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Power Spike Pro Beach Volleyball
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Graphics & Sound:
To begin with, the opening movie of Power Spike Pro Beach Volleyball was quite nice with scenes of many pro players, mostly female (lol), doing moves that I wished I could do in high school. The music was very modern and hip during the opening movie, but when you actually start the game and get to the menus, the music goes downhill. During actual gameplay, you don't here any music at all. The only thing you hear is crowd noises and an occasional grunt from the players. The graphics of Power Spike Pro Beach Volleyball are good enough for the type of game that it is. The stadiums that you play in are rendered well, but there is almost no movement from the crowd. You do have the option of playing during the middle of the day or the evening, which I think actually looks better than the daytime. You can pick either one for an exhibition match, but you lose that control during the tournaments. You are also slightly distant from the players during the game. They did this so that they could get the whole court onscreen. It does zoom in some during the replay, but not much.
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Gameplay:
Power Spike Pro Beach Volleyball is an officially licensed game of the Federation of International Volleyball, and to my knowledge is the only Volleyball game on the market for the computer. I have heard people say that there is a reason for that, because Volleyball is not a game that would translate well to the computer gaming world. I would have to disagree with that because I also remember playing Sydney 2000 based on the Olympic games and that translated really well. Since this game is sanctioned by the FIVB, you are able to play as one of over 50 male or female pro beach volleyball athletes including the top women's player Gabrielle Reece, the pretty girl from the box. You can also create and edit your own player that during game play, if you are playing alone, will pair up with a computer controlled player. This gives you the ability to play with up to four of your friends if you have enough room around the keyboard. If you are playing alone, you can select the player that the computer will control on your team. If two people are playing, then you will play against a computer-controlled team. There are three modes in Power Spike Pro Beach Volleyball . The first is Exhibition mode where you can play any of the players, or play the one that you created. You also get to choose who your computer controlled opponents will be. This was interesting because you can pair anybody up, even players from different countries. You also have World Tour mode. Here, you will participate in eight separate tournaments in which each team earns points based on their finish. Points are cumulative as each team progresses from event to event. During this mode it is not possible to change partners during the season. You also have Practice mode, which is a good idea before you start a tournament. During the actual gameplay, movable player aids will appear on the ground to assist you and to show you where the ball that was just hit is going to land. When I first started the game, it was a challenge to learn how to use the keyboard, but after you get the hang of it, it turns into an enjoyable game that has pretty good replayability to it.
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Difficulty:
Power Spike Pro Beach Volleyball has many different things that can make it easy or hard. First off, you have three difficulty modes: Amateur, Pro, and All Star. Guess which one was my favorite. I was telling a friend of mine the other day that I was proud of myself for winning a game, but it turns out I was on Amateur mode so I wasn't that proud. Also during gameplay, the real skill comes in from being at the right place at the right time. With the player aids (that looks like a large bull's eye on the ground) that expand and contract with the descent of the ball, you can position yourself at different parts of the aid to hit the ball differently and to hit in a different direction. This was hard to do and to get used to. But with practice, I got better. Now if I just had enough nerve to put the game on Pro difficulty. :)
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Game Mechanics:
NOTE: After receiving Power Spike Pro Beach Volleyball , I was quite excited to play a volleyball game because I had enjoyed playing the game in high school. Also, the box had a really pretty girl on the front. Gabby Reece! I tried to install it on my machine at home and it installed ok, but when I went to play the game, it kept freezing up my system. My system met the minimum requirements, but not the recommended requirements. There was only one thing to do from there. Take the game over to my Dad's computer, which is twice the size of mine. It installed ok and works wonderfully. In the whole time I have been playing the game, it has only frozen once on my Dad's computer and I think that was because I left the computer on all day long. However, another reviewer tried this game before me and had the same problem I had initially. His computer also met the minimum, but not the recommended requirements. You have been forewarned. When I first got Power Spike Pro Beach Volleyball , I hoped that it would be able to controlled by a joystick or game pad, but it turns out that what works better than anything else is the keyboard. You move your player with the arrow keys and use the number pad keys to hit different types of shots or block. I only really used two keys on the number pad, the 1 which is listed as a normal shot, and the 5 which is the block. I was not very good at blocking, so I was lucky that my computer-controlled teammate was pretty good at it. You can program the game to work with a game pad, but I never got that to work, which surprised me because Power Spike Pro Beach Volleyball originally came out on PlayStation. Power Spike Pro Beach Volleyball turns out to be an enjoyable but not perfect game, but have you every played a perfect game? I enjoyed getting better every time that I played and when I was only down a point when the opposing team was about to make their match point, my blood was pumping. Enjoy!
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-Wickserv, GameVortex Communications AKA Eric Wickwire |
Minimum System Requirements:
Pentium II/300 or AMD K6-2/266, 32 MB RAM, Windows 95/98/ME (Windows 2000/NT not supported), DirectX 8.0 (included), DirectSound compatible sound card, 250 MB hard drive space, 4X CD-ROM drive Recommended Configuration: Pentium III/450 or AMD K6-3/500, 64 MB RAM, 3D video card (PCI or AGP with 16MB RAM, 16X or faster CD-ROM drive |
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Test System:
Pentium II/1.o Ghz running Windows 98, 512 RAM, Creative Sound Blaster Live with Altec Lansing THX speakers, Nvidia Geoforce 2, DirectX 8, 64 Mb RAM, 6X24 DVD-ROM. |
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