Supraball PC Preview by Whippy – Edited by kytten of We Touch Games – Developer: Supra Games – Publisher: Supra Games – Genre: Sports
Supraball is an early access soccer game with a very interesting twist, replacing kicking with air guns that can knock out other players, shoot the ball across the map and have a shield to protect your goal. It all sounds good in theory and thankfully, it is still good in gameplay. Supraball is an amazing game, and I hope one day that it becomes an e-sport, though that won’t happen when there’s no one to play the sport.
The first thing I was greeted with was a small window that allowed me to pick a server, change my settings, etc. It’s a neat little launcher that works effectively in finding servers for me to choose. But before I could find a server, I had to play a practice match. The way it works is that you’re meant to find other players that are in the practice servers to play! But after 20 minutes of jumping in and out of servers trying to find someone, I ended up having to score one goal by myself and then alt tabbing waiting for the timer to count down so I could actually browse matches. Not only did this practice match just waste my time, but it also didn’t tell me a damn thing of how to play the game. All I knew was that I had to grab the ball with my generic looking air gun and get it in the goal of the other team. Not once was I told that I could use a shield, charge my up shots, and jump super high in the air, this all had to come with trial and error. After my boring practice match, I tried to auto find a server, but I never found one. I had to manually find my own servers using the browser and to my disappointment, I found a lot of servers that had no players. But luckily, I found one server in Europe that was full. I spectated the match as I waited and it was amazing, the spectator mode was really well done and always focused on the action as I oo’ed and ahh’ed at the close calls.
When I finally did get into the match, my eyes were glued to the screen. With clean textures and over 100FPS as all the action appeared on screen, the game looks amazing. My ears were blessed with some excellent sound design as the ball scraped on the grass and bounced off the walls. The crowd cheering as the ball got closer to the goal, the rush of defending the ball from your goal, it’s all fantastic. I got a familiar feeling that a lot of games don’t give me. When I got the ball, I knew I had limited time before someone knocked me out with the hyper air guns, so I get the feeling of “okay, don’t screw this up.” But sadly, with 300+ ping to the server and poor netcode for high pings, I found myself constantly screwing up. When I thought the ball had passed me, it would randomly spring back towards me, and I’d have it, when I let go of my right mouse button there as a considerable amount of lag from me letting it go and when it shot on screen. This could have been prevented with client side connections. Meaning that the server follows my role, not me following the server.
The atmosphere around the game can change, from a crowd cheering you on to being in a broken down castle. While they change the looks of the game, they don’t do much to alter it. Simple changes like having bumps in the floor, making the arena super big or small, having obstacles in the air or a having to put the ball somewhere else than the goal! Maybe a hoop? A box in the sky? A cup? Something that adds a different experience! Because sadly, the only experience I got was poor netcode for high ping, and the same level with different looks. When picking your spot in the lobby waiting for people to join, you can be an attacker or a defender, but annoyingly enough, it means absolutely nothing. You can be the goalie, but that doesn’t stop you from leaving the goalie position and trying to attack and score a goal. So you can actually have no designated goalie at some points, but thankfully you can just take over at any time seamlessly by just walking into the goalie zone.
When you’re not playing Supraball at 300+ ping, it can be seriously fun with friends that know how to play. There is no such thing as “off side” in Supraball, it’s no rules, all play. The bonus of being able to shoot people out of the air if you’re close to them adds that brutal side to Supraball, and it’s what also makes it so unique from the other soccer / party games. I really think Supraball could be a common party game with friends, if only it had more people playing it, the polish is there, the gameplay is amazing, but the playerbase is almost nonexistent. I like Supraball, and I believe many will also like it, but just remember when buying Supraball, you might want to grab a copy for a few friends, because finding random people to play with is like finding a needle in a haystack.
Whippy gives Supraball a Drastik Measure 6.5 out of 10.0 (65).
PROS:
- Unique way to play soccer
- Excellent sound design and graphics
- Fun with friends
CONS:
- Poor netcode for higher than normal ping
- No variations to map design besides looks
- Weak player base
