POSTED 8/3/12


HUSTLE KINGS

Sony
Vita (also on PS3/PSN)

If not for balls, we’d all be fucked. Actually, more to the point we wouldn’t be – in which case none of us would even exist. Umm.

What we started getting at before a mid-sentence realisation explosion hit was that without balls we wouldn’t have much to entertain us. No footy, cricket, basketball, soccer or insertyourfaveballsporthere. No pinball (wah!), nothing rotund for dogs to slobber over, Jaffas wouldn’t roll down cinema aisles... and that’s just entertainment-wise. Hell, maybe we’d have no videogames, for it all started with Pong which was based on, uh-huh, a ball game.

Luckily, however, we do, and one of our fave uses for balls is to plock them around a fuzzy green table with a rather big stick. Hustle Kings lets us do that in the confines of our teensy flat, which is cause for several hallelujahs and a few other Happy Mondays songs besides.

Especially as it does it so bloody well. Inarguably better than its PS3 forerunner, it fits the Vita like those vests fitted Eddie Charlton – like vest-shaped gloves. In fact, it’s possibly the best use of Vita’s touchy-feely stuff of all the launch games as there are no bullshit gimmicks, just functionality – with alternate classic controls for the most part if you just can’t get down to the touchy-feely sound.

So, you move the cue around, aim and make sticky-stick go now with your finger. It’s remarkably natural. As is the first person table view, although in reality the overhead one offers better accuracy.

There are more game/rule variations than through a season or two of AFL, challenges aplenty, local single or multiplayer, online and even a whole free bonus download of snooker for those who dig red balls. Plus it all looks slicker than Eddie’s hair.

Oooooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh – do it! Do the hustle!

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