One of the ways we stay energized throughout the day is playing with the company Foosball table. When things get too predictable, we like to shake them up with some “alternate” rules, which we call Ultimate Foosball.

This posting describes a Foosball variant we’ve enjoyed playing called Ultimate Foosball. Apparently the term “Ultimate Foosball” goes around quite a bit - you can google for a lot of uses of this term. Multiple balls in play seems to be a common theme to many of them, and certainly applies here. Without further adieu, here are the MusicIP-style Ultimate Foosball rules, version 1.0.

Starting the game

Ultimate Foosball begins with each player setting two balls into the launch pockets. Recommended starting position is the right hand on your offensive line, and the left hand covering the launch pocket. One plays says “Ready, Set, Go”, and both players release their balls simultaneously.

After all balls have gone into either side, points are allocated as follows:

4-0 - The player scoring 4 balls receives 2 points
3-1 - The player scoring 3 balls receives 1 point
2-2 - Each player scores 1 point (this advances the game without giving an advantage to either player).

Games are played to 10 points. If a 2-2 score would result in one or both players reaching 10 points, then no points are alloted, and “Sudden Death” rules are invoked. In SD, only three balls are used for each point. The underdog launches 2, while the other player launches 1. Whoever is behind is the underdog. In the even the underdog is not clear, you can use Rock/Scissor/Papers or any other agreeable method to determine who launches the extra ball.

Sudden Death scoring goes like this:

3-0 - The player scoring 3 balls receives 2 points
2-1 - The player scoring 2 balls receives 1 points

Special Cases

If a ball leaves the table, the entire round is restarted. Hence, if you find yourself in a position where your opponent will get more points than you if the round ends early, you may want to force a ball to leave the table. This is a valid tactic.

This entry was posted on Friday, October 6th, 2006 at 9:28 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.