Pop Bubble Around is a bubble-popping game in the subcategory that has geometric patterns instead of hanging rows. This specific game features a hexagon-shaped pattern found in similar titles like Balloons Around and Bubble Around. The player's goals are to pop all the bubbles with a central projectile shooter, aiming line and targeting bubble and earn the highest online score.
The game presents the pattern of colorful glossy bubbles on a grid of gray frame-style hexagon spaces. When the player targets and hits a group of two or more adjacent matching bubbles with a color-matched projectile, the game doesn't pop the bubbles. It makes the cluster glow upon impact and then disappear from the grid.
Pop Bubble Around displays the score in the upper-center area above the pattern. It shows a preview of the next two projectiles in order in the lower-left corner. If the player wants to swap the central projectile with the next one, they merely need to select the numbered button in the upper-right corner. If they need to use this tool more than three times, they must view ad videos.
In the lower-right corner, the game offers two penalty passes. If the player fails to form a cluster of three or more bubbles two times, then it adds a frame of bubbles along the outer edge of the pattern. That said, if they fail once and then follow up with a hit, they receive back the lost pass, which means they can theoretically prevent penalty drops entirely.
The player can also remove more bubbles from the field by performing avalanche moves. They merely need to remove a cluster that has non-matching bubbles attached to it.
