About Penalty Bluff

A free one-on-one penalty mind game, made by one person. This page explains where it came from, the rules it is built on and what you will find on this site.

Who makes it

Penalty Bluff is made by Artem Podrushniak, an independent game developer based in Indonesia. It is a one-person studio: the game design, the code, the computer opponents, the online server and the pages you are reading now are all the work of one developer. Even the sound effects are synthesised in code rather than taken from a sample library.

Being small has one advantage: every decision about the game can be made for the player rather than for a sales target. The principles below are the result.

Where the idea came from

The game grew out of a short video that went viral: two friends playing penalties as a pure guessing game. One secretly chooses where to shoot, the other secretly chooses where to dive, and both reveal at the same moment — same zone, saved; different zone, goal. No skill with your feet, no reflexes, just one person trying to read another.

That structure is one of the oldest guessing games there is. Game theorists call it "matching pennies", and real penalty kicks follow the same logic: the keeper has to commit before the ball is struck, so both sides are guessing. We wanted a version you could play anywhere — with a friend on one phone, with someone in another city, or against a computer that studies how you play.

What the game stands for

• No luck in a kick. The two picks alone decide the result. The only chance in a match is the coin toss that decides who shoots first, and in a rematch the other player starts.
• Honest computer opponents. The computer makes its pick at the start of each kick and seals it. It never sees your choice. Against a truly random player, any level saves exactly one kick in three on average (on the Classic three-zone goal, with tricks off). It improves only by learning your habits from your earlier picks, using a team of small pattern predictors — the same idea as the well-known "Iocaine Powder" rock-paper-scissors program.
• Nothing that affects a kick is sold. Coins are earned by playing and spent in the Locker room on looks for the keeper, the shooter and the ball. Nobody can buy a better save.
• No pretend people. If you are left waiting for a random opponent online, you can choose to play a bot instead, and it is always labelled as a bot.
• No real clubs. There are no real teams, crests, players or competitions in the game or on this site. You put your own kit together in the Locker room.
• No accounts. You never sign up. Your progress stays in your browser; the privacy policy lists exactly what is kept and where.

What is on this site

The game itself runs in any modern browser on a phone or a computer, with nothing to install. You can play a quick match against the computer at four levels from Rookie to Legend, a career against two leagues of rivals who each have a habit to crack, a two-player match on one phone, or an online match against a friend or a random opponent.

Around the game there are pages that help you play it well:

• How to play — the zones, the match formats, the two tricks and every mode.
• Strategy guides — for example, how to read your rival, the game theory of a penalty kick, why people are bad at being random, when to use the tricks, how to beat the career rivals and ways to play with friends.
• The Privacy Policy and the Terms of Use.

The game is free. To pay for the servers and the time it takes to build it, the site may show ads.

Phone apps

Versions for Android and iPhone are in the works, built from the same code with the same rules and the same honest opponents. There is no release date yet. Until then, the browser version is the complete game, and an invite link you send from it opens straight in your friend's browser.

Get in touch

Found a bug, have an idea for a rival, or want to ask about your data? Everything you need is on the contact page. Every message is read.