Scoring Overview
For a more detailed description on how points are scored, please refer to Scoring Mechanics. All features except for Critical Hit apply to Kroakatoa Island.
Basic Matching
Match groups of three or more balls to clear them from the screen. They are normally worth 10 points per ball, but their point value increases based on your speed bonus and multiplier.
Combos
When balls are matched up, if it would cause another match when balls slide back, you receive a combo bonus. 1,000 points are gained for performing a successful combo, 2,000 for the next, etc. The bigger the combo, the further balls are pushed back to the start and the longer it will take to get back to normal speed (which may or may not be a good thing).
Ball is matched up here... ...yellow balls slide back for a combo.
Chains
Making six or more consecutive matches in a row gives you a small chain bonus. In addition to points gained from clearing balls, you get a chain bonus of 200 points plus 10 more after that (so a 10x chain gives you 240 extra points, 15x gives you 290 extra points, etc.)
Your chain bonus will break if you either miss or the ball fails to make a match.
Gap Shot
If you fire a ball through a gap in order to make a match, you will get a gap shot bonus. The smaller the gap, the more points you will earn. On the new island, the larger the gap, the more points you will get.
Gap Shots are the most common tool essential to producing high scores, due to the fact that this is the only mechanic that scores a lot differently than other Zuma games (10k compared to 500), and even higher on Kroakatoa (as much as 900k per gap). Its high point value means that your success in the leaderboard depends on whether or not you can find a way to get a lot of them. Once you master this on the new island, nothing else matters, as it will account for over 90% of your score alone.
There are many strategies that allow you to keep churning out high-value gap shots. See Gap Shot Tricks.
Multiple Gaps
If your shot passes through multiple gaps, your gap score is further multiplied by the number of gaps it passed through. Combined with a small gap, the results can be very impressive, capable of scoring hundreds of thousands of points within seconds in the end game.
Fruit
Introduced at level 6, fruit appears in areas where access typically requires breaking through one or two layers of balls. They last for a short time before they disappear. Each fruit collected will increase the point value of subsequent fruit collected.
Explosions
Starting with Hot Frog at level 3, and Bombs at Level 5, explosions can knock out a huge amount of balls on the screen for a small amount of points. Normal explosions (without upgraded powers or food items) are around seven balls in diameter.
Curve Clear
If you completely clear a curve (typically through the use of hot frog), you will get a bonus (the later in the game you do this, the larger the bonus), and balls will come back into play rapidly.There is a small distance that balls must come back up to before you can get a curve clear bonus again on the same curve.
Critical Hit
Introduced at level 14, you have a small percent chance (1-10%, depending on your level) that when you make a match, it will be worth twice as many points as usual. Your screen will flash ‘Critical!’ over your frog as well as a small distinctive sound when this happens.
End of Game Bonus
If you have Last Hurrah active, a score bonus will be given for each powerup left on the screen. If you have a monument active, you get a bonus for using it. On Kroakatoa Last Hurrah is automatically triggered after each game.