Time to Take your Treo Bowling

It’s been quite a while since I last went bowling and also since I last had some spare time to play a game on my Treo.

Thanks to Ultimate Bowling Fighter ($19.95) I have now again been able to indulge in both activities (albeit the virtual kind).

Unless you’ve never before played a game of bowling I guess that I don’t have to run you through the scoring basics so I’ll jump straight into how Ultimate Bowling Fighter manages to deliver a highly entertaining and rich bowling experience.

The first thing that I need to get out of the way though is the fact that Ultimate Bowling Fighter (UBF) is a chunky 4.2MB application which also requires at least that much free available memory after you’ve installed.  This means that before installing UBF you’ll need to have at least 8.4MB free on your Treo.  Alternatively, you can also install UBF to your SD card and therefore only need about 4.2MB free.  Since I typically only have about 2.0MB free I had to move a few things around with PowerRun but I definitely think that it was worth it.

Once I launched Ultimate Bowling Fighter and selected New Game I was given the option to either play a Solo, Tournament or Multiplayer game.  In the Solo mode you’re then offered the option (bottom left image) to select one of four players – two male from Japan and Spain + two female from USA and Brazil + one bonus player which will become available as you progress to higher levels in Tournament mode.  This is followed by your choice of one of eight locations – same countries as the players plus four bonus ones.

Once on the bowling lane you only need to focus on four things:

1. Position the player using the Right/Left 5Way navigation button
2. Carefully look at the angle meter going back and forth in the middle of the screen (left image below) and then press Center 5Way to lock that position
3. Try to hit the power meter as high as possible (right image below) again using the Center 5Way (hitting max power will give you a cool ‘flaming ball’)
4. Pray that you hit a strike and definitely not a split…

Here below are a couple more images showing two different lanes (Japan and USA) and me hitting a lucky strike in the first  while Kelly’s ball is just taking flight in the hope of doing the same…

After each frame is completed you’ll get to see your progressive score (below left) and hopefully reach the very top of the tournament league…

If you haven’t taken Ultimate Bowling Fighter for a spin yet (no pun intended) and have been looking for a great new game to add to your Treo then I can definitely recommend that you get it – it’s one of the best that I’ve come across in some time.

Treonauts know how to make time for fun…