Rotate, thrust, and touch down softly on the flat landing pads — fuel is limited and gravity is patient.
Hold ◀ or ▶ to rotate. Hold ▲ to fire the main thruster (along the lander's nose). Land vertically on a flat pad with low velocity to score. Fuel left, smaller pads, and softer touchdowns all multiply your score. Crash = run over.
Read the velocity readout, not the visuals. The Vy number is what kills you — anything above ~25 px/s on touchdown is a crash. Train yourself to glance at Vy every second, not at how slow the lander looks. Visual speed is deceptive at high altitude.
Kill horizontal drift early. The lander's rotation rate is slow, so if you build up sideways velocity near the ground, you can't tilt enough to cancel it in time. Cancel Vx before descending: rotate to oppose drift, hold thrust briefly, level back to upright.
Approach high and slow, not low and fast. Burn most of your fuel killing altitude with the lander upright (just brakes against gravity). The closer you start to a hover, the easier the final touchdown — and the more bonus you bank for being upright.
Aim for the smaller pads. A 60-px pad is worth 3–4× a 160-px pad. If you have plenty of fuel, the high-score play is to commit to the narrow pad early — center over it, then descend straight. Wide pads are insurance, narrow pads are the multiplier.