Outlaw Volleyball Remixed

"The best volleyball game for the PS2 (although that's not saying much)"

From those who brought us such raunchily amusing games as Outlaw Golf and... uh... Outlaw Golf 2, comes Outlaw Volleyball Remixed for the PS2! Once again, the outlaw gang is back to inject copious amounts of violence and sexuality into otherwise mundane sports activities. I can't wait for Outlaw Jarts.

The most important aspect of any sports title is how it plays. If you've got a clunky interface, it's just not going to be enjoyable to play, especially since plot is necessarily meager in such titles. Luckily, Outlaw has once again managed to grasp the dynamics of a sport and make it accessible enough to grasp, yet complex enough to challenge you. The majority of the time, you will only need to use one analog stick and a single button for all your ball interaction needs. However, the timing of that button combined with options for immediate returns, as well as the inclusion of a turbo meter, provide you a variety of strategies during a volley. There are some reflexes required, but its more of a strategic duel – setting up your opponents to be far afield in one shot can yield dividends the next when you return it close to the net. Rest assured, this is no button masher.

The turbo meter adds another level of depth to the game. Your characters have a momentum meter, which will get larger or smaller depending on how well you're doing (similar to Outlaw Golf's composure meter). Your momentum determines how quickly your turbo meter fills. You can use your turbo meter to run more quickly via a shoulder button, which will help you get to those far-away shots in time. Once your turbo meter is full, though, you can hit a more powerful spike that is harder to return. Here another level of strategy develops – do you want to run down your turbo to ensure you return the ball close to the net, or do you opt to stay in the backcourt so you can get off a more powerful shot?

Also adding to the game's complexity is the inclusion of different rules during play. You have the standard rally point vs side out rules of scoring, but there are a host of other options available, which range from alternate victory conditions (having the most money in Casino scoring, forcing your opponent's time to run out in team timer) to complications on the court (an exploding ball in hot potato, and small bundles of dynamite laying around the court in time bomb). The different conditions force you to adapt your strategy to the situation – simply pounding the best serve and playing your best game will not always get the job done. Sometimes you need to opt for quick returns and exact placement to eke out a victory.

So, the gameplay is pretty nice. There are a variety of modes to play – tour mode lets you unlock stuff (characters, clothes, drills), drills will increase character skills, and exhibition will let you play against your friends. There's even an online option (though judging by the number of reviews of this game, you may have a hard time finding an opponent).

As far as playing through the game, there's a decent amount to unlock. You start with four characters, and can unlock another 10 or so. Each character has 3 different “basic' outfit sets, and you can unlock different colors for each piece. Interestingly, the characters you start off with are not very good at volleyball – a ranking system places their ability at A-D (A being the best, your four starters are D's) based on their four attributes. You can increase these attributes by completing drills. In an amusing twist, the characters you unlock will have higher skill levels, and you won't be able to use them until you have someone on your team of equal or greater skill (eg, an A will not join a D, but a D will join an A). So you have to play with chumps to unlock the allstars, and then upgrade your chumps so you can use them.

So – great volleyball engine, decent variety of matches, lots of unlockables... what's not to like? Unfortunately, a few things.

For starters, even though there's a certain level of complexity with skills, drilling, and partner selection, it ultimately falls flat. Characters can be upgraded to the highest rank by completing maybe 7 drills (out of 20 total). So it ceases to be a strategic issue after the first 10-15 events. What's worse – if you want to use a variety of people, you have to upgrade each one individually, including the unlocked ones. 20 drills x 15 people = 30 drills to fully upgrade all characters. Really not worth the effort. You're ultimately better off simply choosing one pair and sticking with it until you unlock a pair of “A” starters, then upgrading and using them for the rest of the game.

There's also the graphics, which are not great. Like Outlaw Golf, a lot of effort went into the characters themselves, but there isn't much texturing on them, and the backgrounds are by and large pretty bland. Bystanders likewise are featureless.

The sound is ok. Steve Carrell does the commentary and is a very funny man. But like Dave Attel in the last game, there's not enough here for the entire game experience. Too much repetition makes it just as much a negative as a positive. The music is acceptable – it doesn't grate on the nerves, but it's nothing you'd want to hear over and over again (which, unfortunately, you do).

There's a fighting option during gameplay - If you win, you get to steal the other player's momentum, but combat is uninspired. You've got one special move, and a couple of weak punches and kicks. It's clunky, and usually not worth doing unless you really need the momentum.

And a final bit of bad news - “Remix” is a pretty liberal term for this title. The back of the box tells us there's an extra character, two new courts, and hundreds of new outfits. That sounds great, doesn't it? Well, sure, but it's only correct in a technical sense. The one extra character is not accessible for tournament play, only exhibition or online. Likewise with the courts – they don't appear in the single player experience, and are lacking any specific commentary from Steve Carrell. The hundreds of outfits are simply pallette swaps of the usual designs – and there's not even really hundreds. They get that number because 2 of the 3 designs for each character are composed of two pieces – so you can get a “unique” outfit by combining two different colors. In reality, there are five color choices per piece when fully unlocked, so you have a theoretical 25 outfits per design, but the numbered colors were obviously meant to go together. So, claiming hundreds of new outfits is a real stretch. These gains are more than offset in the apparent drop in graphical acuity from the Xbox version (I haven't played it, but I've seen screenshots, and there's a difference).

So, what's the verdict? Well, I reviewed Summer Heat Volleyball a while back, and Outlaw is definitely better than that. It's also a budget title, so it's easier on the wallet than a lot of games. It's definitely your best option if you want to play volleyball on the PS2, but there's not a lot of competition. If you've already played the Xbox version, or own an Xbox, stick with the original title. If that option is not available to you, go ahead and give this a try. It's a decent sports title with enough variety and crude humor to keep you entertained for a while.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 12/08/05