Every hazard in Fliptempo belongs to one world. Downtown never throws ice at you and the Storm has no cars, so once you know a world's set you know everything a level in it can do. This chapter goes world by world. For the order of the worlds and their levels, see Worlds and levels.
Rules that hold everywhere
- There is always a way through. Each level is built around a proven route, and every hazard is checked against that route across its whole motion before it is placed.
- Sweeping hazards leave a safe side. Beams, floods and curtains cover part of the corridor, not all of it. Read which side is live and take the other.
- Warnings are timed to your arrival. A charging beam or a swelling bubble is set to go live as you reach it, not before. If it is warning, it will be dangerous when you get there.
- Surge beats everything. While Surge is running you smash through solid objects for points and ignore beams, lava and floods. See Techniques for charging it.
Gems
Gems are the magenta crystals, and they are the same in every world. A level holds five on Easy and ten on Hard, spread evenly from about 15% to 84% of the way through, and every one sits on the proven route. Each gem adds 1,500 points times your multiplier, and it goes into your gem total the instant you touch it, even if you crash a second later. Collecting all of them is one of the two conditions for the bonus stars. During Surge, gems are pulled in from 3.4 times further away.
Downtown
| Hazard | Where | How to read it |
|---|---|---|
| Lamp posts | Floor | Static, standing on the road at intervals. |
| Cars | Floor | Drive along the road toward you, faster than the street scrolls. The headlight cone shows where the car is about to be. |
| Traffic signals | Ceiling | Static and solid, hanging from wires. Rare and brightly lit. |
| Scanner gate | Either wall | Two posts that charge, fire a beam across 55% of the corridor, then cool. It fires as you arrive. 45% is always open: go to the wall the beam is not coming from. |
| Cargo hauler | Mid-air | A drone carrying a crate on cables. The crate winches up and down, so the open gap moves; the cable length tells you which way. |
| Wrecking ball | Floor, from level 16 | A crane ball swinging on a pendulum over the road. Watch the arc, not the ball. |
| Elevated train | Ceiling, from level 16 | Runs the ceiling rail toward you, faster than the scroll. |
The Storm
| Hazard | Where | How to read it |
|---|---|---|
| Shard comb | One wall | A row of ice teeth rising and falling on a wave. The low point of the wave is an open channel that travels along the row: ride the channel. |
| Shard rotor | Mid-corridor | Two or three ice arms turning around a core. The safe gap rotates, so aim for where it will be, and give the whole disc room. |
| Bird flock | Near one wall | A loose V of birds flying at you, wobbling but never crossing to the far side. Appear after the first sixth of a level. |
| Calving curtain | One wall | A row of shards along a crack. They shear off and fall part of the way across the corridor; the far lane stays open. |
| Ice spikes | Both walls | Static spikes rooted in the walls, placed so that long rides along either wall get interrupted. |
The Belt
The Belt mixes things that kill you with things you should fly straight into. The helpers sit on the route, usually where it crosses the middle of the corridor.
| Object | Type | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Asteroids | Hazard | Faceted rocks drifting through the corridor. |
| Fuse rocks | Bonus | Asteroids with glowing red veins. Pass close and the rock lights, then explodes harmlessly behind you. Lighting several in quick succession builds a LIT chain worth 25 points per step, up to ten steps, times your multiplier. |
| Crystal geode | Helper | Fly into it to SHATTER it. Worth 60 points per step of a chain that lasts six seconds between geodes (up to eight), its small satellite crystals add more, and it counts as a flip for your combo. |
| Ion ring | Helper | Thread it through the centre for an ION DASH: 1.7 seconds that work like Surge, smashing rocks and ignoring hazards. |
| Arc tether | Hazard | Two rocks joined by an electric arc. The rocks are always solid; the arc between them switches on and off with the beat. Pass on the open side. |
| Solar flare | Set piece | Once per level, in the back half. A huge rock stands out from one wall and casts a long shadow. For a third of a second, everything outside the shadow burns. Be inside the shadow, clear of the rock itself. |
| Pulsar sweep | Set piece | Not in every level: about a third of first-pass Belt levels and half of second-pass ones. Warned two beats ahead, then half the corridor burns for a third of a second. |
The Forge
Colour tells you everything here: white-hot and orange kill, cyan helps, dark steel is solid.
| Object | Where | How to read it |
|---|---|---|
| Lava bubbles | Floor | Domes that swell before bursting upward. A row bursts as a travelling wave and never reaches across the whole corridor. |
| Molten floor | Floor | The lava surface rises over the floor in cycles. It glows and lifts before it becomes deadly, then drains. |
| Stalactites | Ceiling | Static rock spikes. Some shear off and fall; a scorch mark shows where they will land. |
| Molten pour | Ceiling | A curtain of lava poured from above, part-way down the corridor. |
| Furnace tap | Floor | Once per level, in the back half. Molten metal floods the lower part of the corridor, up to just under half its height. A rising glow gives four beats of warning, the flood lasts about a beat and a half, and then it drains. Climb. |
| Quench canister | On the route | Cyan. Fly through it and the floor is safe for a while: lava cannot kill you and bubbles on screen are capped. It also adds 100 points and a step to your combo. |
| Hammer | Either wall | A heavy ram that is raised as you pass and slams just after. Passing under it at the right moment pays a CLOSE CALL bonus. |
| Piston row | Either wall | Pistons that open ahead of you and slam shut behind, in a wave. |
| Grinding wheel | Either wall | A spinning wheel set into the wall, throwing sparks. |
| Slider | Mid-corridor | A heavy ball sliding up and down across the corridor. |
| Pendulum | Either wall | A weight swinging across most of the corridor. Pass it mid-swing for a CLOSE CALL. |
| Crucible | Ceiling | A ladle that pours a stream of lava to the floor for a set window, either before you arrive or just after. |
| Hot ingots | Hung from a wall | Solid if you hit them, but pass close and they are TEMPERED: they cool, drop away harmlessly and pay a chain of 25 points per step. |
A CLOSE CALL is worth 80 points times your multiplier, once per machine.
The Signal
Hot colours (yellow through red) kill; white-gold helps. Almost everything here moves in time with the music.
| Object | How to read it |
|---|---|
| Kick pistons | Blocks that punch out from a wall on every beat, then sink back. |
| Sequencer | Lit blocks that step down a column. |
| Orbiters | Two or three hot dots circling a point. |
| Sine dot | A single dot weaving up and down. |
| Faders | Three blocks sliding up and down out of step with each other. |
| Metronome | An arm ticking side to side from one wall. |
| Rotor | A bar spinning around the middle of the corridor. |
| Compressor | Both walls clamp in at once on the beat, leaving a narrow gap in the middle. Threading it pays 120 points times your multiplier. |
| The drop | Once per level, in the back half. The music goes quiet as a warning, then the bottom of the corridor floods for two beats. The game tells you: be on the ceiling. |
| Notes | White-gold, on your route. Fly through them for a NOTE chain: 35 points per step, or 60 for a PERFECT hit close to the beat, up to ten steps. Notes do not add to your combo. |