Earlier today I got sent word of a new roguelike game called Rack and Slay. I was pretty tired and almost didn’t open it before signing off, but the word “BILLIARD” in full caps caught my eye.
True story: back in 2006, after uni, I had a job working in education administration. I had a lot of spare time on my hands and I got proper good at a browser game called Blast Billiards. At one point I was posting scores in the global top ten – my job was that boring.
Armed with that increasingly relevant context, I’m sure you can understand why I proceeded to immediately open the aforementioned email, download the demo, and then spend the last hour playing Rack and Slay, at first alone and then taking turns with my youngest son.
I appreciate that was probably a more long-winded and enthusiastic intro for a discovery news piece than you were expecting, so I’ll get to the point now: I really like this game (and so does my boy).
What is Rack and Slay?
Rack and Slay is a game developed by Ludokultur. If you’ve not heard the name before, I don’t blame you; this is a solo dev who, by the looks of their Steam page, likes to think a outside the box. I was immediately intrigued by the prospect of billiards infused with roguelike ideas, and I was really pleased that there was a demo for me try.
The aim of the game, as you would expect from billiards, is to hit your white ball around a table, potting red balls without doing anything too silly. At this point, Rack and Slay wraps a bandana around the white ball, departs the world of reality and starts to do its own thing.
The red balls all have different propertie. Some have armour, some are sleeping, and so on. You’ve got to pot them all, but there are obstacles everywhere, including spikes. Oh yes, lots of spiky spikes. Fun.
There are bombs, different surfaces and obstacles, gold and diamonds, teleportation portals, and those are just the first things that come to mind. The holes, scenery pieces, chests and other collectables are all positioned procedurally. I’ve not played enough to thoroughly test the overall variety, but my initial impression of the level generation is positive and I didn’t find any impossible situations.
Play your cards right
My son and I got through to the very last level before we perished. Along the way, between the levels, we were practicing our reading on the three cards offered to us at the shop. You can pick one each time, and these give you various benefits that can boost your power, give you extra gold, or more interesting things like give you health if you can impale a red ball on a spike.
These benefits can impact everything, including things as fundamental as the power you use to strike the ball. In fact, shooting the ball is probably the most simple and intuitive part of the game. The demo launched with controller support, making it super easy for everyone to get into. You can aim using the stick, but the cursor is much less sensitive if you pull the appropriate trigger.
Once you’ve got your shot lined up, you need to tap the button and then tap again to shoot. There’s a meter that flies back and forth, so you can see how much power is going into the shot between taps. That makes it sound easy but it’s not straightforward to stop it exactly where you want it – timing is everything.
That said, it didn’t take me long before I was attempting trick shots, not just using the table but also taking advantage of the game’s unique mechanics. Pulling off a trick shot through a portal and then impaling your characterful white ball on a spike to lose the game? That’ll be Rack and Slay.
Download the demo and do the wishlisting thing over on Steam.
