Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe
The Bitmap Brothers released Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe for IBM PC MS-DOS 2.1 in 1991. Speedball 2 was designed by Eric Matthews and programmed by Robert Trevellyan and Mike Montgomery. Speedball 2 graphics were drawn by Dan Malone. The Speedball 2 Nation 12 "Brutal Deluxe" soundtrack was composed by Simon Rogers.
Speedball 2 is the Bitmap Brothers' sequel to the original Speedball of 1988. Speedball 2 is notable for its accurate controls, multi-directionally scrolling pitch, smooth sprite-shifting and 2-player versus mode. Speedball 2 improved and expanded upon the audiovisuals and team-management features of the original Speedball; the sequel also plays much faster and smoother than the original.
Jumping up to catch a ball is much easier in Speedball 2 than it is in Speedball. Speedball 2 also added after-touch control (throw curve-balls).
The problem with single-player Speedball 2 is that it's too easy to farm wealth, purchase a top player, and then just bulldoze the opposition with that top player (a center-forward).
It is also too easy to electrify the ball and score or repeatedly employ bounce domes. And it is too easy to injure the opposition center forward and get him out of the game. The computer-controlled teams are not good at fighting for the score multiplier either.
That said, it is still a challenge to beat your highest scores and best stat-lines. And of course, there is 2-player mode.
Speedball 2 displays in 256-color VGA 320x200.
Speedball 2 requires an i8086 CPU clocked at 10 MHz and 640K RAM. Speedball 2 audio supports Sound Blaster, AdLib and Roland. A joystick is recommended. Speedball 2 was distributed on 2x 5.25" 360kB DS DD diskettes or 1x 3.5" 720kB DS DD diskette.
Speedball 2 Feature List
- Run with ball, slide, slide tackle to get ball, punch to get ball, catch ball, throw ball (high and low) + after-touch control
- 1x team to choose from: Brutal Deluxe (original Speedball 3x)
- 9x players on-pitch players per side (original Speedball only 5x)
- Positions: Forwards, Mids, Backs, Goalies and Subs (x3)
- Two halves lasting 90 seconds each
- Sampled Speech (Get Ready! Ice Cream! Replay!)
- Slo-mo goal replays (slow-motion)
- 8-way player-sprite movement
- 8-way scrolling pitch (original Speedball only 2-way)
- Overhead highlight indicates player-unit being controlled (based on proximity to ball)
- League, Knockout, Cup & Practice modes of play (original Speedball only League & Knockout)
- League has Team Manager mode
- League, Fixtures, Results and Stat tables
- 2-player simultaneous, versus computer or no opponent (practice)
- Transferable players (Trades) and upgradeable players (Gym)
- 8x player stats (each player is constituted by eight stats)
- Injuries (players are stretchered off on RoboBots)
- Save game per four matches
- 2x Divisions and 16x computer-controlled teams
- 21x different "power-up" tokens that can be collected during matches
- Warp gate, bounce domes, electro-bounce ball electrifier, score multiplier, star board
Speedball 2 Atari ST & Amiga Versions
The Atari ST and Amiga versions of Speedball 2 were released in December of 1990. Amiga Speedball 2 is practically identical to the PC VGA version (the VGA version being a port of the Amiga version), but the ST version only displays in 16 colors and its audio is much weaker. Also, there are no rivets on the pitch or star-shape painted on the pitch.
Speedball 2 Atari ST version:
The Amiga Speedball 2 pitch of 1990 is 640 pixels in width and 1152 pixels in height whereas the Amiga Speedball pitch of 1988 was only 320 in width and 592 in height.
Speedball 2 Commodore 64 1991
The Bitmap Brothers ported their 1990 ST/Amiga version of Speedball 2 to Commodore 64 in 1991. Published by Imageworks of Mirrorsoft, C64 Speedball 2 was programmed by Carl Muller, drawn by Alan Tomkins and composed by Martin Walker.
C64 Speedball 2 lacks the sampled sounds of Amiga Speedball 2, but the gameplay and menus have been faithfully transferred over. The screen scrolls smoothly and the silvery ball and player-sprites move about well.
In addition, Martin Walker's SID rendition of Nation 12's composition is (relatively speaking) as good as Richard Joseph's Paula rendition.
Indexes:
- Amiga Games Reviews (Index to all Amiga game reviews)
- Computer Game Reviews (Index to all computer game reviews)
- History of Computer Games (Master Index)
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