Zerdly

Corebreakers

An arena defence shooter: you do the shooting, and a small gadget budget only helps. Bots always have a way to the core - no layout can wall them out.

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About Corebreakers

Corebreakers is set in an abandoned crystal quarry. Bots walk marked lanes from the gates to the core in the middle. You move around the arena with a blaster and stop them yourself. Between waves you spend a small budget on five support gadgets: a slow field, a shield wall, a short-range turret, a mirror that sends bolts back, and a decoy beacon.

Before each wave a wave card lists every bot group, the lane it will use and, for saboteurs, which gadget they will go for. The dashed lines on the ground are the routes the bots will actually walk, worked out from your current layout. Gadgets can bend those routes but can never close a lane: a placement that would seal one is refused.

Five bot roles each have a clear tell and a counter - rushers, ranged bots that stop and charge a bolt, shielded bots you must hit from the side, saboteurs that hunt your gadgets, and slow heavies that smash walls. Three bosses - the Breach Strider, the Swarm Spindle and the Lens Warden - each change the fight in phases.

How to play

  1. Pick a contract and a difficulty. The first contract has a short guided tutorial you can skip.
  2. Between waves, select a pad and choose a gadget, or drag a gadget from the tray onto a pad. Read the wave card to see what is coming and where.
  3. Press Start wave, then move, aim and fire to stop every bot before it reaches the core. Overcharge (Q) boosts the gadget you aim at for a few seconds.
  4. Between waves you can repair the core a limited number of times, sell, move or rotate gadgets, and give one damaged gadget a free repair.

Controls

  • Keyboard and mouse: WASD or arrows to move, the mouse to aim, left click to fire, Space to evade, R to reload, Q to overcharge a gadget, V or right click for the close aim view (pointer lock), Esc to pause. F fires at the nearest threat.
  • Between waves: click a pad or press Tab to reach it and Enter to select, choose a gadget from the tray or drag it onto a pad. R rotates a wall or mirror, X sells, E jumps to the pads.
  • Touch: a stick on the left moves you, dragging the right side aims, and buttons fire, evade, overcharge and reload. Holding Fire without a recent aim drag aims at the nearest threat. Tap pads to build. A left-handed layout is in Settings.

The rules

  • A wave is cleared when every bot in it is destroyed. If the core reaches zero health the contract fails.
  • The core has a shield that soaks damage first and refills between waves. Core health only comes back through the limited repairs.
  • Each contract gives a fixed gadget budget. Selling an undamaged gadget refunds all of it; a damaged one refunds one less. Destroyed gadgets are gone but their cost returns to the budget.
  • No gadget can block a lane completely. Every placement is checked against the whole layout before it is allowed.
  • Bots on every difficulty react with a delay and miss sometimes. Ranged bots must see their target, and they glow before they fire.

Scoring, saving and limits

Points come from bots destroyed, waves cleared and finishing a contract. Each contract has three stars: the core at 60% or more, the contract's own objective, and finishing with gadget cost at or under the stated number. Stars unlock cosmetic core coatings and gadget colours only - every gadget is available from the start.

Progress, stars, best scores, settings and a run in progress (between waves) are saved in this browser on this device only. Nothing is uploaded and there is no account. The Clear data button in Settings removes only Corebreakers data.

Needs a browser with WebGL 2. There is no online leaderboard: the Daily Siege is the same for everyone on a given UTC day, but your best is only kept on this device. A run can only be resumed from the start of a wave, not mid-wave.

Accessibility

Settings include reduced motion, sound on or off (off until you turn it on), look sensitivity, inverted look, stick size and opacity, a left-handed touch layout and a graphics quality setting. Bots and gadgets are told apart by shape as well as colour. Every pad is a real button you can reach with Tab, and status changes are announced to screen readers.

Questions

Can I win just by building gadgets?
No. The budget is small and gadgets only slow, block, distract or chip at bots. You need to shoot most of each wave yourself.
Why was my gadget placement refused?
Most often because it would have closed a lane completely. The message on the pad panel says why: a wall needs a large pad, gadgets need space between them, and no lane may be sealed.
What does difficulty change?
Bot numbers, health and timing, plus how bots pick lanes. On Calm, bots take the shortest lane; on Sharp and Expert, saboteurs pick the lane nearest their target and heavies head for your walls.
Is the Daily Siege the same for everyone?
Yes. The arena, lanes, budget, gadgets and waves come from the UTC date, so everyone gets the same siege that day. Your best result is kept on this device.