Pool is normally a pretty straightforward game. Hit the balls, sink them into pockets, and try not to accidentally send the cue ball in after them. The developers behind Ultrapool have decided that’s nowhere near complicated enough.
Developed by Icedrop Games and published by offbrand games, Ultrapool launches today on Steam, turning a familiar game of pool into a colorful roguelike where the balls have their own abilities, scoring big earns you money for upgrades, and your perfectly normal triangle can eventually contain ghosts, bombs, chickens, and apparently the entire planet Earth.
The aim is to survive 10 rounds and impress the bartenders along the way, but doing that means putting together a collection of balls capable of producing some increasingly ridiculous trick shots.
These Aren’t Your Average Pool Balls
The basic rules are easy enough to understand. Pocketing balls earns points, and scoring above your target gives you additional money to spend at the bar between rounds. It’s what those balls actually do that makes things interesting.
Each can bring its own effect to the table, giving you plenty of opportunities to find combinations that push your score considerably higher. There’s a ghost ball capable of reappearing after being pocketed, a chicken that lays spherical eggs, and a bomb that explodes after being bumped too many times.
Getting the right ball into a pocket is only part of the challenge too. Working out how its ability could interact with everything else on the table is where Ultrapool starts moving much closer to the build-crafting we’re used to seeing from roguelikes. Suddenly, lining up the perfect shot could trigger considerably more than you expected.
The Bar Is Open for Business
Between rounds, the money you’ve earned can be spent improving the collection you’re taking into future games. That gives each run a familiar cycle of scoring, spending, and gradually putting together something far more powerful than the setup you started with. The better you perform, the more money you’ll have available to strengthen your build before the next round.
Eventually, the cocktail bar opens too. Here, the bartender can mix two of your balls together to create something new, opening up even more combinations and giving you another way to push your build into increasingly ridiculous territory.
Considering the game is already willing to put a chicken and planet Earth on a pool table, we’re expecting some fairly unusual cocktails.
There’s Plenty to Experiment With
Players have already had an opportunity to see how all of this works through the free Steam demo, which arrived in February. That early version includes more than 60 different balls alongside dozens of passive abilities, multiple modes and difficulty options, and cosmetic pool tables to unlock. It has also received a pretty positive response so far, with 96% of its 83 Steam user reviews currently giving the demo a thumbs up.
The full release expands on that idea while keeping the focus firmly on finding increasingly powerful combinations and seeing just how badly you can break what should have been a perfectly innocent game of pool.
Time to Rack ‘Em Up
We’ve seen roguelikes turn poker, pachinko, claw machines, and plenty of other familiar games into build-crafting playgrounds, so perhaps pool was always going to get its turn eventually.
Ultrapool looks like it’s having plenty of fun with the idea, keeping the basic satisfaction of lining up a shot while giving you dozens of reasons to think carefully about exactly which balls you’re sending around the table. Whether you’re chasing ridiculous scores, experimenting with combinations, or simply wondering what happens when you smash a bomb into a chicken, there’s certainly more going on here than your average night at the pool hall.
To celebrate the launch, a Ball-Star League is taking place throughout the day with streamers competing to get the wildest shots and craziest builds.