🔨Play Whack-a-Mole

Whack-a-Mole is a reaction test wearing a fairground costume. The original cabinet appeared in Japan in the mid-1970s and the format has barely changed since, because it does not need to: pop-up targets and a short timer are a complete game.

The version here adds two things to the classic loop. Golden moles create a decision — they appear less often and hide faster, so going for one means abandoning whatever you were about to hit. Bombs create the opposite pressure, punishing pure speed and forcing you to actually look at what you are hitting.

Thirty seconds is a deliberately short round. It keeps the whole game inside the window where sustained attention is easy, and it means a bad start is never worth quitting over — you can just play again.

Keyboard controls exist because they are genuinely better. Mapping the nine holes to the number keys removes travel time entirely and pushes the ceiling of the game noticeably higher.