Rockstar Games Presents Table Tennis

Unlike most sports games, this unconventional recreation of ping pong provides intensity and drama through bold stylistic techniques.

In 2006, Rockstar Games was synonymous with controversy. After publishing unapologetically edgy adult games like State of Emergency, Max Payne, and Manhunt, it came as quite a surprise when the studio announced that their next title would be an E-rated ping pong simulation titled, simply, Rockstar Games Presents Table Tennis. The explanation at the time was that this game was an experiment, an attempt to see what happened when the computational abilities of the new Xbox 360 were focused like a laser into an extremely small space. Today, that explanation more or less persists as most Rockstar fans view Table Tennis as an aberration among franchises like Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead Redemption.

But although Table Tennis is not as thematically mature or daring as Rockstar’s other titles, it still absolutely reflects the ethos that made the developer legendary. Table Tennis may be a sports simulation game, but it is an unflinchingly dramatic and theatrical sports simulation game. It is a game that is not attempting to capture the structure of table tennis as a game as much as it is trying to simulate the sensation of competition.

Start playing any match and you’ll instantly see what I mean. Once you hit the ball back and forth a dozen or so times, a thumping techno soundtrack begins to fade into the background, getting louder and louder until it almost overpowers the natural sounds of the match. Hit a ball close to the edge of the table, and the game’s camera will cut away to a slow motion close up and show you in excruciating detail how close you were to losing a point or staying alive. Have both players activate their focus mode and the venue you’re playing in will theatrically fade away until the only thing illuminated is the table you’re playing on.

Including these details make for a fantastically thrilling playing experience. Though I was always just playing ping pong (usually in the stakes-free exhibition mode), I found myself deeply invested in each match, each game, each point. I was wincing in agony every time I pulled the ball too far and missed the edge of the table, and I was seething with joy every time I smacked a smash shot to the wide open half of the table.

But these details are all choices that, in the context of existing sports games, could be seen as unnecessary or distracting. It would be easy to imagine a development team declaring that they couldn’t cut to a close up of the ball hitting the table because it would throw off the players’ rhythm, or they couldn’t make a song play during a rally because players will wonder where the music is coming from. Removing these flourishes that Table Tennis includes would probably even make for a fairer, more competitive game. But it would also neuter the drama and tension of this experience, destroying the emotional impact this game provides.

The mistake—and, yes, I’d go so far as to call it a mistake—that most sports games make is that they focus almost entirely on recreating the mechanics of the game they are portraying. While simulating those mechanics can create tension or drama, those sensations often only come to those who are knowledgeable about the sport or competent at manipulating this specific rendition of it. Table Tennis, on the other hand, creates the thrill of competition for anyone willing to give it a few minutes of their time.

This decision to buck conventional wisdom in the name of creating an affecting experience is the kind of thing that made Rockstar famous and developed their reputation as a studio that was moving the medium of videogames forward. Table Tennis, though not even a fraction as famous or controversial as their larger titles, continued this work and brought a much needed dose of drama to the world of sports videogames. Plus, it’s a game whose impact is still visible today: When I played MLB The Show 24 recently, I was shocked to see that sometimes when you hit a home run the camera will cut away to a unique shot that highlights the path of the ball and frames the player that hit it as a towering presence. It’s a remarkably effective technique that captures the triumphant, “no doubt” feeling of hitting a pitch perfectly, and it’s really no different than how Table Tennis cuts to a close up of the ball when it’s close to the edge of the table.

I know it’s unwise to hope that major sports videogame franchises will ever get to create an entire game in Table Tennis’s daring, dramatic style since their stakeholders include billion-dollar sports leagues and their publishers are counting on their annualized release to be one of the best selling games of the year. But if anyone ever wanted to, they know exactly which game to imitate.feeling of hitting a pitch perfectly.

Chris on Videogames is a new kind of videogame criticism that examines the medium through The Experience of Art.