- Playtest closed - 2 June 2026
Hi everyone!The playtest is now closed. Thank you for trying it out and providing your feedback!Quick overview of the latest features that have been added to the game while the playtest was open:Fireballs! When a robot hits the ball to bounce correctly on the court 5 times in a row, its next ball will become a fireball. If a fireball hits the receiving robot, that robot explodes and will lose the match immediately!Upgrades window now shows the first 3 characters of the upgrade name and its level directly on the upgrade boxesMatch statistics window now shows the initial, difference and resulting match scores and robot points of both players for completed matchesSmall ranking list window adjustmentsImproved quit game pop-upSound effects during scene transitions, when tabs are switched in the settings menu and when interactive pop-ups open and closeBetter music outside of tennis matchesBet…
- Playtest closing on Monday - 27 May 2026
Hi everyone!If you want to try out the playtest, you still have time to do so until Monday, 1st June.I will then deactivate and reset the playtest, meaning all playtest participants will lose access after Monday.
- Exploding robots, tutorial, upgrades and new playtest - 8 May 2026
Hi everyone!First of all, sorry for the long waiting time since the last update. Due to private issues it took me longer than expected to complete the next iteration of the game.However, it is done now and a few great features have been added:A tutorial that explains the most important mechanics of the game as soon as they show up for the first time. Tutorial messages can be turned on or off in the settings menu. You can also reset all tutorial messages there, in case you'd like to see them again. Otherwise they won't be shown again after being closed.When a robot moves over a burning area of the court, its condition deteriorates. Once its condition goes down to 0, the robot explodes and loses the match immediately. So you might want to keep an eye on your condition and maybe try to hit that red bonus bubble before it's too late...Hover your mouse over the opponent robot on the court to…
- Playtest closed, new playtest coming soon - 14 January 2026
Hi everyone!The first playtest is now closed, thank you for your feedback!Quick overview of the latest features that have been added to the playtest:Height, width, energy, condition and precision of computer tennis robots now depend on their initial (random) match score: The higher their initial match score, the higher their attributesGodotSteam integrationRemoved unnecessary files from export buildIf the ball hits fire, it explodes and the receiving robot scoresIf the ball hits slime, it bounces much lower and slowerIf the ball hits water, it bounces a bit lower and slowerImproved match score changes and robot point rewards at the end of a matchRanking list now shows the updated match scores for both robots after a match finishedWhen a button is unhovered, it zooms back to its original size in a short animation, instead of snapping back instantaneouslyStay tuned for more improvements a…
- Playtest now open until January 12 - 1 January 2026
Happy new year everyone!As of today, the playtest is open to everyone. That means you don't need to request individual access anymore but can download and play the latest version straight away.The playtest will be available until January 12. After that date, I will take it offline again and continue working on whatever needs the most attention.Please consider filling in the feedback form via main menu, this would be much appreciated!
- Lots of improvements and upcoming playtest - 8 December 2025
Hi everyone!I made some good progress in the last few weeks.\Court effects: Every couple of hits, each corner pillar erupts either fire, water or slime, which then falls onto a random area of the court (the quarter of the court closest to that pillar) and affects energy consumption and required precision when the robot or ball interacts with the affected target fields on the court.They will disappear after a few hits, resetting energy consumption and required precision for the affected target fields back to default.Next to each corner pillar, there is a box with a number counting down the hits until the next eruption of that corner pillar (actually it's two labels per pillar, one on the inside and one on the outside of the wall, so you don't need to constantly rotate the camera to see the exact numbers on opposite court sides).2 hits before an eruption, a pillar starts spitting out a li…
- Robot Tennis is now Hydraulic Slam! - 19 September 2025
Hi everyone!As the game takes shape more and more, I liked its name less and less, so I decided to change it from something that just describes the base setting of the game without provoking much fantasy or excitement, to something that indicates that this game might actually be fun.Also, this was a good opportunity to get a new, more professional logo and capsule artwork.With this in mind, let the Hydraulic Slam begin (soon)!
- Sparks, dust trails, ball trails, smoke, fire, water, slime - 7 August 2025
Hi everyone!I have added some particle effects to make the game look more exciting:When robot arms move up/down and rackets move left/right, a few sparks spread out in all directions.When robots move around the court, they leave a trail of dust behind them, slowly rising and disappearing shortly after.The simple trail behind the flying tennis ball is now replaced by bright, moving particles.When the ball is hit by a robot racket, there is a little explosion effect emitting some smoke out of the moving racket.The corners of the court are now featuring thick pillars, which are spitting either fire, water or slime, depending on the type of the court.(Bonus feature: The pillars also contain spot lights which create more realistic shadows on the net and robots.)
- Settings menu and demonstration scene - 26 June 2025
Hi everyone! Exciting news: Robot Tennis finally has a proper Settings menu! Initially, it was just a very simple kind of dummy screen with a couple of options to choose from. Now it is composed of 5 separate tabs for Controls, Interface, Graphics, Audio and Calendar settings. The most development effort has been put in the Controls tab, where the player can now individually adjust all relevant in-game keyboard controls. When clicking the "Save" button, any changes of settings are applied and saved to the local user config file. Once the game is started the next time, individual settings are loaded from the local user config file and applied automatically. Apart from that, I updated and extended the "demonstration scene". This is a separate, static scene in the game which is by default invisible but can be activated manually via code when debugging and is supposed to be used for demonst…
- Improved court graphics and button animations - 20 April 2025
Hi everyone! Over the last couple of weeks I experimented a bit with shaders, and ended up with some nice, gently moving and not too distracting backgrounds that float behind the tennis courts. Each court type (clay, grass and hard court) now has its own floating background, matching the colour of that court surface. In addition to that, I implemented mouse-over animations for all buttons in the game (except for input fields and buttons that open drop-down menus). Hovering over a button is now more enjoyable, as it not only changes colour but also increases in size once the cursor touches it. Other improvements: - Replaced the net in the center of the court, which was previously just a single rectangular shape with weird looking transparent holes in between, with individual cylindric shapes. It now looks much better, especially when zooming in from an angle. - Replaced large court surfa…
- Target field animations are there! - 24 March 2025
Hi everyone! Quick update on the latest progress of Robot Tennis: I didn't like how the target fields just suddenly appeared on the court out of nowhere at the start of each player turn, and again suddenly disappeared at the end of the turn. It looked a bit cheap. Hence I added some animation for each target field to smoothly expand onto the court when the player turn starts, and smoothly shrink back into the court once the player selected one of them (or decided to hold the robot position). Old: New: It is now much more fun to click on a target field, especially with that little random animation delay for each field and when the field size "overshoots" a bit at the end.
