How to play
Balloon Pump is a push-your-luck game with one button doing almost all the work. Each pump adds air and raises the multiplier; any pump might be the one that bursts the balloon. You decide when to stop.
- Pick a risk. The buttons read Low, Medium and High. Each sets how likely a pump is to burst the balloon and how many pumps it takes to reach full size.
- Set your bet with the chips. Bets run from 100 to 10,000 credits in steps of 100.
- Tap Start. The bet leaves your balance and an empty balloon sits on the pump.
- Tap Pump as many times as you dare. The panel shows the current Multiplier, and a Next box shows what the following pump would pay and its chance of holding.
- Cash out at any point after the first pump. The button shows the exact amount you’d collect.
If the balloon pops, the bet is gone. If you pump all the way to full size without a burst, the top multiplier is paid automatically. On a keyboard, Space or Enter pumps.
The burst point is drawn from the game’s random generator at the start of each round. Nothing you do during the round can move it.
The three risk levels
| Risk | Burst chance per pump | Pumps to full size | After one pump | At full size |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Low | 1 in 20 | 40 | ×1.02 | ×7.54 |
| Medium | 1 in 10 | 30 | ×1.07 | ×22.88 |
| High | 1 in 5 | 20 | ×1.21 | ×84.13 |
The burst chance is the same on every pump: the fortieth pump on Low is exactly as risky as the first. That also lets you work out how often a balloon survives all the way. On Low it makes it to full size about 13% of the time (0.95 to the 40th power). On Medium the figure is around 4%, and on High a little over 1%.
How the multipliers are set
Each multiplier is the fair price of surviving that many pumps, shaved to 97%. Take Medium: a pump holds 9 times out of 10, so a fair game would multiply your stake by 10/9 for every survived pump. After three pumps the fair multiplier is (10/9)³, about 1.372, and the game pays 97% of that, ×1.33. Payouts are rounded down to whole credits.
The result is that the expected return is 97% of the bet no matter when you cash out. Stopping after one pump, after ten, or riding to the end all give the same long-run average. The house edge of 3% (plus a tiny rounding loss, under 1% even at the minimum bet) is built into every pump.
Strategy
There is no pump count that beats the game. What you choose is the shape of your results, not their average.
- Low risk, early cash-outs give frequent small wins and slow swings in your balance. Cashing out at around ×2 on Low takes 15 safe pumps, which happens a little under half the time.
- High risk, late cash-outs mean most rounds lose, but the occasional one pays dozens of times the bet.
- Decide your target before tapping Start. The temptation is always “one more pump”, and the Next box makes it look small. A plan set in advance is easier to follow.
- Ignore streaks. A run of busted balloons doesn’t make the next one safer, and a long safe run doesn’t make a burst “due”. Each pump is independent.
- Size your bet to your balance. Since every strategy returns 97% on average, the only thing bet size changes is how fast your credits move.
For a game with the same climb-and-cash-out idea but no fixed ceiling, try Multiplier Rocket. Tower Climb uses the same ladder of multipliers, but you pick a door on each floor instead of pumping.
If you enjoy Balloon Pump, try Ban Luck or Banca Francesa next.
