Game Review: Stopball (ZX Spectrum, Mastertronic)

First Impressions

Once the game has loaded, you are presented with a monochrome black and white menu screen.  You have the option to choose either the keyboard or joystick but for some reason, there is a very badly flickering block with what looks like an odd shaped = sign within it.

Now choosing a joystick or keyboard should be simple, right?  Pressing fire (press) begins the game on the keyboard but selecting a joystick is odd as you need to press L and Enter at the same time.  Quite why they didn’t have numbers to choose an option, I’ve no idea!

The inlay card says that if you press L, it can be played on a Sinclair Joystick but the only joystick mentioned is Kempston on the front menu screen.

Graphics

95% of Stop Ball is in monochrome black and white (including the loading screen).  The only other colour is green which is used around the main playing area, timer countdown and high-score table.

The backgrounds on most screens can make it rather difficult to keep track of where you are as you can totally blend in like camouflage. The screenshots on the back of the inlay card are not the Spectrum version.

Playability

The keys are un-definable and are an odd configuration of K (left), Enter (right), O (up) and L (fire). To add to the confusion, for some reason, the instructions don’t even mention that you can move down as well.  To do so, press M.

As the keys are bunched up so close to one another, it makes no sense to do so.  Although it is possible to move diagonally, its just plain awkward because of the keyboard layout. The only sensible option is therefore to play using the joystick.

Collision detection isn’t great either, although not terrible, it’s not far-off.  To be fair, if a ball bounces of one of your tiles, that seems quite accurate but on the avoidance screens, it isn’t so good.

Timer and Energy

During each screen, there is a timer that counts down to 01.

On the screens where you must bounce the ball, there is also a number showing how much energy you have remaining underneath the timer.  Keep the ball bouncing or its game over.

Sound Effects Only

Sound is limited to a nasty sounding buzzing noise (which can last a until you get the tile under the ball) or a small tap when a ball collides with another one or a tile you left when the bounces of it.

Music is non-existent.

Even The High-Score Table Is Rubbish!

As soon as the high-score table appears, you couldn’t always type your name in.  This is probably because there is no game over message and the Enter key is used to move right during the game.  So effectively if you are pressing Enter, it treats it as you have entered your name (blank).

If you are able to type your name in, it is possible to delete back (one saving grace). You must press fire (L) on the keyboard to exit the high-score table screen too!

Point of Interests

DroSoft who programmed the game were a Spanish computer and video game distributor. (They were also responsible for re-releasing Mastertronic and Virgin titles in Spain and even had their own Mastertronic range. We will be covering this elsewhere on the site – Editor)

When the loading screen is drawn, it loads a bit quicker despite being a standard loader.  As there is no colour, there isn’t any ink, paper and brightness to fill over for the block attributes.  This is the only game I’m aware of that loads like that.

Final Thoughts

If I’d bought this back in the day, I’d been thoroughly disappointed.  Yes, even bearing in mind that this is a budget game, you’d felt ripped off.

Stopball only gives you one life as well.  In someways, that may not be a bad thing, so you can reach for the power lead and switch it of sooner rather than later!

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