040 · VOLLEYBALL

• VOLLEYBALL - HERE’S YOUR CHANCE TO BUMP, SET AND SPIKE YOUR WAY TO VICTORY
• Developed by Nintendo and Pax Softnica now just Softnica.
• Pax Softnica was kind of like a Second Party team for Nintendo and all of their releases only made it to the Famicom, except for Volleyball
• The game is a six player-a-side volleyball simulation. Players can select teams to compete in either a men's or women's competition from the following countries: United States, Japan, People's Republic of China, South Korea, Brazil, Soviet Union, Belgium, Cuba, Tunisia.
• Training Mode
• Game Mode
• Move in Rows
• GAMEFAQS
• WHILE PLAYING THIS GAME…
• I put my hand in a ceiling fan.
• It was off. So I just suffered minor scratches.

Auto-generated transcript. Each paragraph starts with its timestamp. Speakers are not identified.

00:00 Volleyball, here's your chance to bump, set, and spike your way to victory.

00:19 And welcome to NEStalgia, a chronological exploration of every NES game released in North America. I'm Mike. I'm Sean. And I'm Joe. Guys, today we're talking about volleyball, developed by Nintendo and PAX Softnica. Now just Softnica. Okay. Not that it mattered, I don't think the PAX had any, like, it wasn't like, oh, now we're free of our shackles and we're gonna make good games.

00:47 But yeah, we got volleyball here, another sports game, in many ways feels like a NES launch game. Yeah, if it wasn't for that incessant, like, theme music at the beginning of every single one of these, it's killing me. What's it been so far? Baseball, soccer, right? Baseball, soccer, and tennis. And tennis. And I'll tell you a funny story. In the, in like the ZX Sharp, which was only in Japan, they like, had a relationship between Hudson and Nintendo to make some of those games for the ZX Sharp as well. And it wasn't called the ZX Sharp. Don't quote me on that. It's called something stupid. But it's a computer for Japan.

01:23 And they made a port of golf for, for this computer system at home. And they even put the music in there. Oh my God. They put this theme song, like a computerized version of it. But it's like, this song is just, I guess like, it's right up there. It's like one of Nintendo's sports theme. It doesn't sound sporty. Yeah, it's the least competitive sounding song I can think of. I don't even think it got an homage in Wii Sports. Like, I don't, I don't hear it anywhere in there. So, but yeah, you definitely know you're playing a first party Nintendo game when you hear that, that startup sound and get two options. The two options in this one being training mode and game mode. But before, before we do that, why don't we go through first impressions?

02:18 Well, my first impression of this game was I'm really bad at it. And the Z-axis is one of those problems again, where I'm just trying to, I know how to bump, set, and spike. I played volleyball in gym class. Okay. So I know the rules of the road. Do you get a certificate for that? You get an A as long as you show up. Nice. Yeah. Does that have a good word? The certificate is the report card. Nice. Very good. But anyway, I know the rules of volleyball. I know that you have to be under the ball to hit it usually. And I was under the ball, and I could never hit it.

02:58 Yeah. I think that's a common problem we're going to run into as we talk into this game. But Joe, any first impressions? Same thing before I read the manual. I mean, same thing after I read the manual, too. Before I read the manual. I thought you were going to tell me you got enlightened after the manual. I mean, the manual has a lot of information in it. There's a lot you can do. And I feel like if any of us took a long time to memorize and learn these things, we could probably be good at this game.

03:24 But my first impression is probably this is not a pick-up-and-play game. Also, that the volleyball players are all, like, dancing the whole time. They're really moving their hips the whole time. Yeah, but you weren't talking about dancing before. Huh? What are you talking about? Dancing. Is it twerking? Dancing? Might as well acknowledge that dancing. It's like they're humping the air, essentially. Yeah, it's a dance. It's just in rhythm, though, too. I'm trying to keep it, you know, family-oriented. Even your opponents are, like, synced up with you. Everybody is just synced up. It's a grand old time. Yeah, I don't think there's any, I don't remember any music while you're actually playing. No, there's music. While you're playing?

03:57 I'm pretty sure. Okay. It's terrible. All right, yeah. Maybe that's why I just drowned it out. But I was going to say that whoever's actually at that gymnasium is just dropping a fat beat. You know, like, everybody's... You know what? I didn't think about it until you just said it. They are synced up. That makes it so much funnier. Right. Everybody is just... They're all, like, perfectly in sync. Yep. It's like... Just humping the air. Yeah, it's really more of a dance-off than it is volleyball. That's true. It's just a side effect of what's happening.

04:20 All right. My first impressions aren't that much different. I really agree with the idea that this is not a pick-up-and-play game. I was kind of shocked at how, like, you know, as long as you understand the real-life rules of a game like baseball or tennis or golf, as long as you understand those rules, all of those games that Nintendo's offered us have been, like, you know, pick-up-and-play style games. You don't have to go right to the manual. So, I think, for me, it was like, this is just weird that we have volleyball and you can't play it, you know, like, right off the bat. You have to kind of figure it out.

04:58 Yeah, because another part that we haven't seen yet in the sports games, I think, is the idea of controlling more than one character at once. And I think that causes a lot more issues. And I think just real fast before we go any further into talking about the game, we should probably just talk about the objective, because there are, like, different kinds of volleyball here. And I think that's important. This is a, like, six-on-six indoor volleyball style game. This isn't two-on-two beach volleyball. Like, I think most people are familiar with the Dead or Alive series, Extreme Beach Volleyball.

05:36 So, yeah, it's not like that. It's six-on-six. And you can play as men or women. And this game does not, like, you know, no different under each one. Oh, it's different. And it's a little insulting to the women's game. Uh-oh. You picked on something I clearly didn't. I only played just the women's game. I think I only played the women's. Yeah, I don't know why. The women's game is slower.

05:56 Oh, shoot. Yeah. Ouch. I was about to say, like, how progressive that was in Nintendo to have, like, no gender bias. And then you come in and be like, eh, well. Yeah. It's a little bit of a problem. I guess now that you say that, it almost looks like women's and men's are, like, mode A, mode B in a lot of other games. Oh, yeah. So, that is what it's all. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, since we're talking about mode A and mode B, we should probably talk about the training mode first. I found that to be helpful after deciding to go to it. You know, game is the option that's offered to you right away. Yeah. You have to hit select to get over to the training mode. But I found that to be helpful. Yeah, I thought it was the only mode that I could actually compete.

06:38 I only played the training mode for, like, a minute. I did tell you guys off the mic, but I guess I'll just admit it to the world that I actually, while playing it, thought I was controlling both sides. Like, that's how little idea I had of what was going on in this volleyball game. The first time I started up the game, I hit the start button and thought that, like, I guess it just didn't register or something. And I thought I was in the game.

07:01 And I thought I was playing as the team. But it was just a video. It was just like, you know, the demo of the, you know, as Joe famously knows, there's a guy playing the demo. Yeah, the guy who plays the demo. The guy who plays the demo. Live. Trapped. When you hit it. In the machine. Trapped in the machine. I have no mouth, but I must scream.

07:18 But yeah, no, I thought that the training was like, oh, you control both sides, so you get an idea of the cadence or something, and then you get into the real game and you just pick one side. Yeah. No, that wasn't what was happening. I don't know if that would have been more helpful, though.

07:29 Like, being able to, like, I think it would have been even more stressful. I was confused while I was watching. But then you can kind of just, you can know where, if you know where the opponent's going to hit it, you know where to move your next character. Okay, so what I liked about the training mode was, as Joe mentions, it highlights who you're playing as, it changes their, everybody's wearing white shirts, and then it changes them over to, like, a pink or something.

07:50 Well, for context, the only reason that this is a thing in training mode is because when you're in a regular game, and I actually think I need to take another step backwards, basically you only control, like, half of your team at a time. You control them in rows. Well, in rows, or sometimes in quarters.

08:13 Um, if it goes to, like, one side or the other. And in a regular game, there's no designation. It does not show you which half of your team you are controlling. It, you just have to sort of make a guess that, yes, I'm controlling these three players.

08:32 What training mode does is it actually gives you a tool to know which players you are controlling. Yeah. And I think that that should have just been a feature in the regular game. In the regular game, too. I don't understand why, like, why that isn't a feature. Why wouldn't you? Especially because, just to be clear here, too, other characters move that aren't you.

08:51 Yeah. In the game. Like, and you won't necessarily know which ones you're controlling unless you have a good feel for this game. I almost think, even though it's not ideal, I almost think for a gameplay, I think they would have been better off if all the characters were just tied together. Like, and then you could at least see you're controlling all of them. To be honest, that was my... But seriously, then you can pass to each other. And, like... That was going to be my offered solution because I know it sounds archaic, Sean, but, like, that was, like, the 10-yard fight style of things in a weird way where it was, like,

09:16 that's how defense... Like, you always controlled one person, but the rest of your team all moved, you know, as a group. I just kind of felt like I would agree with that. And then you're, like, you're just the server or, like, you know, you hit, like, a different button to do it. And you can set to yourself, even though it's kind of going to be weird to have to move. I think it's something that the Super Nintendo would have done, you know, having the ability to have an X and Y button for additional toggles. This, obviously, there's just, you know, like, what button would you map it to?

09:44 But, you know, for me, it's like, that would have been the ideal way. To only control either a single character or a group of characters. It should have been, like... And this one makes it more like foosball. Yeah. But it's very hard to figure out. I still prefer the training mode version to your all or nothing. Okay. But just because I think that if you make it so that you only control one or, like, you serve and then you set to yourself, like, that seems too simplified to me. But, I mean... It's tennis. I'm not tennis. It's volleyball. It's sports. It is a sport game. So, okay. So, now you've finally figured out which players you control. Are you returning the hit? No. I'll tell you what, Mike.

10:30 Because there are times when it seems to give you some leeway. It seems to say, like, oh, you meant to do this. Like, you're obviously in reach of the ball. Mm-hmm. And you'll hit the ball. Or you might set it to your teammate. Or you might just bump it over. But other times, it'll just be... You'll be standing right under it. And you will hit the button. And it will just fall to the ground. And then that really annoying fake whistle will go. The train whistle.

10:58 Right? Yes. No, it's... Yes, that's what it sounds like. It's clearly not a train. Yeah. That's what it sounds like. I get that sometimes, like, regardless. Like, I feel like I have bumped the ball. But the ref is like, no, that's illegal. You know? Like, you're not supposed to touch that ball. And it's like, that's the only thing you were supposed to do in this game.

11:17 So that... Yeah. I think that that's, like, a weird thing. Is that, like, after you've figured out getting over the hump of even just, like, which characters do I control? Now it's like, well, good luck using them. Yeah. So then you sort of... Like, once you...

11:33 You're at, like, a 50% success rate of even returning the ball. Then you have to figure out how to score. And the whole... The whole setup of how you go about getting from bump to set to spike is just a, like, a maddening exercise in futility. Because I think I've spiked... I was able to spike it maybe a half a dozen times. And I think twice I scored. Okay. I was very good at blocking with the front row. I got better with that. Yeah. In training mode. Yeah. I think, like, you know, it's cool that they have these things going on.

12:10 But even more so than tennis, I remember on the tennis episode we were very critical of that Z-axis and just, like, you know, it was maybe a little harder than it needed to be for a fun game. You know? You know, in this one, it's, like, it's nice that they offer these options. But at the same time, how much more complicated does it make the game? And how much more fun would it have just been if it was, like, auto-lock-on to the ball. Right. Yeah. And then figure out your strategy in terms of, like, bumping, setting, and spiking, you know? And did you guys read the manual?

12:39 I did. So once you look in there, you see that there's, like, there's tons of, like, weird button combinations to spike it and to do it, you know? Yeah. And I think it's a little—I think, honestly, like I said, I kind of stand by what I said at the beginning. I think that if we were, for some reason, really interested in continuing playing this game and, like, we put a lot of time into it, we probably could get good at it and, like, enjoy it a lot more.

13:01 But I just don't see a lot of people really wanting to do that. But would it be any more rewarding than, like, say, NES baseball or, you know, NES golf where it's, like, it doesn't take much to get started?

13:12 Obviously, the more you play, the better you get. But, like, the fact—like, would getting good at this game be any more rewarding than just playing those games normally? Yeah, I think that what I'm saying is just, like, if somebody out there just, like, is crazy about volleyball, this would probably be— I'm just kind of, like, an opinion that doesn't really come from anywhere, but, like, I think that if you're crazy, crazy about volleyball, you'd probably like this better. You're enabling people. Someone who's crazy about baseball would like NES baseball. Sure, yeah, that's true. Because if you really, really want to put, like, your all into this, like, you can probably do more in this than you can do in NES baseball.

13:45 That may be true. I think, though, that in a game design perspective, this is, like, this is an example of trying to fit too much onto a very simple controller. And that—it's a good idea to try and give people that want the most control the most control. Right. By giving them all these options, but it also introduces problems in which, like, I—like, the B button is to softly, like, set it to yourself, more or less. Right. The B button, while you're pressing right or left, is to spike the ball.

14:24 So I'll just try and get under the ball and set it to myself. But because there's maybe a little bit of overlap between me pressing right and B, I am way out of sync, and I will just jump into the air and miss my set. No, I completely agree. I mean, that happened to me the entire time, too.

14:43 Yeah. Yeah, I think that, if anything, like, they should have been able to have, like, a way that you can just casually play. And then, like, if you want—I mean, it's hard to do that on NES controllers. A simple mode, yeah. But, like, it's funny because, like, Mario Tennis Aces has that, you know, where it's, like, here's just a mode where you just want to play your regular tennis, and then here's another mode where, like, you can do trick shots and build up a meter and slam and serve, you know?

15:06 It's, like, all that stuff. And I think, like, yeah, this game would have benefited from that, but I think, you know, the idea with these games, at least for me, these Nintendo first-party sports title games are supposed to be, like, an easy entry. Right. You know, it's supposed to be something that, like, mom and dad can play with you.

15:24 And I just—I'm not getting that vibe. If only because I consider myself pretty good at video games, and I didn't win a single game. I scored some points. Yes. I did not win a single game, even if I was playing Tunisia. Yeah. And to that point, yeah, I think that, like, just picking up this game for any of us, it seems like, or for really most people that are just picking up a game, you're not going to have fun off the bat. And you're probably not going to want to continue playing it. Right. So it really doesn't benefit. Any stray thoughts?

15:51 I like the country lineup. I found it to be a very interesting mishmash of— Yeah, like, are these popular countries for volleyball? I was just surprised to see a country like Tunisia next to the Soviet Union and, like, other countries. I guess I don't know what the powerhouse countries for volleyball are. I think it's, like, Brazil. Yeah, I think it's, like, Brazil. Yeah, I don't know in the 80s. That's true. But, like, Brazil is always big in volleyball.

16:22 And I think Belgium, which is also in the game, I think they're a big volleyball team. But I didn't know, like, South Korea was huge on volleyball. Maybe they are. I was also interested to see that—I thought that I had already—I had accidentally pressed a button already.

16:36 And that was the reason I was, like, picking who I was playing against. I thought I could pick the team I was going to play as. But, no, it's always the United States. I thought you could play anybody. Right, right, right, right. Nope. Yeah, that is actually weird that it took us this long to get to that point. But to me, it didn't matter anyway because only the changes are the colors. The color of your pants. Yeah, the color of your pants. You're still going to air hump no matter what country you're from. Which is, like, a really nice set to me. Yeah, it's a great—like, no matter what country you're from, you're going to air hump. Yeah, you're going to air hump. I'm sure the People's Republic of China loved it.

17:08 I have a little straight thought. Let me hear it. So every once in a while I like to talk about the pause screens. Yes. And in this— Pause me, Joe. Did you guys pause the game at all? You know what's funny? I know. It's true, but— But did you guys pause the game? I probably did. I don't remember it, though. Well, the thing was, you can't pause during play. No, which I think is cool. It's actually kind of like you're calling a timeout. I don't know how it works in volleyball, but— That's how it's described. It's like a timeout in between plays.

17:36 So—and then your whole team, like, runs over to the sidelines. Like, it doesn't actually freeze. Oh, that's a nice touch. So I was like, yeah, that is— And it's also nice that you can't— I did, so I totally never paused this game. No, I definitely didn't pause. I was like, wait, and, like, pause what's in the air and, like, decide where you're going to go. I think that's probably what I tried to do and then was like, oh, you can't pause during this game. It's broken. Like, so many other things. All right, I have one straight thought, and then we'll go into the essential games list.

17:59 This comes from the game FAQ for this game. Like, the forum? No, the walkthrough guide for this game. And this kid loves volleyball, and he just kind of went— All his FAQ goes through is just, like, the strategy of it. But he writes, very interestingly, at the end of his game FAQ, he writes, in all caps, while playing this game, and then the body is, I put my hand in a ceiling fan. It was off, so I just suffered minor scratches.

18:31 Like, he just needed to tell us? I love those. What year was that? Game FAQ, that was like, you know, if I had to guess, it was probably, like, early 2000s, 2002. That's when a lot of these NES guides were done, and no one's touched them since. So one quick thing. It's a very straight thought. Yeah. One thing I love about, like, the early 2000s internet, it was like, you could just mention that part of your day.

18:54 Right. It didn't matter. Maybe it was a strategy we don't know about. Maybe we should try putting our hand in a ceiling fan. As long as it's off. Well, it's off. I mean, I know that, like, Twitter is just, like, built for that. Yeah, yeah. But, I mean, just to throw that into an FAQ at the end, that used to just be very endearing. Yep. Mm-hmm. Okay. So, with that in mind, let's do the Essential Games List.

19:19 All right. It's the Essential Games List. And if you don't know what that is, basically, we just go around, we talk about whether we think this game is essential today. Not in 1987. Not in the history of the NES. We're talking about, in today, is this game still worth playing? Sean. It is not worth playing, Mike. Ouch. Joe? Yeah, I mean, we, I think sports games already have a little bit of an uphill battle. I think with all three of us, definitely with me, to get on my Essential Games List. And this one's already even more complicated and just not intuitive enough. Yeah. I'll also say that it's not essential, so it's off. And thank goodness. Because people would seriously doubt our judgment.

20:04 Well, it really was actually the, like, he already said no, so it couldn't have been on. Oh, interesting. Okay. You don't have to sway his eyes. I'm sorry that I pretended like I had power that I don't. So, I guess, just to echo some thoughts here, I think what really bugs me about this particular game is, you know, we've seen Nintendo handle, like, 8-bit sports games in a relatively okay way. We had some beef with baseball and the fact that you can't control the outfield and that makes the game kind of wild. We had some beef with, like, you know, the way that tennis handled the Z-axis. But in this one, I have a lot of complaints, and I don't know if that's because, like, Pac-Softnica, like, got involved as, like, a second party kind of thing.

20:50 But, like, that just bothered me that, like, you know, Nintendo would rush out a sports game like this. Thankfully, I did check. We're going to get some more volleyball games, and I do like volleyball, so I'd like to see a competent one. I don't know if they're going to play differently than this. They might play exactly like this. But while we're here, you know, like, this is a pretty rough entry, and I would feel burned if I spent 40 bucks on this back in the day.

21:13 Oof. Definitely. All right. That is all the time we have for this episode of Nostalgia. Join us next time for Rush and Attack. Rush and Attack. Thank you, Sean, for stating the obvious. I have to read it as they're written down. It is not and, though. There's no and in there, right? Well, it's like Rush and Attack. Rush and Attack. All right, all right. Sorry. It's like Rush apostrophe N. Anyway, if you want to see that episode, all you have to do is hit the subscribe button wherever you listen to your podcast. Yeah, smash that subscribe button. Give us five stars on iTunes.

21:47 You know, send me snail mail if you're sleuthy enough to figure out where I live. Who knows what's going to happen? Because this is Nostalgia, and we have a website where we talk about a lot of crazy things.

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22:20 Or maybe more intellectual people will want to check out, like, hey, what were Miyamoto's intentions while he was making the NES launch games? It's like, well, we have an article on that, too. So we don't just cover silly stuff. We got all sorts of stuff. We also have the show notes for every single episode.

22:34 And I just want to say, if you do check out NES baseball, if it's haunted, no means means you're not an intellectual. Maybe you are an intellectual. Yeah, maybe you're savvy enough to know that you need that. You need to be armed with that information for the truth. You really do need, like, an IQ of, like, 500 to understand, like, the articles we put on that website. Yes, absolutely. All right. I'm Michael Esposito. You can find me on at Esposito Film on Twitter. And I'll talk to you soon. Bye.