Review: Home Sports
Home Sports looks to bring a number of different sports into your home with the use of Mixed Reality. When you think back to the start of Motion Controller games, one game stands out and that is Wii Sports, which allowed you to bring sports into your own living room. Has Home Sports found the winning formula to bring this to Meta Quest?
Release Date: December 11th 2024
Developer: Resolution Games
Publisher: Oculus Publishing
Price: £9.99
Reviewed On: Meta Quest 3
* Access Provided For Review *
More Semi Pro, Than Pro
As mentioned Home Sports is looking to bring a number to sports into your own living room via the use of Mixed Reality on the Meta Quest. With this in mind the team have included five sports into the Mix, which are:
Badminton
Badminton is my favorite sport included in Home Sports, where at times it can feel a little slow, if you get a good rally going it’s fun – especially against someone online. However the sluggish nature of this compared to the other sports means it might not be one that suits everyone – and I feel this one could lose its online audience quickest, which is a shame.
Hockey
Home Sports version of hockey echoes air hockey more than actual hockey, with you and your opponent being at either end of the rink, with the sides of the rink being designed to rebound the puck back into play – as it would on an air hockey table. You only get one hockey stick but, you will cycle between the goal-keeper and outfield sticks by holding the stick with either one (goal-keeper) or both hands (outfield). This keeps it very simple for those with less experience in the medium and makes it pick up and play but, it has an unpredictability on the physics, sometimes taping the puck makes it fly around like crazy, and sometimes swinging with some power would see it move slower.
Bowling
Wii Bowling was my favorite game on Wii Sports, so this was one I was hoping they would replicate in Home Sports. Again it is easy to pick up and play for anyone never mind their experience in virtual/mixed reality. However, after playing a few rounds of bowling I noticed again this game has some inconsistency in the ball physics, which can break the immersion and become annoying.
Mini Golf
This is probably the most accessible game that people will go to after bowling but, the issue this faces is, if someone already owns Walkabout Mini Golf it fails to compete with that. This is down to a number of reasons, firstly where the ball physics are serviceable on Home Sports, it’s perfect on Walkabout. Then the courses lack the creativity, which seems like an oversight considering these are virtual courses – where they didn’t need to go crazy, they could have been more creative.
Pickelball
With Pickelball it lacks any real depth, and is by far the worse sport included for me. With how it plays there is no real strategy to the game. The limited amount of shot types and again some odd physics especially when having to return the ball from the bounce after a serve, and this one becomes repetitive quickly. After a few rounds of this you feel you have seen everything this is going to offer, and I will rarely see myself returning to play it.
Where this is a solid start bringing a game like Wii Sports to mixed reality, it feels like these games miss the charm of the aforementioned Wii Sports. Although Wii Sports was all about accessibility and being pick-up and play, they seemed to make the sports all feel like they have some depth to learning them – making them easy to play but hard to master. Home Sports does not give off this feeling at all, they all seem to lack that depth and challenge that made Wii Sports resonate with an audience of all ages.
The game can be played in single player against bots, drills and practice mode but, the single player element does become boring quite quick. The game includes a multiplayer mode and this is where the sports become more enjoyable as you do have a human (players Meta Avatar) across from you within the portal on standing near you in your own space.
A Mixed Reality
The use of mixed reality is the strongest point of the game to me. For the sort of sports they have created they had to make sure you can expand on the play space the best they could – while making sure they blend them perfectly. They have done this by opening a portal that maps perfectly to the scan of your room (you do when setting up the rooms guardian system). This has allowed them to put your half of the courts, ice rink, bowling ball machine and a set amount of the golf course into your physical space, with the rest being inside of this portal. This works great with the only large amount of real movement being need on the golf courses. For this it will just automatically move you forward to your ball, with the course then coming more into your room – but you are at the point of the course you need to be at, allowing it to give that feeling of true to life size.
To go with the more family orientated feel of the game, for the visuals on the virtual part of the game they have gone with a cartoony and bold colored look. Which make sense and works with the idea of the game, online using Meta’s avatars and the audience it seems to be aimed at. Sound wise with all indoor sports you will get music and general noises from the sports like the puck sliding across the ice, the noise of the racket hitting the shuttlecock and the ball being bowled. The only time you really get some more environmental noises, is when playing Mini Golf outside and you will hear birds chirping as well as the music.
Where the mixed reality is the games strongest point it does come with a rather big caveat, you need a decent sized playspace to get the most out of the game. I have a moderate size playspace and I to amount I had actually had to reduce it to get the most out of Home Sports made it so I didn’t really need to move much on the courts and ice rink to be at either side – more of little step sideways than a strafe. Meaning if you already have a limited playspace area this could become very stationary and pointless outside of bowling and mini golf. The next issues comes from the game only being playable while standing, there is no adjustments for seated play and this takes away some of the accessibility the game has been created around – especially if you are unable to stand due to a disability.
Comfort
The Verdict
Home Sports is a title that clearly has ambitions to bring a family and accessible game like Wii Sports back into peoples homes. This it is a solid start for bringing a Wii Sports style game to VR and, the use of mixed reality allows it to bring the sports and their arenas into your home. However, the execution of the sports all feel a little lackluster. Add to this the experience being better for those with a larger playspace and it removes some of that accessibility and will hamper the enjoyment for those who don’t have big spaces. I think it could be the sort of title you might find yourself jumping into briefly with friends every now and then but, outside of that its not one you will play on your own.