Okay, so I’ve been messing around with old Flash games lately, you know, for the nostalgia. And I stumbled upon this volleyball game, a super simple one. I thought, “Hey, I could probably recreate something like this, it can’t be that hard, right?” Famous last words, I guess.
Getting Started
First, I fired up Unity. I figured it would be * I created a new 2D project. I’m not aiming for anything fancy, just a basic, functional volleyball game.
The Court and Players
- I threw in a couple of sprites for the players – just simple colored rectangles for now. No need to get fancy with the artwork yet.
- Then I added a line in the middle to represent the net. Again, super basic.
- I made the player * the ‘A’ and ‘D’ keys for left and right *’s working so far.
Ball Physics
This is where things got a little tricky. I wanted the ball to have that classic, slightly floaty arcade feel, not super realistic physics.
- I added a Circle Collider 2D and a Rigidbody 2D to the ball.
- I played around with the gravity scale and bounciness until it felt “right”. It took a lot of tweaking! I kept adjusting, playing, adjusting, playing.
Hitting the Ball
Now for the core mechanic: hitting the ball. I decided to keep it simple – no complex spiking or diving, just a basic upward hit when the player is close enough to the ball.
- I added a trigger collider to the players.
- I wrote a little script that detects when the ball enters the trigger.
- If the player is in range and hits the “jump” key (I used the spacebar), the ball gets a little upward force.
Scoring and Game Over
I needed a way to keep score, obviously.
- I added a couple of UI Text elements to display the scores for each player.
- I created a simple scoring system: when the ball hits the ground on one side, the other player gets a point.
- I added a “Game Over” screen that pops up when one player reaches a certain score. It’s just a simple text display, nothing fancy.
Tweaks and frustration
The amount of times I tweaked values and re-tested is countless. Getting the ball physics just right, making the player movement feel responsive, and preventing weird glitches – it all took time and lots of small changes. I almost gave up a couple of times, but I was too excited and kept going.
It’s Alive!
It’s not perfect, not by a long shot. But it’s playable! You can move, hit the ball, score points, and eventually win (or lose). It’s a super basic, bare-bones volleyball game, but I made it! And that’s a pretty cool * feels good so far.
