Tag.

How to play Tag

1. Choose the Playground Tour for the next stage, Quick match to set a mode, playground, number of rivals, skill and round length, 2 to 4 players for local play, or the daily chase.
2. Move with A and D or the arrow keys. Press W or Space to jump, and press it again in the air for a double jump; hold it for a higher leap and release early for a short hop.
3. Press S or the Down arrow to drop through a wooden deck. Push into a chimney or crate in the air to slide down it, then jump to kick off. Press F or Shift to dash; three dots under your feet show the recharge.
4. Read the markers: a gold crown in Crown Tag and Keep Away, a sizzling potato in Hot Potato, a snowflake badge on the Freeze Tag chaser and a green goo badge on anyone infected. The scoreboard at the top shows every player’s time, lives or status.
5. Touch another player to tag them. A dashed ring means they are shielded for a moment. In Freeze Tag, stand next to a frozen friend until the gold ring fills to thaw them.
6. When the round ends, the results list every player’s place and stats, the stars you earned and anything you unlocked. Use P or Escape to pause, R to restart and M to mute.

Make your move

About Tag

Tag is a quick side-view chase for one to four people. Everyone runs, jumps, double jumps, drops through wooden decks and dashes with exactly the same physics. The round starts with a short countdown, and whoever is chasing counts to one before moving, so nobody is caught before they can react. After any tag, a dashed ring shows a short no-tag-back shield: the new chaser cannot tag the player who just tagged them straight away. That shield is the reason chases in Tag feel fair instead of turning into a flurry of instant swaps.

There are five rule sets. Crown Tag is the classic: touching another player passes the crown, and the player with the least time as IT wins the round. Keep Away reverses the goal, so everybody chases the crown and the longest holder wins. Hot Potato has no clock; a sizzling potato passes on contact, and whoever holds it when the fuse pops is out until one player remains. In Freeze Tag, IT freezes runners, and a free runner can thaw a friend by staying close for a moment. Infection turns every caught runner into a slower chaser without a dash; survive until the clock runs out, or be the last runner caught.

Eight original playgrounds give each chase a different rhythm. Garden Club has springboards and open terraces. Harbor Hop and Canal Arcade loop through tunnels at ground level, so running off one side brings you back on the other. Sunset Roofs has brick chimneys for wall slides and wall jumps. Frost Park is icy, so you slide past corners if you brake late. Toy Works moves you along conveyor belts, the Night Market has warp lanterns that link the ground to the upper stalls, and Kite Hill lifts you on warm updrafts to its highest decks.

Computer rivals are labelled CPU and play by the same rules as you. They plan routes with moves that were tested by running the real game physics, so they climb, drop, wall jump and use lanterns and tunnels rather than teleporting. They react with a short delay, cannot see a player using the Ghost power-up, and come in Easy, Normal and Hard. Power-ups are optional and equal for everyone: Sneakers for speed, Springs for higher jumps and an extra air jump, Frost to freeze everyone nearby for a moment, and Ghost to slip out of a computer’s sight.

The Playground Tour has 24 stages, three in each playground, and each stage has three star goals such as winning, staying free for a number of seconds, thawing friends or grabbing power-ups. Every star has been earned in testing by a computer player using the same physics, so none of them are out of reach. Stars unlock more characters, from a frog and a bear to a mouse and a penguin, plus hats that change only how they look. The daily chase picks one mode, playground, twist and set of rivals for the date, and counts a winning streak.

Two people can play on one keyboard, on one phone or tablet with a control pad for each player, or with gamepads; up to four people fit in one match, and computer players can fill the remaining seats up to six. On a phone held upright, the camera follows the action between the scoreboard and the thumb controls, and arrows at the screen edges point to players out of view. Sound is generated in the browser, with optional music. Your stars, looks, records and settings stay in this browser; there are no accounts, online rooms or public leaderboards.

A little help for your next high score

• In Crown Tag, watch the clocks rather than the tag count. One tag followed by a long escape beats several quick swaps that leave you holding the crown.
• Use the no-tag-back shield. Right after you pass the crown you are protected from that player, so change direction or level straight away instead of staying close.
• Drops are faster than climbs. When a chaser jumps up to your deck, press down and fall through to the level below, then run the other way.
• Save your dash for the last few steps of a chase or to break away from a close runner. Dashing into a wall or off an icy ledge wastes it for almost two seconds.
• Learn each playground’s shortcut: the tunnels at Harbor Hop and Canal Arcade, the warp lanterns at the Night Market, the springboards in Garden Club and the updrafts on Kite Hill.
• In Freeze Tag, thaw friends when IT is busy on the other side. In Infection, avoid corners and crowded decks, because slower chasers still trap runners who stop moving.

Good questions