Ants (1998) — beta.playants.org

🎯 How to Play

Goal: get the most points by getting food. Send your ants to food: they pick it up and carry it home to your anthill, one piece at a time.
Score: yours is at the top of the screen, the other players' at the bottom. When the clock reaches 0:00 the highest score wins.
Power-ups dropped by special flowers give an ant a special power (see below); an ant holds one at a time.
Opponents: the Menu button starts a game on this computer against Easy, Medium or Hard bots, each base at its own level, with you and one bot as a team if you like, or alone as in the original; there you can also host or join a match on the game server to play against friends.
Help: F1 or the Help button shows the original's quick help.
Picture: 16:9 by default; Classic 4:3 is the original's picture. Choose it under the game (the game restarts), or add ?aspect=4:3 to the address (?aspect=16:9 for the wide one). ⛶ Fullscreen makes the picture as big as your screen allows.

🖱️ Mouse

Select: left click an ant. Shift+click adds or removes one. Drag a box (more than 4 px) to select your ants inside it.
Order with a left click: ground = move, food = harvest and carry it home, another player's ant = attack.
Right click: a move for groups, workers and combat ants; a single powered ant uses its special power. It acts when you release the button.
Buttons left of the Status box: Move, and for a powered ant Use Special Power. Click one, then click the target. Stop (on the right) halts the ants.
Minimap: hold the left button on it to scroll the map; right click sends your selected ants there.

🗺️ Scrolling

Edge scrolling: move the pointer to the edge of the map: an arrow shows and the map scrolls. Options → Map Scroll Rate sets the speed. In a window the map keeps scrolling while the pointer is just past the edge of the game (about an inch); it stops when the pointer goes farther, onto a button or a link of the page, or out of the window.
Fullscreen: ⛶ in the header. The black bars of a screen that is not 16:9 count as the picture's edge: the map scrolls with the pointer anywhere beyond it, corners included. The mouse is held inside the game (Fullscreen mouse: Locked, under the game, is the default): your cursor cannot leave the picture, so every edge of the screen scrolls the map, and a Mac's Dock and menu bar stay away. A click on the game takes the mouse again if the browser let it go (that click does nothing else).
Esc in fullscreen: in Chrome and Edge Esc goes to the game (deselect, close a dialog) and holding it leaves fullscreen; in Safari and Firefox Esc gives the mouse back first (Safari leaves fullscreen with it).Free under the game gives the browser's plain fullscreen.
Minimap: hold the left button on it and the view follows the pointer.
Jump to an ant: Ctrl+N / Ctrl+P select the next / previous ant and scroll to it; Ctrl+H selects your anthill.
Zoom: the mouse wheel (a trackpad's two-finger scroll or pinch) over the map zooms in and out towards the pointer, one level a notch: from 2× (every world pixel a 2 × 2 square) through 1× (the original's picture) down to the whole width or height of the map; the middle button goes back to 1×. It works in an online match too.
As in the original, nothing scrolls with the keyboard: arrows and WASD do nothing.

⌨️ Keyboard

Hold Ctrl (the Control key, on a Mac too):
A select all your ants • S stop the selected ants
L show / hide hit-point numbers
O options • Q quit dialog
Esc deselect • F1 quick help
Chat: just type; Enter sends. F9–F12 send the four quick chat texts (edit them in Options).
Setup screen: ↑ / ↓ pick the map, Enter or S starts, Q or X leaves.
Browsers keep some Ctrl shortcuts for themselves (Ctrl+N opens a window on Windows and Linux); the on-screen buttons always work.

🐜 Special Powers

An ant that picks up a power-up gets its power. Select the ant, click the special power button (or right click), then click where to use it.
Bomber: plants a bomb, or puts out one of yours. A bomb goes off when an ant walks onto it.
Fire ant: builds a wall of fire (about 3 minutes, not on mud) or puts one out.
Swimmer: swims, and builds or demolishes mud mound bridges on water.
Thief: steals food (up to 50 points) from another player's anthill.
Combat ant: hits hard (it throws its victim four tiles) and attacks enemy ants near it by itself.

📱 Touch & Mobile

Tap acts like a left click: select, move, harvest, attack.
Special powers: tap the special power button, then tap the target (there is no right click on a touch screen).
Minimap: press and drag on it to scroll the map.
Fullscreen: tap ⛶ in the header; landscape works best.
The keyboard shortcuts need a keyboard.