, by NEKOGAMES, features a ball whose speed dramatically increased when struck, bouncing back to the paddles almost immediately. If missed it is able to bounce off the bottom of the screen, and its speed returns to normal.
The game Bricksmash, by Draknek features multiple breakanoids on one board. Each is contained within one of the bricks, and is activated (to play simultaneously with the main game) when struck by a ball.

Offshoots

Breakout Roles

Breakanoids with a player-controlled character filling the role of the paddle, its wielder, or even the ball itself.

1990 - Thunder & Lightning
The player controls a hungry fellow named Mr. Chin (same guy from Mr. Chin's Gourmet Paradise on the Game Boy), who is armed with a large stick used to direct a bouncing ball at blocks in its path.
- 1992 - Thunder & Lightning 2 / Block Carnival^JP
1991 - Cyber Block Metal Orange
You're a cybernetic lady in a space ship. When the paddle gets bigger your spaceship gets options like in a shooter.
1993 - Firestriker / Holy Striker^JP
The player walks around a top-down environment, slashing at a moving ball of flame to direct it at blocks, obstacles, enemies and bosses. The goal of each level is to manoeuvre the ball towards the exit, without it leaving the screen.
1994 - 平成イヌ物語バウ　ポップンスマッシュ！！ (Heisei Dog Story Bow - Pop'n Smash!!)
Each player defends their edge by striking a ball or their opponent with their chosen weapon. Each edge has a row of blocks which must be removed before the ball can pass. Anime license. Maybe too Pong-y)
1994 - Ｚｉｇ　Ｚａｇ　Ｃａｔ　ダチョウ倶楽部も大騒ぎダ (… Osterich Club Also Makes A Fuss)
The player walks holding a force field in the shape of a paddle, used to bounce a ball (which is actually a cat) at blocks and enemies are along the trail, enjoying power-ups along the way.
1995 - Kirby's Block Ball
Kirby serves as the ball throughout the game, smashing blocks and enemies alike while guided by moving paddles on top and bottom (or all four sides in boss rooms) of the screen. At times he wields his own paddle in face-to-face mini-games such as air hockey.
1996 - 星くずし (Star Break)
Kirby plays the ball again in a chapter of the Satellaview game カービィのおもちゃ箱. Two hamsters carry the paddle.
1996 - 東方靈異伝～Ｈｉｇｈｌｙ　Ｒｅｓｐｏｎｓｉｖｅ　ｔｏ　Ｐｒａｙｅｒｓ (Touhou Reiiden …)
You control Reimu, who interacts with the ball by sliding into it, shooting it, and hitting it with her gohei. Players lose lives by losing the ball, and being struck by the enemies attacks. Ball is effected by gravity.
2001 - Gunbarich
Breakanoid in which Gunbird's Marion controls a pair of pinball flippers.
2003 - SpongeBob's Bubble Pop watch
Game on a Plug'n'Play console where the paddle is SpongeBob SquarePants.
2017 - SpiritSphere get
- 2017 - SpiritSphere DX get get
2017 - Alehop watch
Amiga game where the paddle is a seesaw and each of two balls are people who take turns being propelled around the board and catapulting the other.
2019 - Antonball get
Game Boy-themed, horizontal breakanoid, where you control a Mario-like character. There are platforms to navigate, and it gets quite complex. Made for GBJam 7
- 2021 - Antonball Deluxe get get
  Fancier graphics, new modes, dash attack and a gun powerup, seems to get more frantic—
2019 - Castle Break get
Is kinda more of an air hockey game? Anyway, you're a castle-looking thing/guy defending the bottom of the screen from bombs. Paddle is tied to the mouse.
2019 - Prison Ball: Full Blown get
Played horizontally. Guy holding a paddle. Can also wrap round the screen, like you're playing Pong against yourself.
- 2021 - Solo ReflectioN! get
  Very similar looking game that' also available as a DLC add-on for Prison Ball: Full Blown.

Breakups

Multiplayer competitive breakanoids, though the line gets fuzzy between Breakout or Pong influences

ballistix (Played against another human or the CPU, the player attempts to direct a puck through special tiles and through obstacles to end in the opponent's goal ³⁾)
block_wars ⁴⁾
funny_soccer (2v2 soccer, with each players' paddles being moved as one.)
pop_n_smash (Two players swing a variety of sports equipment in order to direct a ball at the opponent's goal, while defending their own⁵⁾)
spiritsphere_dx
warlords (Four players each guarding a corner of the screen, which is also protected by a mass of bricks/shields)
sanrio_world_smash_ball

Brickless

In place of walls of bricks/blocks, large bosses are found.

ghox ⁶⁾
thunder_lightning (Arcade version - The player controls hungry fellow named Mr. Chin, who is armed with a large stick used to direct a bouncing ball at enemies in its path⁷⁾)

Breakfree

Games where the paddle can move freely.

Starbop, and it's (pseudo?) sequel Cortex. They also allow you to break blocks with the paddle!
Breaktroid is a flick-screen adventure breakanoid I made, where the paddle also uses Clickteam's race-car controls.
SnOut - Breakanoid where your paddle moves like Snake, including death if your snake's head touches its body or the ball.
Whack Ball is one of the games from the pack-in cart. that came with the menacer. You bounce the ball by moving the gun, the bricks are in different configurations around the edge of the screen.

Examples

Action Puzzle Prism Land - Lunatic Obscurity article
alleyway
amegas
arcamania
- arcamania_2
arkanoid
- revenge_of_doh
- arkanoid_ds
aquanoid
bananoid
bat_ball
beebop (Beebop 1, 2, 3 games later packaged together as Hyperball.
- starbop
  - cortex - video
blockage - Get
blocker_3 (versus breakanoid, screen split down the middle.)
blockids
breakout
- super_breakout
Breakout Invaders
breaksout - Play
bricksmash - Play
brilek
castlevania_xtacy - Play
cyberblock_metal_orange
DX-Ball series
Getout: Forever - Play
EM: Shader Attack
Gachi Heroes 2: Flexboll (But not the first Gachi Heroes game)
goindol
gunbarich
high_voltage - Varient with four paddles, one on each screen edge.
magical_brickout - Player rotates thr circular playfield, rather than a controller a paddle.
nervous_brickdown
no_escape_from_ball_and_paddle - Play
paddle_ball - Play
puchi_carat
rdbk - Play
shatter
sprint_breakout - Play
strikey_sisters
super_free_kick - Hardcore Gaming 101 description
tecnoball
- TechnoballZ
- RadiclBallX
wizorb

???? - Block Smasher play
???? - Drillkanoid get - Incomplete. Ball is a drill that carves through a wall of dirt. Paddle can be tilted to 45° each way.
???? - LBreakout
- ???? - LBreakout2
- 2018 - LBreakoutHD
1990? - BoinkOut - Type-in program, published in START magazine.
- 1999 - BoinkOut 2 - Archived homepage.
1991 - Moraff's Blast
- 1991 - Moraff's Super Blast
- 1995 - Moraff's Ultra Blast
1992 - Poing - Played horizontally, hit screen edge 10 times to progress.
- 1994 - Poing 2
- 1995 - Poing 3
- 1997 - Poing 4
- 1997 - Poing 5
- 1998 - Poing 6
- 2002 - Poing 7
1992 - OOPArts - Has pinball element where you activate parts of the screen by going over them with the ball.
1994 - Cybersphere
- 1995 - Cybersphere Plus
1999 - Beat Ball - get
- 2017 - Beat Ball 2 - get
1996 - Diamonds 3D - play - 3-D perspective, can catch the ball a limited amount. Catchy music.
2000 - Blasterball - straight-forward Arkanoid-clone.
- 2001 - Blasterball Wild
- 2002 - Blasterball 2 Revolution - Wiki says 2002 release, dev page says 2004.
- 2004 - Blasterball 2: Remix
- 2004 - Blasterball 2: Holidays
- 2006 - Blasterball 3 - Adds a level editor.
2003 - Geometry (A stage in the pinball game flipnic)
2003 - 3D BrickBlaster Unlimited - Stage is really tall, camera zooms out and in as needed.
2006 - SIMPLE2000シリーズ Vol.106 THE ブロックくずしクエスト~DragonKingdom~ / Beta Bloc
2011 - Breakvaders get
2014 - SDL-Ball
2018 - Arkball - get
2018 - Griefer - get - Triangular bricks.
2018 - Spin Breakout - get - Interesting Unity template for a breakanoid where the bricks are at the top and bottom of the board, and you paddle rotate round a circle in the centre.
- 2021 - Spin Breaker get - Asset flip version.
2019 - Playing a Janky Version of Breakout on a CRT TV Sitting Behind a Mirror in the Bathroom of a Gourmet Restaurant at 2:19 PM - Play
2020 - SpaceWings get - Like Alleyway, your paddle is a spaceship—you can even see the little fox guy in there. You can also control the ball's direction with the left and right arrow keys.
2022 - Meekanoid get
2024 - BreakPong get - Breakout roll, Breakup.

To Add

Trivia

According to wikipedia:

Breakout directly influenced Steve Wozniak's design for the Apple II computer — 'A lot of features of the Apple II went in because I had designed Breakout for Atari. I had designed it in hardware. I wanted to write it in software now'. This included his design of colour graphics circuitry and the now infamous beep and click sound circuitry. It also directly influenced his design of Integer BASIC (which he referred to as “Game Basic”), with his Integer BASIC version of Breakout being the first proof-of-concept application running on the prototype Apple II. His desire to play Breakout on his new computer also led to the addition of a paddle interface, and ultimately the bundling of paddle controllers and a cassette tape containing the code for Breakout for the Apple II's commercial release.
Pilgrim in the Microworld is an autobiography by David Sudnow detailing his obsession with Breakout. Sudnow describes studying the game's mechanics, visiting the manufacturer in Silicon Valley, and interviewing the programmers.
For Kid Stuff Records, John Braden recorded a 7-in 33 1/3 RPM record telling the story of Super Breakout. This science fiction story dealt with NASA astronaut Captain John Stewart Chang returning from a routine mission transporting titanium ore from Io to space station New California. He encounters a rainbow barrier, presumably a force of nature, that seems to have no end on either side. He has three lobbing missiles of white light that he can bounce off the hull of his shuttle, and they prove able to break through the layers of the force field. With his life support systems failing, what follows is a test of endurance turned game as he strives to break through the barrier in space.

wiki.ryliejamesthomas.net

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