“Ball bouncer” documentation

This help file explains how to navigate the menus and screens of the application, and also describes the gameplay in detail with most of the nuances. If you want to figure it out yourself, we recommend that you immediately go and familiarize yourself with the table of control keys.

About the game

Brief description

BallBouncer is a simple, yet hard to master arcade game which will put your reflexes and patience to the test.

Armed with a hefty bat, hit the ball at the right moments to turn it’s wild trajectory into a well thought out tactic of object destruction.

But can you really think ahead when cups, dishes, closets and tvs crash around you?

The ball’s unpredictable bounces can create thrilling chain reactions, keeping you challenged and your playstyle evolving.

Ball bouncer offers the possibility of creating your own scoring strategy. With a variety of skills, features and upgrades to unlock and max out in the store, can you beat your previous score? At the end of the gaming session, points are converted to coins. Spend them wisely!

So, are you ready to embark on a path of methodical, but chaotic destruction? Then go ahead!

System requirements

windows 10 64 bit or later.

ubuntu 22 64 bit or later.

First steps

When the game runs for the first time you will have to select a language. After making your selection, a welcome screen will appear. As soon as you make your selection our logo will start playing. You can skip it by pressing the enter key. After the logo is skipped or finishes playing you will be taken to the main menu of the game. We encourage you to familiarize yourself with its contents. If you want to learn the game sounds, you need to select “Settings” in the main menu, then on the “General” tab click on the corresponding button. On the “Sound” tab you can adjust the volume of music and sounds, change the sound panning mode And disable some alerts. on the “Behavior” tab. You can delete your progress and reset your settings to default by clicking the corresponding buttons on the General tab. Resetting the keyboard shortcut configuration to the default one is done on the corresponding tab as well.

If you don’t like the sound of the ball, you can change it in the settings, on the “Sound” tab, choosing from five proposed options. This can be done directly during the game by going to the settings from the pause menu. The ball sound will change as soon as you unpause the game.

Moving through menus is done by using the up and down arrows. Enter selects an item, while home and end keys do their respective job by setting you on the first or last menu item.

Screen navigation(settings, shop, profile, etc.),: tab/shift+tab forward/back, activate controls by pressing enter or spacebar. Move through the lists with up and down arrows, change the value of the sliders with arrows. Tab selection is done by pressing left/right arrow keys.

On the shop screen, by pressing enter on the item you have selected, you can open reference information that describes this item. In your profile, on the “Statistics” tab, by pressing enter on a list item you can receive a reward, if available. By pressing ctrl+c you can copy the contents of the item into your clipboard. On the “Skills” tab, by clicking on an item, you can get detailed information about the skill.

All menus and screens, excluding the main menu and the last game results menu, can be closed with the escape key.

Game process

Training mode

The game has a training mode where you can spend unlimited time and where all penalties are disabled. In this mode, a sound will be played when you can hit the ball, which you can listen to in the learn sounds menu. The sound will play when the ball has bounced at least once off the floor to teach you to sense the moment for the perfect strike. In training mode, game statistics are not collected, and points are not scored. During training, you can press f2 in order to open the training mode screen. There you can set your blow force recovery rate and skill (if any) levels to your liking. Levels range is from 1 to your current unlocked level. By pressing f1 you can instantly zero the cooldown of your skills.

These keys can be changed using the Shortcut Key Configurator.

How to play

After selecting “Start game” in the main menu, the starting countdown will begin. You will then be able to control the character. At the beginning of the game the character is in the center of the field. You can move it using the left and right arrows. Initially the camera is in the field-centered view, but you can switch it to first person view and back by pressing v. By pressing the C key, you will hear a sound positioned at the character’s location if in the field centered view. In the first person view the sound is played in the center of the field. This will help you better understand your character whereabouts when trying to hit the ball. With the left or right shift you can set the direction the character is facing. When moving, the facing direction is set automatically.

First of all, you need to throw the ball so that it appears on the playing field. You can do this by pressing the f key. After the ball is on the field, you will hear a tone which will move left and right, indicating movement of the ball in the horizontal plane. The tone’s pitch and volume will also change, indicating vertical ball movement. Decreasing volume and rising pitch mean that the ball is moving upwards, while increasing volume and lowering pitch mean the opposite.

There are two types of throw:

The goal of the game is to destroy as many objects as possible, gaining points along the way. The ball always tends to fall down, and you need to hit it back with a bat.

The ball can be hit in two ways:

You can only hit the ball while being near it. After each swing of the bat, the character restores the force of the blow. Once it is fully restored, you will hear an alert, the sound of which can be heard in the learn sounds menu. You can also toggle the sound of successful bat hits in the options on the behavior tab.

You need to strive to always make perfect strikes, as you will be awarded bonus points for them. A perfect strike occurs if the ball bounces off the ground only once. For the second and subsequent bounces, you will lose points. The more the ball bounces off the ground, the more points you lose. Therefore, try to hit the ball up as quickly as possible. Standing in one place for a long time is also not worth it, since if you don’t move for ten or more seconds, you will also lose points. At the beginning of the game, do not hold the ball in your hands for long, as each second of holding the ball will result in an increasing penalty. The same applies to the caught ball. For the fifth and subsequent misses with the bat a penalty is assessed. For colliding the ball with an object, as well as for destroying the object, you get points. If the ball bounces off the ceiling, you will also get bonus points. After colliding with an object or destroying it, a streak begins. There are separate streaks for collisions and destructions. Each subsequent collision or destruction brings more points. But if the streak did not last more than six seconds, it is reset. The same applies to ball bounces from the ceiling. After making a perfect strike, a streak also begins. For each new perfect strike you make, you get significantly more points than the previous one. If the ball bounces off the floor more than once, the streak ends and you have to start over. Once destroyed, objects will fall to the ground, causing inconvenience with loud sounds and adding to the chaos.

During the game, you can watch not only the entire picture of the playing field, but also switch to the ball watch mode. To activate this mode, hold down the G key. Ball Watch mode will be active as long as you hold G and will turn off as soon as you release it. The game can be paused by pressing the escape key. When activated, you will be taken to the pause menu, where you can see the time until the end of the gaming session, the number of points scored and other information. You can also access the settings from the pause menu, or interrupt the game. Alternatively, press t to see the time and p to see the points during the game.

If you allow your points to drop to minus one thousand, the gaming session will end early. Coins will not be credited, but you do not lose anything else. A gaming session lasts five minutes. This time can be increased by improving the time aura in the profile. After the game session ends, a sound animation of coins being added will begin playing, which can be skipped by pressing the enter key. Then the last game results menu will open, where you can find out how many points were ultimately scored and coins received. After closing the menu by pressing enter, you may be shown a notification about an available reward for reaching a statistic milestone. The display of the results menu for the last game and notifications about available rewards can be disabled in the settings, on the “Behavior” tab.

The game also has skills that are fully described in the game. To use a skill during the game, you need to assign it to one of ten slots. Assigning is done in your profile, on the “Skills” tab. Slots are accessed using keys from 1 (first slot) to 0 (tenth slot).

In the store you can unlock the mechanics of jumping and catching the ball. These two mechanics are also fully described in the game, including the keys to use. They are also present in the table of controls.

The object map

The object map works in any mode. You can open it with the m key. The map displays all objects that were on the field when it was opened. Using the arrow keys, you can move the cursor around the map, which will play a short sound of the object in the place where this object is located, and the type of object will also be announced. You can turn off the pronunciation of the object type using the f1 key. Using the f2 key you can switch between movement modes.

There are two cursor movement modes:

In addition to the cursor, the map indicates an observation point, which is located in the center of the horizontal axis and can be moved vertically. All object sounds are played relative to this point. You can move the observation point using the keys w - up, s - down. In this case, a sound will be played that changes its pitch depending on the position, so that it is easier for you to understand where the point is located along the axis.

You can also find out how many objects are on the field at the moment. To do this, press the o key.

All of the listed keys can be changed using the keyboard shortcut configurator.

Gameplay recording

You can record your gameplay and then play the resulting recordings in the game’s built-in player.

Important: recordings are not made during training mode.

To start recording, make sure the “Record game” checkbox on the game mode selection screen is checked. Recording begins after the game start countdown.

In the settings, on the “Recording” tab, you can determine whether a recording will be saved every 30 seconds, as well as whether to cancel or save the recording when pausing the game from the pause menu.

To listen to recordings, select the corresponding item in the main menu of the game. Then, in the recordings menu, select the one you want and press enter. After loading the recording, you will be taken to the player.

Player control keys:

Your recordings are located in the recordings folder, which in turn is located in the user data folder (userData), and have a .sgr extension. You can rename the recording file if necessary and share it with other people. If you want to play someone else’s recording, place it in your recordings folder. Then it will be visible in the recordings menu.

control keys

All keys in this section can be redefined by customizing the keyboard shortcut configuration.

Basic

Action Key/keys
Move the character right/left Right/Left arrows or d/a keys
Play sound at character’s position c
Set character facing right/left right/left shift
Swing the bat (hit the ball with a strong horizontal impulse) Spacebar, s or e key
Swing the bat (hit the ball with strong vertical impulse) alt+space, alt+s or r
Throw the ball in an arc f
Throw the ball vertically alt+f
Switch the camera to ball watch mode Hold down the g key
Switch the camera to normal mode Release the g key
Switch camera mode between first person mode and field-centered view mode v
Jump (if the mechanic is unlocked) Up arrow or w key
Catch the ball (if the mechanic is unlocked) left or right control
Select a skill slot from 1 to 10 (if the skill is set) keys 1 to 0/numpad1 to numpad0
Cancel skill slot selection Grave / numpad enter
Open the object map m
Find out the time until the end of the gaming session t
Find out the current number of points scored p
Pause the game escape

Training mode

Action Key/keys
Zero the cooldown of all skills f1
Set skill levels f2

The object map

Action Key/keys
Move cursor Arrow keys
Move observation point lower s
Move observation point higher w
Toggle object type announcement status f1
Toggle cursor movement mode f2
Find out the number of objects on the map o

Configuring keyboard shortcuts

In the settings, on the “keyboard shortcuts configuration” tab, by clicking on the corresponding button, you can customise the controls to your liking. On the configurator screen there is a tree in which, at the first level, individual blocks are presented, which in turn contain actions. Each action has a list with assigned keyboard shortcuts. You can either add or remove them from this list using the appropriate buttons. After pressing the add button, a new screen will open, containing four lists, a field assigning the main key, the “Add” and “Cancel” buttons. Each list is responsible for its own modifier key (alt, windows, control, shift), and contains 4 options for using the modifier key (do not use, left, right, any). To set a key, follow the instructions in the key assigner field immediately following the list for the shift modifier key. If you want to use only modifier keys in your shortcut, leave the field unassigned. After all the necessary parameters have been set, click on the “Add” button, but keep in mind that duplicates within the same shortcuts block are prohibited.

If required, you can share your keyboard shortcut configuration with other people. The configuration is located in the user data folder (userData) and is named “keyConfig.json”. The other person will have to replace their configuration, located in the same location, with the one you passed on. Despite the fact that the configuration is stored in open form, it is not intended for manual editing.

Translation of the game into other languages

If you would like to translate ball bouncer into your native language, please visit sooslandia-games translation repository on github

Github was chosen because it allows us to centralize all translations in one place, automatically confirm that the game with a new translation will launch without errors, convert different translation formats using scripts, and maintain the structure of the stored data in order.

If you have any difficulties, contact us for help in the telegram group, discord or email. Look for links to the above in the “Conclusion” section.

Conclusion

We are glad that you got interested in this project and we hope that you will like it. Destroy and have fun!

Subscribe to our channel on telegram, or join our discord server, to receive the latest news about updates to this game, as well as about other interesting projects.

Join the channel chat, where you can share your opinion about the game, report any bugs, or suggest your idea, just like in discord.

If you don’t use telegram and discord, you can write to our email, but a quick response is not guaranteed.

All the best, Sooslandia-games.