Cake Bomb

"Cake Bomb new design.png Make an effort to defuse a Cake Bomb. The explosion is divine!" The cake bomb is a blocker in Candy Crush Saga, first introduced in level 366 of the 26th episode, Pudding Pagoda.

Appearances
For the list of levels that has this blocker, see here.

Characteristics
This blocker is very unusual in many different ways. It is the only blocker to take up four squares, or a 2×2 area. The blocker has a strange design - a round pink cake with a star in the middle and five sugar balls on the outside. The number of hits needed to destroy this blocker can vary significantly, from just the one hit to a maximum of eight (the most of any blocker). Like most blockers, cake bombs can have jelly beneath them. If present, there will be four squares of jelly, corresponding to the area covered by the cake.

Mechanics
Cake bombs can be destroyed either by making simple matches along the edges of the cake, or by using special candies and their combinations. This is detailed in the next section.

When all eight slices of cake are removed, a pink party popper will appear on the bottom right hand side of the screen after all cascades have been completed in the move that the cake was destroyed, and sends an explosion through the entire board, removing candies (include special candies) and blockers, and shatter the frame of the cake bomb. In the case of elements with several layers such as icing or jelly, a single layer will be removed. If two or more cake bombs are cleared in one move, they will activate one at a time in the same order of being cleared. The party popper appears for the first cake, and the board is cleared. When the board has settled, the next cake bomb will activate, etc.

No points are awarded for removing the eight slices of the cake bomb. The amount of points earned for clearing a cake bomb is based on the number of candies on the board. 100 points are awarded for every regular candy or special candy cleared by the party popper. The number of points increases if candy bombs are cleared as well. Each layer of jelly cleared by a cake bomb is worth 1,000 points. 20 points are awarded for clearing any blockers such as chocolate or icing. However, no points are awarded for removing marmalade.

If a cake bomb is cleared before conveyor belts move, it will go off before the belts move. This is first seen in level 650.

Exploding a cake bomb on the last move of a level will result in the party popper clearing the board of candies.

Strategy
The positions of the cake bombs can affect the difficulty of a level directly. If they are positioned in the middle, it is quite easy to break them by just using normal matches. If they are situated on the edges or corners, it can be quite hard because special candy would be required for the corner slices to be cut off, even resorting to special candy combinations.

Destroying a cake bomb
Making simple candy matches adjacent to the cake will remove up to two segments of the cake. One segment is removed from each of the quadrants adjacent to a matched candy.

A striped candy will remove up to two segments from the cake, one from each of the quadrants in its line of action. A wrapped candy can remove up to four segments: if detonated adjacent to the cake, it can take out up to two segments with the first explosion, and up to two more with the second. A wrapped + wrapped combination can clear a cake bomb completely, by taking four slices out with each explosion, provided both explosions are adjacent to it. A striped + wrapped combination can remove up to four pieces of the cake, but will take at most one piece from each quadrant.

A colour bomb matched with a regular candy is ineffective against a cake bomb; even when it removes candies adjacent to the cake bomb, no slices are destroyed. However, the colour bomb + striped candy combination can be helpful. Finally, mixing two colour bombs will remove one slice from each quadrant.

Jelly levels
In jelly levels, cake bombs usually have jellies underneath them, so it is essential to try to find ways to set them off as soon as possible. Typically, the jellies can be cleared only after the cake bomb is removed. However, jellies behind cake bombs can also be destroyed without destroying the cake bomb itself, by using jelly fish from board layout, mystery candies, or boosters.

Notice that, when a cake bomb is cleared, the jelly tiles below will take one hit, leaving single jellies or nothing to worry about.

Ingredients levels
In ingredient levels, sometimes the cake bombs block the path for ingredients to drop down, forcing the player to get rid of them in order to complete the level. It is also possible for a level to contain so many icing squares that a player has to break the cakes to have an easier time bringing the ingredients down.

In rare cases, the cake bomb may act as an obstacle to cause sliding. This can be helpful if such sliding route can let ingredients slip through the exit. On the other hand, avoid such sliding if it leads to stuck zones.

Candy Order levels
Cake bombs can appear in candy order levels, too. In normal order levels (the ones requiring certain colours of candy) and special order levels, they are helpful for weakening a lot of blockers on board and boost the progress. If a cake bomb is destroyed, the candies presents on the board count as order, which is helpful in some levels like level 377. For some reason, colour bombs removed in this way are not counted as order in mobile version, beware.

However, they can become a hazard in combination order levels, since they can blow away your special candies which you are going to mix. A notorious level is level 421, which requires the player to mix striped candies together 5 times (once 7 times). Because all special candies are lost after a cake is blown up, the level requires all 2 (once 4) cakes to be removed before concentrating on mixing combinations. It can be a nearly impossible task to pull off, not to mention the order itself is extremely difficult already.

Moves and Timed levels
Cake Bombs may appear in moves levels and timed levels, but in most of such cases, destroying them is not necessary, unless the board is narrow and you have to clear some of them to gain room for cascades. They can be useful for earning points and clearing threatening blockers in order to get more points, although doing so will take a few moves off/seconds off the clock.

Sugar Drops
In case one wants to collect more sugar drops, one shall know that a cake bomb going to explode counts as a new cascade phase. The best scenario is to make a cascade while breaking a cake bomb in the same move, then after cake bomb goes off, another cascade occurs and forms another drop.

Trivia

 * About how a cake bomb sounds:
 * On web version, breaking slices causes a unique folding sound, but destroying all slices will have nothing special. The party popper also makes some "party noise".
 * On mobile device, breaking slices causes the same sound of removing bombs, and destroying all slices causes an exploding sound like a bomb explosion. However the party popper only makes another blow-up sound.
 * Clearing a cake bomb is definitely more effective than the colour bomb + colour bomb combination as the combination may work worse on awkward boards. It attacks all blockers, although it only takes one layer from multi-layered icing.
 * A cake bomb does not affect popcorns and other cake bombs.
 * The cakes appear in trays similar to the icing sachets. The trays have hearts inscribed in them, one on each quadrant.
 * On web version, candies will be blown away by the party popper. On mobile, candies will just disappear as the popper goes off.
 * Formerly, jellies behind cake bombs were not destroyed by the explosion. They can only be destroyed if they are within the range of a special candy when it goes off. This was changed in a later update.
 * As of mobile 1.53.0.2, by setting off a Cake Bomb, jellies below it will be ripped off one layer, but those behind other cake bombs will not.
 * In the past, jellies without a candy on them were not destroyed by the explosion, but the game has been updated: empty jellies are now removed as well.
 * If two or more cake bombs are destroyed at the same time on web version, the first party popper will clear the board, and a second or subsequent poppers will clear the board after all cascades from the first cake bomb have ended. This can be a problem in some levels (especially those with combination orders) because the first cake bomb explosion may create cascades which form special candies that are then blown away by subsequent cake bomb explosions. On mobile devices, only one popper used to appear even if two or more cake bombs are destroyed at the same time. It works the same way as web version now.
 * This blocker is usually helpful as it cleans the entire board, but it can also make a level much harder. Levels  and  are hard because of the cake bombs.*If a cake bomb is destroyed during Sugar Crush after counting moves, then the popper will work after other special candies go off.*Jelly fish and coconut wheels will actually set off and do their jobs if they are not in marmalade when a cake bomb goes off. When it is in marmalade, the marmalade will just be removed, even on mobile. Similarly, lucky candies and mystery candies are unveiled rather than removed by the bomb.
 * On web version, destroying a cake bomb on the same move a candy bomb reaches 0 will fail the level rather than eliminating the board. However, on mobile version, the bomb will be removed correctly.
 * In the sequel game , there is a blocker named, which also occupies 2×2 squares, takes 8 hits in total to remove, and clears the board upon destroyed. The main difference is that, jelly cake can take damage by hitting any square, but each hit cannot remove more than one slice, even the wrapped candy + wrapped candy combinations will only remove two slices instead of all the slices. After the jelly cake is detonated, some special candies like striped candies and wrapped candies will be activated instead of being blown away in Candy Crush Saga.
 * This jelly cake will blow up on its own without help of a party popper.
 * Cakes are well-known, favorite desserts in real life (and are also used to celebrate birthdays), but in Candy Crush Saga, it is used as a blocker, similar to chocolate.
 * The cake bomb may be the first blocker (in chronological order) to not be spawned by the magic mixer. It is likely that only blockers from the first 20 episodes of the game can be spawned (chocolate, marmalade, candy bombs, liquorice locks, liquorice swirls and all 5 layers of icing). Even if other blockers (such as popcorn) could be spawned by the magic mixer in a later update, it would still be unlikely for the cake bomb to be spawned because it is a 2×2 blocker and the magic mixer takes up only one space.
 * This is the first applicable blocker that has never appeared in marmalade, locks or chests. It is unlikely that will happen, since it is a blocker which occupies more than one space.
 * On HTML5 unknown version, this blocker changed the design. The party popper after clearing the cake bomb is switched to left instead of right, and party popper's popping animation is changed as well.
 * According to the files, it is possible that this blocker will be required as an order in future candy order levels.

Notable levels

 * Level 366 - First appearance
 * Level 373 - The level with the most cake bombs alongside level 2717, which is 6
 * Level 375 - 10th level
 * Level 381 - The 16th consecutive level of cake bomb and is the last of the 16 consecutive levels
 * Level 401 - 20th level
 * Level 421 - Was once an extremely threatening level where cake bombs are a serious hazard before it was nerfed.
 * Level 437 - Another level that is difficult mainly because of cake bombs
 * Level 477 - 30th level
 * Level 639 - 40th level
 * Level 750 - 50th level
 * Level 810 - 60th level
 * Level 892 - First moves level with cake bombs
 * Level 924 - 70th level
 * Level 1002 - 80th level
 * Level 1115 - 90th level
 * Level 1153 - 100th level
 * Level 1703 - First mixed level with cake bombs
 * Level 2525 - First six-coloured mixed level with cake bombs.
 * Level 2817 - Last level with cake bombs on Flash version.
 * Level 3574 - First level with cake bomb order.

Gallery
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