Fairground Days

A day out at a very British funfair. Choose a boy or a girl, work your way round five stalls winning tickets, and spend the lot at the prize counter on the biggest teddy bear you can afford. Then get it home.

The smallest bear fits in the palm of your hand. The largest is twice your size, and the fair’s exit was not built with it in mind.

THE STALLS

You play all five in order, and each pays out up to 20 tickets.

1. Coconut Shy. Ten balls and six coconuts. Hold to raise the crosshair, and let go when it’s on target. It speeds up as it climbs, so the back row is much harder to catch. A clean hit knocks a coconut off. A glancing one only makes it wobble, but then the next hit finishes it. Each coconut pays 3 tickets, with a bonus for clearing them all with balls to spare.
2. Shooting Gallery. Twelve corks and forty seconds, with roast beef, Yorkshire puddings, spotted dick, fish and chips, toffee apples and crowns going past on three rails. Your aim sways until you hold to steady it, and you fire when you let go. Crowns are worth the most. Do not shoot the King’s corgi.
3. Bean Bag Toss. Eight bags and a painted menu with holes in it. The further and smaller the hole, the better it pays. As at the coconuts, the crosshair speeds up as it rises, so the top hole is much harder to catch. A bag slides a little after it lands, so allow for that.
4. Hook-a-Duck. You have 60 seconds, and the stall closes early once you reach 20 tickets. With a mouse you steer the rod, hold to drop the hook and let go to reel in. The hook takes a moment to reach the water, so aim where the duck is going, and after every catch the rod goes back to the top of the pond. On a phone or tablet there’s no rod to steer: tap the water just ahead of a duck, and the hook drops right there and waits a moment for the ring to come past. Gold ducks pay triple.
5. Whack-a-Mole. Forty seconds on the Royal Lawn. Just hit them as they pop up: three points make a ticket. A mole scores 1, a guardsman in a bearskin 2 and a crowned mole 3. Corgis cost you points.

THE PRIZES

Everyone goes home with a bear. Your total buys the best one it can reach.

Tickets	Bear	Getting it home
0	Pip the Palm Bear	Fits in your palm
30	The Little Earl	Under one arm
50	Bertie the Bear	A proper cuddle
70	The Grand Old Duke	As big as you are, and not helping
88	His Royal Hugeness	Twice your size. Good luck at the gate

THE SCOREBOARDS

Your score is your total tickets, out of 100. There are two shared top twenties, one for mobile and one for desktop, because a finger and a mouse aren’t playing quite the same game. A run played by touch goes on the mobile board, and one played with a mouse goes on the desktop board. You can look at either when your run ends.

TIPS

• Take the front row first. The crosshair is still fairly slow there. Save the back row, where it’s racing, for the balls you have left. The same goes for the bean bags.
• Finish a wobbling coconut. It’s now easier to knock off than a fresh one.
• Don’t fire too soon at the gallery. A quick cork goes wherever the sway takes it.
• Lead your ducks. Aim at the water just ahead of the ring, not at the ring itself. With a mouse, pick the next duck near the top of the pond, where the rod comes back to.
• Keep your hand moving. Moles don’t wait, and a crowned one is worth three of the others.

BEHIND THE GAME

Fairground Days is dressed as a 1994 release, and it’s the first game on the site to step right away from what a home computer of that age could play. The band organ is built from detuned pipes with a tremulant and a little room around them, over oom-pah bass, a glockenspiel on the tune and a side drum. The waltz and the galop are both original, and both are synthesised in your browser.

Nothing is loaded from an image or a sound file. Buckingham Palace, the big wheel, the helter-skelter, the bears and the fish and chips are all painted by the game as it runs.