Ink Knight: Creature Health, the Six Attacks and What Falls From the Sky

One creature at a time

Ink Knight is a vertical shooter in black ink on white paper. Your knight stands on a rampart at the bottom of the screen and attacks on his own, several times a second. The one thing you control is where he stands: arrow keys or A and D, the mouse over the game, a finger dragged left and right, or a controller's stick.

Above him floats one creature at a time, assembled at random each wave: a body, one to six eyes, ears or horns, arms or wings, a tail and a mouth. No two look alike. Their numbers, though, follow fixed rules. A creature has 70 health plus 55 per wave, so 125 on wave 1, 345 on wave 5 and 620 on wave 10. It drifts left and right across about a third of the screen, one full swing every 12 seconds or so, and you have to follow it to keep hitting.

The starting weapon, the Arrow, deals 4 damage about five and a half times a second. If every arrow lands, wave 1 takes under 6 seconds and wave 10 almost half a minute. That is why the orbs matter.

Six attacks, always in the same order

The attack depends on the wave number, and the list repeats every six waves:

• Waves 1, 7, 13: three crescents fanned out downward.
• Waves 2, 8, 14: a wide fan of ink blobs, 8 on wave 2 and 14 on wave 8.
• Waves 3, 9, 15: four needles falling straight down at random spots across the screen.
• Waves 4, 10, 16: a wall of ink balls from edge to edge with one gap, about a quarter of the screen wide, in a new place each volley.
• Waves 5, 11, 17: three spinners whose aim sweeps from side to side.
• Waves 6, 12, 18: one ball, aimed at where you stand when it fires.

On wave 1 a creature fires about every 1.4 seconds. The gap shrinks by 0.09 seconds per wave, give or take 20 percent at random, and stops shrinking at 0.55 seconds from wave 11. The shots also fall a little faster each wave. The wall is the first attack you cannot sidestep by a little: you have to be in the gap, so look for it the moment the wall appears.

The aimed ball on waves 6 and 12 is the easiest, as long as you move right after it fires, since it goes where you were. If you let go of the controls, the knight patrols the rampart on his own at a slow walk, which is fine between volleys and bad during them. Left alone from the start of a run, he lost all three hearts on wave 1 in about 13 seconds when we tried it.

Hearts

You start with three hearts. Each hit costs one and leaves the knight untouchable for 2 seconds. Only ink hurts: the creature never touches the rampart. Heart orbs add one, up to five, and one picked up at five hearts is wasted. The run ends with the last heart, and once per run a short ad brings you back with one heart, 2.5 seconds of safety and the screen cleared of ink.

What falls from the sky

An orb drifts down every 5 to 9 seconds, the first one 4 seconds into the run, alternately on the left and the right side of the screen. It takes around 7 seconds to reach the rampart, so you see it coming. Here is what each one is, with its odds:

• A weapon, 31 percent. One of 14, at equal odds, for 14 seconds, then back to the Arrow.
• Heart, 10 percent. One more heart, up to five.
• Power, 8 percent. Every shot deals 1.9 times its damage for 10 seconds.
• Rapid, 8 percent. Twice as many attacks for 10 seconds.
• Shield, 8 percent. 4 seconds untouchable.
• Points, 7 percent. 500 points.
• Slow, 6 percent. Ink falls at 45 percent of its speed for 8 seconds.
• Bomb, 5 percent. Takes 30 percent of the creature's full health plus 40, and wipes every ink shot off the screen.
• Companions, 17 percent in all. A drone (7 percent) that fires its own darts, a bat (5) or a shield orb (5), both of which block ink. They circle the knight for 24 seconds, four at most.

The 14 weapons are the Fan, Barrage, Spear, Comet, Bolt, Star, Slash, Chakram, Twin, Spiral, Rain, Missiles, A-Bomb and H-Bomb. The Fan, Star, Bolt and Rain spread their shots, which helps when the creature swings away. Comet and Missiles steer toward it. Spear, Slash and Chakram pass through it instead of stopping at the first hit. Power and Rapid stack with whatever weapon you hold, so a weapon orb right after one of them is worth walking for.

Where the points come from

Every hit scores its damage in points. Beating a creature earns a trophy and 1,000 points plus 200 per wave: 1,200 for the first, 3,000 for the tenth. So most of a score comes from trophies. Clearing waves 1 to 5 is worth 8,000 points in trophies and about 1,175 in damage. Freex Coins (a virtual currency with no monetary value) come from the final score, plus 5 for each trophy. The creatures never stop coming, so there is no end to reach, only a longer run. More shooters are in the arcade category.