If you’re up to snuff on what’s new and exciting in mobile gaming, you’ve probably seen one or two people playing the addictive little arcade title Crossy Road. If you haven’t, you’re in for a treat. If you have, then even experienced gamers like you will enjoy our 10 best Crossy Road secrets, tips, and tricks (sorry, no “hacks” today) that can be used in the game. Time to put your game face on, and learn some of the techniques that will help you to rack up the highest score that you’ve seen yet.
Okay, readers. Hands in the air if you’re old enough (or “old school” enough) to have played Frogger. Yeah…I didn’t think so. Even though I always feel a little bit older when I ask, it’s worth taking note that classic titles like that still have a ton of relevant with regard to what we enjoy in games in 2016. Sure, we’re pushing the boundaries of digital environments with virtual reality and augmented reality, but thousands of people still get a kick out of titles with a simple premise and execution. Crossy Road definitely goes in that basket.
The goal of the game is simple, as is befitting a title that echoes back to classics–get a higher score than you did last time. If you ever spent a pocketful of quarters at an arcade cabinet, you can understand how furiously addictive it can be to know that someone, somewhere, has earned a higher score than you. It becomes an incessant urge to knock that imposter’s score off the board and seat yourself at the top.
That’s what you’ll be out to do in Crossy Road, as you pilot a pixelated avatar across a treacherous, repetitive environment that moves faster and faster as you get further in the game. You’ll dodge traffic, cross rivers by hopping across logs, and scurry across train tracks before the locomotives come whizzing by like speeding bullets. I can describe the gameplay all day long, but once you pick it up and start playing, you’ll understand how compelling it can be.
Once you start playing, though, you’re going to see how quickly the difficulty can ramp up in this game. It’s an absolute mess of digit dexterity madness, and it’s going to require some practice if you want to start ranking up with high scores. Assembled below are 10 of the “best practices” that you can employ in Crossy Road, whether you’re a newbie or someone that’s been playing for weeks.
Rhythm is Everything
Since so much of your success is dependent upon learning patterns and responding to them, there’s no way around the fact that it’s going to take some practice if you want to get better. This fact goes both ways–on one hand, you shouldn’t expect to get high scores right as you start playing, but you also shouldn’t beat yourself up if the game crushes your hopes and dreams several times.
Keep playing, keep going after the things you need to get better at, and you will see higher scores. Having a healthy dose of optimism is one of the best things that you can do for an arcade-style game like this.
Find Your Focus Point
This is actually something that I learned playing fighting games, but it’s just as applicable here. Instead of letting your eyes roam across the screen in search of the next oncoming hazard, find a good point to “focus” on, and keep your attention there.
The best spot? Right in front of your little, pixelated avatar, rather than on it. If you keep your attention riveted to the spot just ahead of your character, your eyes will start to get a sense for incoming danger, and you’ll notice your reaction times improving. Don’t believe me? Give it a try and find out!
Touch Smart
Are things moving slowly? Juke horizontally to get across faster! No matter if you’re crossing traffic or hopping logs across a river, it’s important to keep moving and keeep forward progress in mind! Games like Crossy Road are meant to keep you in constant motion, more so as they increase in difficulty.
Time standing still or time spent waiting is almost always wasted time, so if slow-moving obstacles are providing a barrier, look for a motion-oriented way to get past them!
Don’t Go Back
…Unless you absolutely have to! One of the ways to quickly (and unnecessarily) make yourself frustrated in Crossy Road is to panic and “backtrack.” If you let yourself develop a habit of this, you’ll seen be hopping all over the screen, forward and then back, and panicky taps will only get you smooshed.
The next time that your finger gets the urge to tap backwards and avoid danger, don’t let it. Develop a habit of constantly moving forward, any way that you can, and only allow yourself to backtrack once you know it’s not going to become repetitive behavior.
Learn the Patterns
Road. River. Railroad. River. Road. If you play Crossy Road for any prolonged amount of time, you will definitely start to notice patterns emerging in the obstacles that you encounter during your mad dash for a higher score. Before your mind learns them, your eyes will. After your eyes, your fingers.
Eventually, you’ll be able to move in response to obstacle patterns without even thinking about it, but before that, you need to not force the process–don’t get in your own way!
Behind, Not in Front
It may seem like a simple thing, but developing a habit of tapping behind your character–rather than in front, or anywhere else–will help you to keep better control over its movements. If you need to visualize it, try this: your avatar has a button that makes them move and jump, but it can only be accessed from behind. Get your fingers behaving accordingly, and you’re going to run into a lot fewer obstacles as you keep playing.
In Crossy Road, being able to see what’s ahead of you is very important. If you block that with a finger, you’re very literally working against yourself!
Take Breaks
Any game that’s outwardly designed to be frustrating is going to require you to take a break from time to time. Because Crossy Road is such a relentless exercise in small, dextrous movements, your fingers are going to get tired. When your patience is frayed, your joints are stiff, and you feel like tossing your phone out the window…do yourself a favor and take a break!
Especially as you progress further with your high score and encounter more difficult obstacles, you’re going to find that the game is outright malicious in its attempts to punish your reflexes. Understand that the experience is the same for everyone and everyone has to take a break now and again.
Earn, Don’t Spend
Look, we know that this game is going to dangle a carrot in your face. It’s a freemium title, which means that sooner or later, it’s going to offer features that you want to take advantage of. Often, this comes in the form of unlockable characters.
Now, you could wait to unlock these features following the natural progression of the game, earning slowly as you go until you have enough coins to unlock what you want to. Or, alternatively, you can drop some real money in the cash shop and unlock it immediately. This offer of instant gratification is why the freemium business model is so popular; people spend hundreds of dollars, sometimes, on a single title that might not cost more than twenty under a more traditional retail price. It’s nuts!
Therefore, I urge you to avoid spending your hard-earned money in the cash shop, and instead be patient. Save those coins, earn those coins, and let their rarity guide you towards the unlocks that you actually want.
Trailers for Coins
Occasionally, you’re going to see offers for short trailers–usually for other games–while you’re booting up Crossy Road. Do your coin cash flow a favor and watch them! It’s only a few minutes out of your life, and the rewards that you net will be a great boon as you work to unlock new characters.
Field of View
One of the consistent elements to the environment design in Crossy Road is shared with ye olde Frogger, and it’s why gamers like me find it to be so appealing. As obstacles move horizontally across your vertical progression path, they enter and exit through the sides of your screen. Following these motions, it makes sense that being able to see where things exit and enter your field of view might be a tiny bit beneficial to you.
Even though I certainly urge to you find a good “focus” spot for your eyes (usually just ahead of your character) that doesn’t mean your peripheral vision will somehow switch off. Your eyes and reflexes will be happy if you can clearly see your entire field of view.
There you have it! 10 of the best tricks, tips, secrets, and techniques to help you step up your Crossy Road game! As with any other mobile game from an authorized app store, you’re not going to find any working “hacks” that allow you to cheat, but the above practices might convince some people that you have. If you still have questions, let us know in the comments below, and don’t forget to share our guide!
