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Vampire Volleyball brings Divekick's surprisingly deep one-touch gameplay to volleyball

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Vampire Volleyball brings Divekick's surprisingly deep one-touch gameplay to volleyball

Think of Vampire Volleyball as doing to volleyball what Divekick did to fighting games. Sort of.

It's a simple game of volleyball played with vampires. The first to seven points wins, and the loser is exposed to a bright light and burns to death.

The comparison to Divekick comes from a control system that's very simple - you only need one button - but offers a surprising amount of depth.

When you tap the screen, your vampire will jump and headbutt the ball. If you tap it again while in mid-air, they'll perform their special move.

Vampire Volleyball

Each hit of the ball needs to be done at just the right time and height to get the desired projectory. But you may also want to bounce the ball off the ceiling or walls to gain momentum, thus making it trickier for your opponent to return.

On top of that, the diverse characters, with their wacky styles and highly divergent special moves, provide plenty of challenge.

A martial artist flying kicks the ball (and celebrates each point to the sounds of Gangnam Style). A green vampire has an overhead strike. Another relies more on blowing the ball at strange angles.

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The biggest let-down is that you can't actually play as the eight different opponents. You have the choice of just three, and their abilities aren't quite as exciting.

Still, with Vampire Volleyball's hand-drawn style, great sound design, and light-hearted game between bizarre characters makes it a compelling title.

If you want to try it out, Vampire Volleyball is available on the App Store [buy] for 69p / 99c, and Google Play [buy] at 61p / 99c.

Chris Priestman
Chris Priestman
Anything eccentric, macabre, or just plain weird, is what Chris is all about. He turns the spotlight on the games that fly under the radar.