Developed by Hand Made Software and published exclusively for the Atari Lynx by Atari Corporation in 1993, Malibu Bikini Volleyball is exactly what it says it is: a game featuring girls in bikinis playing volleyball on Malibu beach in California…

To be fair, there are men in shorts as well, although some may be disappointed that they’re not wearing Speedos… The opening title graphic (and box art) features model Karen Isely (I’m assuming Ms. Isely is/was a beach volleyball player, but a search turned up no information confirming this).

Malibu Bikini Volleyball is a two-on-two beach volleyball game for one, or up to four players. In single-player mode, you play against computer-controlled opponents, with an AI team partner. Up to four human players can compete against each other by connecting four Atari Lynxes via the system’s ComLynx port, although the chances of that ever happening must be close to zero.

A coin flip decides who serves first, and then it’s all about keeping that ball in the air, except when you want it to hit the sand in your opponent’s half of the court.

The aim of volleyball is to score the winning point in a set with a target number of points. You can only score a point if you are the team who served the ball. When the other team is serving, you must defend your court and prevent your opponents from scoring. Each time your opponent fails to score, you get to serve again, and have a chance to score a point. This is pretty much like badminton or table tennis, or other similar sports.

You can serve, set, spike, block and dive using the ‘A’ and ‘B’ buttons. Serving is when you begin a passage of play by hitting the ball from your baseline into the opponent’s court. Setting is when you pass the ball to your teammate to set it up for them to ‘spike’ it into the opponent’s court (pressing either button will do this when the ball is near you). Spiking is when you follow up a ‘set’ from your teammate, to hit the ball into your opponent’s court (you can only ‘spike’ after your teammate has successfully set it up for you). Blocking is when you jump up, near the net, to try to stop a spike from your opponents (press ‘B’ when close to the net – if you’re successful it will deflect the ball back into your opponent’s court). And, finally, diving is when you jump to try to save a ball that looks like it’s going to land in your court (press any button when the ball is out of reach – it’s not always successful).

There are two types of serves: ‘bump’ serves hit the ball underhand (press ‘A’ when serving), and ‘overhand’ serves hit the ball harder, from above (first press ‘B’ to throw the ball upwards, and then press ‘A’ to hit it as it comes down). You can also ‘jump serve’ (first press ‘B’ to throw the ball upwards; press ‘B’ again to jump, and then press either button to hit the ball), which is basically a harder type of overhand serve.

In the options you can change the game mode (friendly or tournament); how long a game is (5/10/15 mins, or no time limit); the speed of the ball (one is slowest; five is fastest); the win points total required; the wind strength, and toggle the hit squares on or off (which shows you where the ball is going to land when it hits the sand). You can also “sign in” to enter your initials and choose whether to play as a man or a woman.

The key to getting fast, interesting games going is… practise! Start at a lower ball speed and practise the above-mentioned moves, and get a feel for how Malibu Bikini Volleyball plays. And then gradually increase the ball speed and opposition difficulty, until you’re able to compete at a higher level. To be frank: the lowest difficulty setting for opponents is pretty pathetic – they seem barely able to hit the ball back – so you should take it up a notch once you’ve gotten used to serving and winning points. Unless, of course, you just want an easy ride.

Overall, though, Malibu Bikini Volleyball is somewhat lacking as a sports game. It’s not as playable or as varied as it should be, to entice people who aren’t fans of the sport. And it’s probably one of those games that real Lynx owners might even skip owning.

More: Malibu Bikini Volleyball on Wikipedia