We couldn’t do a reboot of the 80s arcade genre without fruit bonuses – lots and lots of fruit bonuses. But the fruit in Space Ark does more than just give you bonus points because the key to a good arcade game is depth within simplicity. You get fruit as a bonus for creating Combos and collecting the fruit gives you points – simple. But fruit also increases your power meter (show on the left of the screen in this screen shot).

The meter has multiple levels and each level you reach multiplies the points you get from collecting DNA, combos and any lives remaining at the end of a level. This means that fruit has an impact on every other scoring element of the game and is an essential part of your Space Ark game play strategy if you want to achieve mega high scores.

But beware – gravity is a harsh mistress. The good work you do collecting fruit can be undone if you let your Arkonaut hit the ground. The level meter will drop one level every time you drop your Arkonaut (and you will lose one life as well.)

Previous Space Ark design posts:
Space Ark – Introducing combos