Look, they shoveled snow off the lines for the game. Aw

 

Haven’t you always wanted to play foosball on your Mac? Come on, sure you have. Foosball rules. And this is a light, practically brainless, stress-relieving, palate-cleanser of a foosball game, perfect for breaking up long stretches of...whatever it is you do all day.

 

Everything you’d want in a foosball game is here. You can pick from seven player formations (we like 3-4-3), and play a tournament or one-off matches against the computer. You slide your men up and down by moving the mouse, and spin them by clicking. We wished we could reassign the movement to the keyboard when playing with a laptop, but we worked around it with a two-handed approach using the trackpad. Just because it’s virtual foosball doesn’t mean you can’t be injured—thumb cramps can hurt nearly as much as a foosball to the face.

 

The venues are awesome and influence gameplay—the ball skids around a little quicker in the cool-looking Snow venue, with its chalk lines helpfully shoveled clean by wee, unseen groundskeepers.And we dare you not to have a dance party at your desk the first time you hear the startup music. (OK, maybe the second time. You’re not made of stone.) During the games, the crowd chants, sings, and reacts to big plays.

 

A nice touch for cross-platform warriors is the $29.95 Master Kick five-pack, which includes support for Mac, Windows, Linux, Asus Eee, Windows Mobile, and Palm OS 5. Unfortunately, PowerPC Mac owners are stuck getting their foosball fix at the local tavern—Master Kick can only play nice with Intel Macs.

 

The bottom line. It’s almost impossible not to have fun playing this, unless you have no soul. If quick bursts of foosball fun are worth $10 to you, go for it. (It’s just too bad there’s no multiplayer option, so you can recoup the purchase price hustling chumps.)

 

COMPANY: Industry Entertainment

CONTACT: www.indus3.org

PRICE: $9.95 for Mac; $29.95 for five platforms, including Mac

REQUIREMENTS: Mac OS 10.4 or later

Pick-up-and-play or tournament foosball. Great mechanics. Tons of fun.

No control customization or window resizing.