Speedball (Atari ST)

Super Adventures in Bitmap Brothers Games - Game 2

There aren't many sports games on this site, and the main reason for that is they're generally not very interesting to look at in screenshots. This is the left side of the pitch, this is the right side of the pitch, you've just seen the entire game.

Plus I'm bad at them. Really really bad at them. And I hate them.

But whatever, I'm going to play Speedball anyway.

I guess Speedball's going to be one of those ultraviolent future sports where everyone's wearing spiked gloves and body armour, all possibly inspired by the movie 'Rollerball'. I hope the guy's wearing armoured pants too or else he'll be limping around the pitch if he keeps that up.

Oh damn, those bastards have put the control instructions on the menu. That means I've got absolutely no excuse for not knowing how to play.

Well that's certainly a wall of text.

I'll just figure it out as I go. It can't be that hard, the controller only has one button.

You know, I keep accidentally typing the title as 'Spaceballs' and this picture ain't helping.

I gotta go with team Bitmap shades, as the other two look way too dumb.

He was about to punch his leg again, but he reached down and caught himself.

Okay, this looks pretty straightforward. The launcher in the center spits the ball in a random direction, then have to run and grab it.

There's only one thing I'm still not sure of. What colour am I?

Oh yeah, look at that! Straight down the field and right into the open goal. Green team didn't even put up a fight.

Fuck, I'm playing as green team aren't I?


A FEW SECONDS LATER.

And the green team scores a point! Making it 4-1 to the red team.

It seems easy enough to run up the field with the ball, as red team isn't trying that hard to take it off me, and there's no danger of accidentally dropping it. But getting it past the keeper into the goal is another story.

I could try to kick the ball at a wall and bounce it into the goal, but those green orbs are in the way and they seem to deflect it.


LATER.

Okay, it's only 7-1, I can still pull this back. Fortunately while red team was running around scoring goals, I was running around picking up coins. Now I've got all kinds of new corruption options available.

Shame I have no idea what any of these actually do.

Round 0, leg 2. I have to win or draw to stay in the game.

Well the good news is that we started at 0-0 again, so I didn't have to score 6 goals just to get a draw. The bad news is I still lost 3-2.

I would have done better if my damn goalkeeper hadn't failed to save a single goal. Though to be fair that is partially my fault, as I'm the one directly controlling him. But I'm usually trying to intercept the ball with one of the defenders, so when it switches to the keeper I'm still pulling in the wrong direction and he goes wandering away from the goal.


SEEMINGLY HOURS PASS.

That was a BEAUTIFUL shot! Right into the corner of the goal. 5-1 to me.

It's true, I finally won a leg. If I can keep this up I might actually make it through to round 1. I'm still no good at tackling the other team for the ball, or passing between my players, but running up the screen and avoiding the guys in red I can do.


BUT THEN, ON LEG 3.

Oh come on, I can't even see my damn players. This doesn't happen often, but it happens more often than I'd like.

But then I manage a truly outstanding shot. From the other side of the pitch I kick the ball off a wall and bounce it right into the goal. My own goal.

It's 3-2 in the final seconds of the third leg of round 0. All I have to do is get a draw and I'm through.

I can do this. I know I'm not the best at sports games, in fact I'm probably the worst at sports games, but I can do this.

I couldn't do it.

But fuck Speedball, I'm bored of that. I'm going to play Klash Ball on the NES instead! Apparently 'Speedball' didn't sound badass enough for Nintendo so they upgraded it.

Seems like basically the same thing though. It's even got the dude constantly punching his leg.

Klash Ball (NES)

Suddenly the Atari ST version seems a lot slicker in retrospect. I don't know what I was expecting, but this is pretty much the same thing except worse.

Klash Ball (NES)

Though at least in the NES version I get a huge scoreboard exploding onto the screen with every goal to show how badly I'm losing. This is the kind of thing the Atari ST version could have done with, a bit more flash and style.

But I'm bored with watching my team lose now, so I'm moving on to the next game.

Bitmap Brothers games:
Part 1: Xenon (Atari ST)

Part 2: Speedball (Atari ST)

Part 3: Xenon 2 - Megablast (Amiga)
Part 4: Cadaver (Amiga)
Part 5: Speedball 2 - Brutal Deluxe (Amiga)
Part 6: Gods (Amiga)
Part 7: Magic Pockets (Amiga)
Part 8: The Chaos Engine (Amiga)
Part 9: The Chaos Engine 2 (Amiga)
Part 10: Z (MS-DOS)