Knockout City is the second game from Velan Studio, they released their first last year with Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit and while you may have thought they would take a bit for number 2, they kept revving those engines and now we are here.

Knockout City takes the game of Dodgeball, more familiar to Americans than us, but adds in some complexity on its mechanics, slathers on a lot of style and has a DJ that broadcasts from the moon. Here are 5 things you need to know about the game, ahead of its release on May 21st for PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch

Throws are only part of the game

When you get into a match, your first objective is always going to be, getting your hands on a ball, without it you are almost next to useless, except you are not. This is not like a shooter, where you need ammunition to be useful, as long as you are playing, you are ok.

This is because you can catch any ball that is thrown your way, and if you catch a powered-up ball, you can return it to the person, with even more power, a bonus for catching it. The ball types will also play into your strategies, like with the bomb-ball, the moment you pick it up, a timer starts to count down, hold on to it too long and its adios to you, but throw it with moments to spare, then your target has nothing to do but hope they can dodge. Combine all of that with lob shots, or curved shots and you can easily find yourself becoming a dodgeball champion.

You can also carry your teammates around, when they roll up into balls, letting you power them up to unleash devastating attacks, capable of taking out an entire squad in one go and if that wasn’t enough, you have a glider. Getting around is simple, but with the glider, you can ride wind currents to boost up higher, giving you a look at the map from a new vantage point, which could give you an advantage, if you make use of your time in the skies.

Staying on the go is crucial to success

Like any competitive title, motion is the one thing you need to succeed, this time it is perhaps even more so, because standing still not only makes you a target, it makes it so you cant return fire, because your ammunition is scattered around each map.

Thankfully, you have some options when it comes to getting around, you can move at a normal pace, or if you feel like you want to get up close and personal, you can run. The two things you will use a little more are the special attacks and the tackle, yes you read that right, tackling and if you time it right, you can knock the ball an opposing player has, loose. But tackling also works if someone is near a ledge, because if they are close enough to the edge, no they won’t break, but they can be pushed off, which is an instant KO.

There is also another way of getting around, that I haven’t mentioned and that is the glider, like The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild before it, you can use the glider anytime you are in the air, to help you get around. The only real catch, you are a free target in the air, and though you can let go and fall, some maps have some harsh drops and if you miss your landing, goodbye.

Looking good, is perhaps more important than playing good.

When you start the game, you will have the basic outfits that are offered by the game, but as you play you will earn coin, known as Holobucks and as you earn it, you can spend it in the store. The most important thing to note is that there are no, I repeat NO, pay to win items here, everything is just cosmetic, so if you spend hours grinding to unlock a set of rare gloves, there is not going to be any change to how well you catch.

In addition to gloves, there are gliders, ultimate holograms, ko effects and a variety of poses you can buy, to allow you to find the person that best suits you. Something that is interesting is that on the back of each character are places for logos, now these have multiple layers and colours, so you should be able to find a style that suits you and your team.

Something that I liked, though wasn’t something I worried about in my time with the game, was that you can save your character to a pre-set and you can have three of them saved, so if you run with a few different groups, you could have a character decked out in blue for one, yellow for another and then red for the last, allowing you to swap back and forth, without having to worry about remembering which piece went wear.

Seasonal offerings all year round

While the game will be basic out of the gate, during the games free trial period, the first season will release, giving players access to even more content, that means more maps, balls, swag in the store and beyond, the best news is that access to each season does not require a pass, once you buy the game, you get everything else for free.

For those that don’t care about the seasons, but want to level up, the game will offer hundreds of levels via their Street Rank progression system and as you level up, you will earn Holobucks and more importantly new cosmetic options. For those that do care about the seasons, that is where League Play comes in, as you win and lose in this mode, your score will change and the higher you place at the end of each season, the better your rewards will be.

Don’t worry if you are not into the online as much as others, you can always run around in the training space, though if you have friends you game with a lot, you can set up your own private matches, meaning there should always be a mode you can enjoy.

Cross-Play means there will always be someone to dodge

Cross-play has become something that many companies are fully embracing and for good reason, it means that instead of x number of players on each console, there are x number of players total enjoying the game. Knockout City will have cross-play at launch and that will be for all platforms and that is a great thing.

As this is not a twitch-based shooter, or a racing game where time is counted in the microsecond, no this game lets you play things a little more calmly. Not to say that you won’t find yourself in the chaos often, as having six or more players running around maps is going to get loud, but due to the somewhat easier play space, it won’t matter if you are playing on the Xbox Series X or a Nintendo Switch, you will get the same experience.

This is not just marketing hype either, the developers wrote their own new engine and game code, in order to ensure it, so if your PC is as low spec as they come or running enough coolant to make a nuclear reactor jealous, you should encounter the same smooth gameplay.

The game is launching on May 21st for PC, Switch, Xbox One and PlayStation 4, with next gen support and will offer a full trial for all platforms, so people can try before they buy.