Table Tennis Live
At A Glance
- Customization, spectator mode, multiplayer, timed tournaments, and the other benefits of taking your Table Tennis game online.
All things considered, Rockstar Games presents Table Tennis is a multiplayer offering through and through. The sport itself, played in rec rooms, basements, and community centers around the country provides the ultimate pick up and play competition, and with spot on controls and easy-to-understand multiplayer features, Table Tennis looks to offer the most intuitive, fast-paced, competitive game on Xbox 360™.
The current online favorite, Liu Ping.
Timed Tournament and Exhibition
Once online, you'll have two main game modes to choose from, each with their own benefits. First up is Exhibition, which is simply a one-off affair played against a single opponent, usually with the object to win two out of three games to take the match.
Like most game-types on Xbox Live®, you can play Exhibition as Player Match (unranked) or Ranked game, if you're feeling a bit more competitive. In Player Match games, you'll be able to invite folks from your Friends List directly into the game, but with Ranked matches, you'll be pitted against the first person to join to make sure you don't "fix" games with your friends to cheat your ranking.
Timed Tournament is a bit more comprehensive game mode, but still easy to understand. Set up for either four or eight players, each player will rotate around to ensure that everyone gets to play against one another, with the player with the most overall wins taking the tournament. The distinguishing characteristic here is the time constraint. You don't play to a set number of games, but instead are given a set amount of time (7-10 minutes) to win as many 5 point games as you can.
It's all about the follow through.
Table Tennis Network
Table Tennis marks the first game since Project Gotham Racing® 3 to offer a Spectator mode, so whether you just want to take notes on other player's strategies, or you want to watch a couple friends of yours duking it out, you can hop in at any time of the match and watch to your hearts content. Also, in an effort to avoid having to hear grief from strangers in your match, the spectator can't talk to or distract the competitors in any way. The speed and fluidity of Table Tennis is inspiring on its own, but that makes the seamless and lag-free Spectator mode all the more impressive.
Options
No Xbox Live game would be complete without allowing customization, and Table Tennis is no different. Here's a quick look at the basic game options you can set:
- Points per Game: Quick games go for 7 points, the average contests go for 11, and if you want a marathon match, you can play to 21.
- Games per Match: You can go with 1 out of 1, 2 out of 3, or 3 out of 5, depending on your mood or available time.
- Allow Spectators: You can, if you want to, choose to be private about your Table Tennis prowess, and turn this option off, but seriously? Leave it on and let the world watch you play.
- Private Slots: This is available in Player Match games to ensure that the buddy on your Friends List can pop in to an Exhibition or Timed Tournament match without worrying about someone else taking his place.
- Points per Serve: The default is a standard two points per serve, but you can switch it over to five as well.
- Minutes (Timed Tournament Only): As mentioned above, you can choose between 7 and 10 minutes for each match in a Timed Tournament.
Keep your eye on the ball! Good girl.
Leaderboards
Not one to keep a simple universal Leaderboard and leave it at that, Table Tennis offers Weekly and Annual Leaderboards for Ranked Exhibition and Timed Tournaments. You can also filter the contents based on the top players, your Friends List, or just see where you fit overall.
Rockstar Games presents Table Tennis is built with multiplayer in mind. Although the single-player experience certainly offers plenty of competitions, it's built to train and prepare you for what you'll face online. With the uncluttered and easy to use Xbox Live feature set, however, you can dive right in.
Article by Ryan Treit
