''U.S. Championship V'Ball'', also known simply as ''V'Ball'', is a 1988

beach volleyball Beach volleyball is a team sport played by two teams of two to four players each on a sand court divided by a net. Similar to indoor volleyball, the objective of the game is to send the ball over the net and to ground it on the opponent's side o ...

sports game A sports video game is a video game that simulates the practice of sports. Most sports have been recreated with video games, including team sports, track and field, extreme sports, and combat sports. Some games emphasize playing the sport (such ...

released for the arcades by Technōs Japan Corporation. The arcade version was distributed in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

Taito is a Japanese company that specializes in video games, Toy, toys, arcade cabinets, and game centers, based in Shinjuku, Tokyo. The company was founded by Michael Kogan in 1953 as the importing vodka, Vending machine, vending machines, and Juk ...

. A

Nintendo Entertainment System The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan on 15 July 1983 as the and was later released as the redesigned NES in several test markets in the ...

version was published by

Nintendo is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto. It develops, publishes, and releases both video games and video game consoles. The history of Nintendo began when craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi ...

, in

and the PAL region, under the title of ''Super Spike V'Ball''.

Arcade version

The player takes control of a pair of self-described beach bums named George and Michael who make their living playing beach volleyball against locals. One day, they find a flyer for a nationwide beach volleyball tournament offering the winning team a $2,500,000 cash prize. In single-player mode, one person controls both characters on a team. In two-player mode, the players either cooperate by playing on the same team or compete against each other by controlling opposing teams. The American version allows the game to be played by up to four players (if the cabinet allows it). The single-player mode consists of two cycles with four stages: the Minor Circuit and the Major Circuit. The stages in the game are Daytona Beach, New York,

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

and

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; ) is an island U.S. state, state of the United States, in the Pacific Ocean about southwest of the U.S. mainland. One of the two Non-contiguous United States, non-contiguous U.S. states (along with Alaska), it is the only sta ...

. After completing the Major Circuit, the player faces against the U.S. Navy team, set in a naval base. The controls consist of an eight-directional

joystick A joystick, sometimes called a flight stick, is an input device consisting of a stick that pivots on a base and reports its angle or direction to the device it is controlling. Also known as the control column, it is the principal control devic ...

and two buttons for jumping and receiving. The characters perform several moves including power spiking, back spiking, jump-serving, blocking and diving. There are a few minor differences between the Japanese and American releases. The Japanese release (''U.S. Championship Beach Volley: V'Ball'') features an opening cut-scene explaining the plot. Between matches, intermission sequences depict the main characters visiting a car dealership to purchase a vehicle. As the player progresses, the cars increase in quality, shifting from used cars to new cars during the Major Circuit. The American release (''U.S. Championship V'Ball'') removes these cut-scenes but extends the multiplayer support to up to four players with multiple game modes (1 or 2 players against the computer, 1-on-1, 2-on-1, or 2-on-2). A conversion of the arcade game, developed by SPS, was released for the

X68000 The is a home computer created by Sharp Corporation. It was first released in 1987 and sold only in Japan. The initial model has a 10 Megahertz, MHz Motorola 68000 Central processing unit, CPU, 1 Megabytes, MB of Random Access Memory, ...

computer in

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NES version

The NES version features several key differences from the arcade game. In the NES version the player can now select their teams. The available pairs in the single player mode are: George and Murphy, the default well-balanced team; Al and John, powerful, but slow players with poor defensive skills; Billy and Jimmy (the heroes of the ''

Double Dragon is a beat 'em up video game series originally developed and published by Technōs Japan. It began with the release of the arcade game '' Double Dragon'' in 1987. The series features twin martial artists, Billy and Jimmy Lee, as they fight again ...

'' series), defensive players with poor spiking power; and Ed and Michael, fast players with average hitting power. The NES game features a tournament mode against the CPU that can be played alone or with another player, and a competitive mode that allows up to four players. There are several differences between the Japanese Famicom version (''U.S. Championship V'Ball'') and the western NES version (''Super Spike V'Ball''). The Famicom version features a single tournament mode which consists of five American Circuit matches ( Daytona Beach,

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

Las Vegas Las Vegas, colloquially referred to as Vegas, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and the county seat of Clark County. The Las Vegas Valley metropolitan area is the largest within the greater Mojave Desert, and second-l ...

and

) three World Cup matches in

(of random nationalities) and two additional matches against the U.S. Navy and a

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

team in that order. The player can adjust the difficulty setting in the option menu in the Famicom version. Additionally, the characters of George and Ed had their partners switched in the Famicom version, with George being partnered with Michael as in the arcade version, while Ed is partnered with Murphy. In the NES version, there are three different tournament modes: Exercise, the American Circuit and the World Cup. The Exercise Mode is just a match against the first team in a crowd-less court set to an easy difficulty. The American Circuit simply consists of the first five teams featured in the Famicom version's tournament mode set to an average difficulty. The World Cup mode consists of seven teams in the following order:

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

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Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

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, the Navy and

USSR The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

, all set to a hard difficulty. The background for the Russian stage was also redrawn to make it look less hostile with the omission of the tanks in the Famicom version. There is no difficulty setting in the option menu since the three different tournament modes serve as difficulty settings themselves.

Female teams

Four additional female teams are present in the game but are inaccessible to the player under normal playing conditions. Using a cheating device the teams become selectable. Even though they are fully playable in-game the images representing the female teams in the team selection screen are missing resulting in garbled graphics being displayed instead.

Soundtrack

An arranged soundtrack was released in Japan by

Meldac is a Japanese music industry, music and computer and video game, video game company. It was founded in July 1985 by Hiromu Takamizawa, Tohru Sasaki, Tetsu Kiso, and Hajime Toyama — all members of the now-defunct vocal group — with financia ...

based on the Famicom version of the game. The soundtrack was composed by Takashi Furukawa, Yoshimitsu Hamano and Funky Yasuda. It was released on March 10, 1990, with the catalog number MECG-28002. # V'Ball (Title Back) 4:01 # First Wave (Daytona Theme) 4:21 # Twilight Game (New York Theme) 3:37 # Sea Breeze Hero (Chicago Theme)–Female Vocal Version 4:07 # $1,000,000 Night (Las Vegas Theme) 4:20 # SeaSide Walker (L.A. Theme) 4:12 # Beyond the Sky (Hawaii World Cup Theme) 6:05 # Iron Wing (Aircraft Carrier Theme) 4:11 # Big Red Attack (U.S.S.R. Match Theme) 3:45 # Winner's Theme (Championship Scene) 4:44

Reception

In Japan, ''Game Machine'' listed ''U.S. Championship V'Ball'' on their September 15, 1988 issue as being the sixth most-successful table arcade unit of the month.

References

External links

The game's entry on the Coin-Op Video Game List''Super Spike V'Ball'' instruction manual
* {{Double Dragon series 1988 video games Arcade video games Beach volleyball video games Nintendo Entertainment System games Nintendo games Sports video games set in the United States Technōs Japan games Video games developed in Japan Video games set in Florida Video games set in Hawaii Video games set in Los Angeles Video games set in New York City Video games set in the Soviet Union X68000 games