Pool Pro Online Impressions

In addition to rifling through its retro archives for new mobile content, Namco's working on a few original games. One of these is Pool Pro Online, a basic billiards game that looks like it will have a very nifty multiplayer component. This game isn't likely to set any standards for originality when it comes out, but it could generate a lot of new interest in the mobile pool genre.

Pool Pro Online appears to be, at its heart, a pretty straightforward pool game. You have your overhead view of the table, you have your cue meter, and you have a little picture of the cue ball in the upper left-hand corner of the screen, where you can apply English to your shot. The important thing about this game is that it will allow head-to-head play over the cellular network--and render your opponent's shots on your screen--in real time. Namco gave us a demonstration of this ability with two side-by-side phones, and the action on each was almost simultaneous.

Namco's pool game will join several other multiplayer pool entries, like FCDG Pool and Kayak Interactive's Pub Pool, in the somewhat overstuffed mobile pool game market, sometime this December. Notably, the Sprint version of the game will feature connectivity to Sprint's Game Lobby service, which will enable ladder and challenge features. We'll have more details for you as they become available.