Boat Tagger

Ninety seconds of paper boats chasing each other round a garden pond

2 player, one device
arcade
chase
2 player

▶ Play Boat Tagger Loads here in the page. No download, no account.

Prefer it full screen? Open Boat Tagger on its own.

About Boat Tagger

Four folded paper boats share a pond built like a tabletop diorama — grass bank, sand ring, a couple of rocky islets, four patches of lily pads. One boat is It. The other three are quietly banking a point every second they stay free, which is the whole reason anyone bothers running. Tagging pays ten, which is worth exactly ten seconds of freedom.

What gives it shape is that the boats handle like boats. They accelerate, they lean, they drag a wake, and they turn at a fixed rate however hard you want them to swing round. A chase is never about reaction speed, then; it is about geometry, and about reading a line two or three seconds before you have to commit to it.

A round lasts ninety seconds and the last five tick audibly, which tends to produce a scrappy finish where somebody lunges at a boat they had been politely ignoring all round. It suits a short sitting, it suits having somebody else in the room, and it does not much reward being good at video games.

What is different about this version

Two rules do most of the work. There are no tag-backs — the boat that just tagged you cannot be tagged straight back, and bumping it only produces a reminder to find somebody else, which stops two boats trading a tag forever in one corner. And the lily pads are a real hiding mechanic rather than scenery: sitting in one costs you a fifth of your top speed, but a computer boat has to come within about nine units before it registers you at all. The chaser is not simply faster than you either. A computer boat carrying the tag runs at ninety-four per cent of your top speed, so it only ever catches you by cutting a better line.

How to play Boat Tagger

Steer round the pond. Turning is rate-limited, so line up a curve early.
Whoever is It must touch another boat to pass the tag on.
Every boat that is not It banks a point per second.
Dash for a short burst; the cooldown allows roughly one per chase.
Sit in a lily patch to go hidden — slower, but bots only spot you close up.
After ninety seconds, boats are ranked on points.

Controls

Desktop	WASD or arrow keys to steer and Space to dash; holding the left mouse button steers toward the cursor and the right button dashes.
Phone or tablet	A thumbstick and a dash button, duplicated on the opposite side when two of you share the screen.
Players	One or two people on the same device. Nothing here plays over the internet.

Strategy

Points come from seconds, not tags, and that should govern everything. Ten points for a tag is worth exactly ten seconds of swimming free, so when you are It a desperate immediate lunge usually beats a careful pursuit — every second you spend circling is a second the other three are paid and you are not.

As a runner the most useful habit is refusing to turn. Your turn rate is fixed, so a boat that commits to a long straight down the pond and arcs only at the end is genuinely hard to intercept, while a boat that panics and wiggles bleeds speed on every direction change. Use the rocky islets as pivots: a chaser following your inside line has to widen out around the rock, and that half-second is often the whole margin.

Dash is the one resource worth hoarding. It is a short burst above top speed plus a shove of momentum, then several seconds of nothing. Spending it the moment somebody looks at you leaves you helpless for the chase that actually matters. Save it until a chaser has committed to an arc, cut across its nose, and you are gone. The lily pads are the endgame: holding a lead with twenty seconds left, park in the weeds, accept the slower speed and let the chaser sweep past.

Mistakes that cost you the game

Chasing the boat directly ahead rather than the one you can cut off. Following a wake keeps you exactly as far behind as you started.
Dashing the instant you become It, leaving nothing for the moment your target commits to a turn.
Bumping the same boat again after it tags you. It is protected, and every attempt costs a second.
Hiding in a lily patch while you are It. The penalty still applies and nobody is coming to find you.

Tips

Aim at where a boat will be in two seconds, not at its hull.
The pond is far wider than it is deep. Long sides build speed; corners are where tags land.
Nothing can be tagged for a couple of seconds after a swap. That is free distance.
In two-player, the bots are still scoring. Ignoring them is how you both lose to one.
Five seconds left and holding the tag: commit to the nearest boat.

Questions about Boat Tagger

Can I play this with someone next to me?

Yes — one of you takes WASD and Space, the other the arrow keys and Enter, or two thumbsticks on a phone. The other two boats stay on autopilot.

What decides the final ranking?

One point per second spent not being It, plus ten per tag landed. Level scores go to whoever carried the tag for less time.

Does hiding really work?

At distance, yes. A lily patch keeps you off a bot's radar until it comes close, so it breaks a pursuit rather than making you invisible.

Why can I not tag back?

Without that rule two boats swap the tag in one spot forever and nobody scores.

Does it cost anything?

No. Boat Tagger is free to play, runs in your browser, and needs no download, install or account.

More games like this

See all 105 games · Read the articles