Beach Spikers: Virtua Beach Volleyball

"Beachs, Women, Swimsuits, and Balls... What more do you need?"

Ok, let's face it, Volleyball games are few and far between, and until now, the sport of Volleyball has had no real video game to represent itself with. Perhaps it's because no one really watches professional Beach Ball in the first place, or perhaps it's because they simply didn't have the processing power to do justice to scantily-clad woman jumping around after a big, inflatable ball. Whatever the reason, the next generation of consoles is more than capable of accurately rendering half-naked wome... err... the sport of Beach Ball. Unfortunately the much acclaimed Dead Or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball for the XBox has recently been delayed (which will feature even hotter women than Beach Spikers does!), leaving me with no choice but to play Beach Spikers to satisfy my insatiable desire for... um... Volleyball.

Beach Spikers features 16 teams from around the world, and the ability to create your own team, from the country of your choosing. You'll find that there are no male playable characters in this game, only women, the way all games should be! The first mode is Arcade mode, where you choose a team and progress from one round to the other, beating each team as you go. This mode is ok for a few times, but most of the game's depth lies in World Tour Mode.

World Tour Mode allows you to create two custom characters (you, and your partner). You can customize their face, hair, skin color, and uniform, as well as throw in a few extras, like hats or sun glasses. Unfortunately you can't modify you're characters body at all, as all the character use the same polygon model, with different hair and skin added onto it. This is perhaps one of the larger disappointments with the game, as it sure would've been fun to modify your woman's... proportions. The hair types are also mostly the same, usually they either have short hair, or hair tied in a pony tail. Sure, I realize no one really plays Volleyball without tying back their long, flowing hair, but it sure would've been awesome if you could select from more hairstyles for your character. Also, your character's hue doesn't have a large range either (you can't have a pale white character, for some reason), only brown or a sun-burnt red. Next up is uniforms, you can select from over a hundred swimsuits for your team to wear. Unfortunately all the swimsuits seem more or less the same style of Bikini, with simply different colors and patterns on them. Perhaps some one-pieces or other weird swim suits would've been nice, but I guess not.

In World Tour Mode you control your main character, and the computer controls your partner. As you play through games, you receive points which you can use to upgrade your partner's various stats. When your partner starts out they're absolutely terrible, but later in the game they're even better than you are most of the time! Unfortunately things can get quite frustrating as your partner can be quiet temperamental. Every 10 plays you can either Praise, Encourage, or Scold your partner, which will raise or lower your partner's cooperation meter (which determines how well your partner plays). Sometimes my partner is doing good, so I praise her, and she gets mad at me, making her meter go DOWN! Has anyone ever gotten mad at you for praising her? Sometimes your partner's response makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Oh well...

You advance through 8 tournaments, earning points as you go to raise your overall rank and surpass the other countries. The game is very unbalanced however, as usually one team shoots out a good hundred points ahead of everyone else by the final few rounds. Furthermore, you might get stuck up against a really, really good team early on in the game, when your partner is terrible. In which case there really is no possible way you can win, a truly frustrating proposition. You just have to accept your loses and move on.

The next two modes are Multi-player and Tutorial mode. Both of which are fairly self-explanatory, and both of which are quiet good. The Multi-player game may be no Smash Bros. Melee, but at least it will extend the game's life by a few hours. Sega has also taken the liberty to add a few Beach-Ball related mini-games, such as racing across sand to grab a flag, or trying to block your opponent's shots from landing in a specified square. Although these are not all they could have been, and are not nearly as deep as Super Monkey Ball 2's mini-games were.

Graphic wise the game is quite brilliant. The women are all excellently crafted, and could be mistaken for real women at some points in the game. The background crowd is actually animated and detailed (instead of just being cheap cardboard cut outs, as they are in most sports games), and the backgrounds are nicely detailed. The shadows also move in real time, and look quite convincing. The sand also moves and sprays as the characters move around, leaving their footprints in the sand. Beach Spikers doesn't have any astounding special effects, such as sand clinging the character's body, lens-flare, or more sand effects.

Beach Spikers' gameplay mechanics work quite well, although I think the girls run a little slower than they should be able to (although some of the unbelievable saves which you can make sort of make up for that). My only real complaint is that the quasi-announcer yells ''fantastic!'' every 3 seconds, which REALLY gets annoying (especially for other people in the room, who always yell at me to turn that idiocy down). Also, all the games are only 2 on 2, you can't have any 3 on 3's, or a full Volleyball game of 6 on 6. I suppose having that many women on the screen at once would strain the processor, and the frame rate would take a major dip, so we'll just have to save that idea for Beach Spikers 2 for the Playstation 3 ^_^ .

Overall the World Tour mode is engrossing, and it will take you a few hours to go through it enough times to truly master it and unlock everything (as there are quiet a few extra swimsuits, hair styles, et cetera to be unlocked). The Arcade mode is nice for a few rounds of light play, and the Tutorial mode is a good learning experience for people unfamiliar with the game's controls. Multi-player mode will last at least a few hours, given that you can find enough people to play virtual volleyball with you. Beach Spikers is a fairly good game, with a reasonable amount of depth, although it can be frustrating at certain parts of the game. It's a good game for a rent or two, although it probably won't have enough replay value to merit a purchase. But heck, if you rent it and really enjoy it, go ahead and buy it!

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/21/02, Updated 11/21/02