Zerdly

Zerdly Bot Arena

A fast first-person arena match against friendly training robots. Tagged bots simply power down and reboot. Everything runs in your browser against offline bots - there is no online play.

Loading Zerdly Bot Arena…

About Zerdly Bot Arena

Zerdly Bot Arena is an original first-person arena game set in clean sci-fi training yards. You move, take cover, dash and tag bots with four original tag blasters: the steady Pulse Rifle, the three-shot Burst Caster, the slow lobbed Arc Orb and the close-range Scatter Tool.

There are three arenas - Lattice Yard, Beacon Terraces and Switchback Hall - each with three lanes, cover clusters, a protected spawn and an alternative route. Four bot roles play differently: Scouts roam the outer lanes, Guards hold cover near objectives, Flankers take the side route and Anchors lob orbs from the back.

Bots follow a hand-made route map for each arena and switch between patrolling, investigating, engaging, taking cover, reloading, capturing and retreating. Difficulty (Calm, Steady, Sharp, Expert) only changes how quickly they react, how wide their aim is, how often they strafe and how they plan. Health, shield, damage and speed are the same for you and the bots on every level.

How to play

  1. Press Play, choose a mode, an arena, the number of bots, the difficulty and your two weapons, then read the short objective card and press Deploy.
  2. First time? The objective card offers a quick Weapon Lab warm-up with targets that never fire back.
  3. Watch for the coral glow and ring: that bot is winding up to fire at you. Break its line of sight or move and it cannot hit you.
  4. After the match, the results show accuracy, eliminations, objective time, damage taken and one training tip. Rematch is one button.

Controls

  • Keyboard and mouse: click the view to capture the mouse, WASD or arrow keys to move, mouse to look, left click or F to fire, right click or V to aim, R to reload, Q, 1, 2 or the mouse wheel to swap weapon, Space to jump, Shift to dash, E to use a refill pad, Esc to pause.
  • Keyboard only: J and L turn, I and K look up and down, so the game can be played without a mouse.
  • If the mouse cannot be captured, hold a mouse button and drag to look instead.
  • Touch: a stick in the lower left moves, drag on the right half of the view to look, and the lower-right buttons fire, jump, reload and dash. A left-handed layout swaps the sides. Optional aim assist slows the view near a visible bot.

The rules

  • Bot Skirmish: free-for-all against 1 to 7 bots. First to the score cap (10, 15 or 20) wins, or the top score when the clock runs out. You reboot 3 seconds after powering down.
  • Beacon Control: your team and hostile bots fight over one glowing beacon ring that moves every minute with a 10 second warning. Each second your team holds it uncontested scores a point; first to 150 wins.
  • Survival: eight escalating bot squads, one life, with health, shield and ammo refilled between waves. The difficulty you pick is the ceiling for every wave.
  • Weapon Lab: 60 seconds against practice targets - static, sliding, pop-up, orb rings and strafing dummies. Nothing fires back.
  • Daily Contract: the same seeded arena, mode, bot line-up, loadout and rule for everyone each day (UTC). Practice runs are not recorded.
  • Friendly fire is off, and a short spawn shield protects you after rebooting until you fire.

Scoring, saving and limits

Skirmish counts eliminations; Beacon Control counts seconds held; Survival gives 100 points per wave cleared, 10 per elimination and 5 for every second left on the wave timer; the Weapon Lab counts targets cleared and accuracy. Your best result for each mode and arena is kept, and six challenge cards unlock blaster coatings.

Bests, challenge cards, coatings, your last match setup and settings 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 this game's data.

Needs a browser with WebGL 2. Single player against offline bots only - no online matches and no global leaderboard. Daily results are kept on this device only. The optional replay cam from the design brief is not included.

Accessibility

Settings include look sensitivity, inverted look, reduced motion, graphics quality, stick size and opacity, and a left-handed touch layout. Sound is off until you turn it on. Hits on bots (white cross) and damage to you (coral edge glow and direction arc) use different cues, and match status is announced to screen readers. Every bot level is described in plain words before you play.

Questions

Is this violent?
No. The bots are training robots and the blasters are tag tools: a tagged bot powers down and reboots a few seconds later. There is no blood or gore.
Do the bots cheat on Expert?
No. Every level reacts no faster than a fixed floor, has a capped aim, a limited field of view and range, and needs a clear line of sight to see or fire. Expert is harder because it reacts sooner and plans better, not because it gets extra health or damage.
How is this different from the Aim Trainer?
The Aim Trainer is about clicking static targets. Zerdly Bot Arena is a full arena game: you move through three-lane maps, use cover, dash and capture beacons against bots that patrol, take cover and flank.
Does it work on a phone?
Yes. On a touch screen the stick, look area and action buttons appear inside the game view, and both thumbs work at once. A recent phone with WebGL 2 is needed.