Bad Ice-Cream Game

Bad Ice-Cream is Nitrome's maze puzzler from the studio's long run of browser arcade games: you steer a small ice-cream creature around a grid-shaped level, and the only tool you get is the ability to shoot blocks of ice out in front of you. Every level is really a small logic problem disguised as a chase.

The goal on each level is simple to say and harder to do: eat every piece of fruit before one of the roaming monsters catches you. Fruit doesn't move, but the monsters do, and they'll home in on you the moment you're exposed. Ice blocks are how you fight back — freeze a monster in its path, wall off a corridor to cut it off, or lay a block across water to open a route to fruit you couldn't otherwise reach. You can also break a block you've already placed, which is often the only way out of a corner you've sealed yourself into.

Controls

Player one moves with the arrow keys and shoots ice with the spacebar. A second player can join in on the same keyboard using W/A/S/D to move and Left Ctrl to shoot, so two people can split a level's fruit and ice-block duties between them.

Tips

• Freeze a chasing monster the instant it lines up in front of you rather than trying to outrun it — a well-placed block stops it cold.
• Look at the whole layout before you move. Committing to a block placement early can wall off fruit you still need.
• If you've boxed yourself in, remember you can shoot your own ice blocks again to break them and reopen the path.
• In two-player co-op, split the level: have one player pin the monsters while the collects the fruit closest to them.

It's a short-session game by design — each level is a self-contained puzzle you can finish in a minute or two, which makes it a good fit for a quick browser break rather than a long sitting.