No I’m not talking about Rocket League, the game I mean is LockBall.

What’s that? You haven’t heard of LockBall?

Neither had I until I started playing World’s Dawn.

I’ve played Stardew Valley, in fact I brought it while it was in early access. I thoroughly enjoyed the slower paced leisurely, “do whatever you want” style so when I was browsing steam the other day and came across World’s Dawn I thought “yeah why not?”.

It is essentially a Stardew Valley clone. You can farm crops to sell, make friends, fall in love and play the epic game known as LockBall.

In town there is a LockBall pitch where you can practice against the villagers.

The controls are quite simple, the arrow keys move you around and the space bar shoots and “locks down” the goal preventing your opponent scoring. I’ll admit I still have no idea how to lock down the goal. I’ve tried tapping space bar, holding space bar, shouting at the ball, everything.

Anyway, when I first played someone I lost spectacularly. I found the arrow keys on my laptop a bit to small to get the movements right. So with my defeat I thought that’s a stupid game I wont play that again. But then a few days later (in real time) I was informed by the villagers that there’s a LockBall tournament/festival on so thinking I could regain my pride I entered. The first two rounds against the villagers weren’t that bad and I surprised myself and got through to the final.

That’s where it all goes wrong as in the final you play against Paxel, who is some sort of LockBall God.

You would expect him to be harder but his AI really is a step up from the previous rounds, so much so I couldn’t beat him.

Never mind second isn’t too bad.

Then the game goes and does something that is unheard of,  it offers you a rematch!

6 games later I still cant beat him and the closest I’ve got is 5-2. Determined to win whatever amazing prize I’ve been promised by Bloom who runs the tournament I ask Chris if he wants a try.

It takes him a few tries, most of which involve swearing, shouting and laughing but Chris finally defeats him and I happily accept the new clothes and 300 coins as a reward.

It turns out, that if I had actually played the villagers when they appear you get better stats at LockBall, but even so, after doing some googling I am not the only one to have trouble facing Paxel. Most resorting to sheer force of will to beat him or even a glitch in some cases!

If other eSports have lost their appeal, I recommend a game of LockBall, I guarantee you will be 2 arrow keys away from throwing your keyboard out the window.