Virtual Pool

ianl, an oldie 14/06/2024 08:03

Virtual Pool as played on the old Windows Mobile (yep, still have a mobile that can do that) is easily the best, most absorbing, addictive and outright frustrating game this oldie has played. It's an adult's game in the true sense. Why frustrating ? Because its' AI obviously cheats ... the Replay Shot is invaluable to see how it does that. Bounces off cushions that are unrealistic but give the computer play an easier pot (every time, no accident), sudden mid-table changes of trajectory and velocity to prevent you from scoring, exact snooker outcomes every time the computer has no direct pot - and its' favourite is using all of those deliberate "tactics" to put your cue ball in scratch. Straight into the side pocket(s) almost every time, again no accident.

Nonetheless, I love the struggle. Its' AI learns your tactics and best shots and then attempts to counter them. Since you are learning too, you can adapt by knowing which counters it will try to use ahead of your shot.

How I wish the developers had kept at it long enough to release a 64 bit for Android. Modern, 64 bit only mobiles, cannot run the 32 bit version. I would pay a reasonable price for this upgrade. There is no other pool game that comes close to this one.

Divarin 08/03/2020 14:33

I used to play this game a lot back in the 90's. I recently set up an older PC to play games of this era again and couldn't find my original disk so I downloaded this game from this site and one other site and both versions have an issue where the AI seems stupid and doesn't make any kind of rational shot. I finally found my original disk and it's doing the same thing so I don't know if there's some configuration issue or what. I've tried under dos box on a windows 7 machine and MS Dos 6.22 on a pentium 2 at 300mhz. I distinctly remember the AIs being pretty good with the ones at the top of the AI list being the most stupid and the ones at the bottom being the most intelligent but now no matter what I do it seems like they all just shoot the queue ball in a random direction not aiming for anything.