When I first received FAIRY TAIL: Beach Volleyball Havoc, I immediately began thinking of when I could play this without anyone I knew or cared about seeing me. I only knew two things about FAIRY TAIL, and both of them were Lucy, so a game based around swimwear was alarming. In the past, whether it was Dead or Alive or even Senran Kagura PEACH BALL, you never knew how lascivious these things could become in the name of fan service. However, after putting in several hours of gameplay with my daughter as an eager second player, I’m pleased to say the game is for fans first, but not the overly thirsty kind. Rather, you need to be a really big fan of FAIRY TAIL to get more than a bit of play out of this fun but nonsensical volleyball title.

Really BIG fans! Right?? ‘Cause they’re large? Please send help.

The entire setup of Beach Volleyball Havoc is “there is a volleyball tournament and everyone is here to play.” There’s no story mode, no grand arcing saga that encompasses the years of lore that FAIRY TAIL has crafted, it’s literally just an excuse to play volleyball and stick everyone in swimsuits. You’ve got a single-player mode, a two-player competitive or cooperative mode, and three or four-player modes to mix and match. The first one to four successful points wins, regardless of the opponent’s standing. At the time of this writing, there are exactly two achievements: one is for “unlock all characters” and the other is for “unlock all fan art.” You automatically unlock something once you finish a game (regardless of victory), so it’s just two achievements for grindset playing.

FAIRY TAIL: Beach Volleyball Havoc relies on simplicity for a lot of things to get their point across. For one, you’ve only got one background, one stage setting. Characters do not get additional costumes or accessories. There are no bells and whistles beyond the frankly impressive roster of characters, and no greater knowledge to be gleaned from playing through. The soundtrack is chiptune adjacent with plenty of bloops and bleeps to give you the sensation of a much older game, combined with 16-bit, pixel art sprites for a majority of the gameplay. The portraits of the characters during selection and point announcement are more detailed and formed, but still distinctly low fidelity in comparison to the anime or the manga. In short, you’ve got a game that is meant to feel and look like a game, not an extension of the universe.

For example, this rain of swords was probably used in the series, just not to ensure a match point.

There are going to be some complaints about the graphics of FAIRY TAIL: Beach Volleyball Havoc, and I understand…to an extent. When you see the visuals of the anime and the movies, the quality is fantastic and very explosive, key to the nature of the content itself. By contrast, the softer designs combined with the tropical element make the view seem almost like a parody, but I think that works really well. After all, the context is “everyone is here for a volleyball tournament.” Why not make it a bit goofier all around? It works perfectly for the gameplay and still gives each sprite a very distinct presentation. If you need more fan service, go check the fan art gallery: it’s chock full of suggestive poses.

Once you get your head around the initial controls, that’s all you’ll ever need. If you’re standing on the ground, you’ve got one of two buttons to bump or set the ball, and jumping is needed to “spike” it back toward the opponent. You can juggle the ball forever on your side if you want to, and the lack of timer means no reason not to keep the ball to yourself if you’re looking to get punched by your opponent. Either “hit” button does the same kind of move at first, so you don’t need to commit your memory to a ton of strategy in this term. Just get under the ball and press the button. Hell, there’s even a delay once the ball hits the ground (usually) so you can make a late dive and still save the volley.

So what makes it FAIRY TAIL: Beach Volleyball Havoc? That’d be the magic, which is both the most fun and most frustrating part of the game. Between points, each team gets a new magical modifier at random they can give to either teammate. These modifiers are all over the map, ranging from silly elements (summoning a Plue to just amble across the court) to distractingly powerful (makes the ball randomly change trajectory in mid-air). The further along you get, the more powerful the enchantments become, evolving into aspects that transform the battlefield (everyone is underwater!) transforming the players (everyone is super muscular!), and just obscuring the screen entirely (who’s grandma is taking up half the screen??). By the time you get to the last match, the concept of volleyball has left the building: now it’s just ballistic magic.

Also, the enchantments sometimes last beyond the match, resulting in this hilarious selection screen.

On the one hand, this mechanic is fairly well done. Not only does it scale appropriately so that someone doesn’t get “Super Black Hole” on the first turn, but the abilities fuse with each other to make things even more chaotic. So if summoning a massive gust of wind wasn’t enough of an obstacle, you’ve also called down a dancing troupe of anthropomorphic, bodybuilding cats to take up visible (but not tangible) space all over the opponent’s play area. Finding the different fusions is some of the most fun to be hand in the game, and matches tend to be over in ten minutes (five if you’re terrible), so you’ll easily be able to roll the bones and get new ones fast.

On the other, though, it becomes clear that FAIRY TAIL: Beach Volleyball Havoc is too reliant on these enchantments to hide the fact that there’s not a lot to the game. The characters have slightly different movement styles, so the Exceed characters of Happy, Carla, and Pantherlily all move a bit more slowly due to them being tiny, but they seem to be the outliers. There isn’t really a speed build or a muscle build since everything is flat in terms of execution. It doesn’t make a difference if you choose the girl who looks like she’s twelve or the dude with a beer gut and an uncomfortably small speedo, they jump, strike, and move all the same. The magic, I suppose, is supposed to be an equalizer as a result.

MA-CHO MA-CHO NYAAAAA. I WANNA BE, A MACHO NYAAAAA.

Yet the enhancements don’t really serve their purpose in helping a single-player game as the AI is weirdly balanced and seems arbitrary. For example, there are times when I played and did a simple hit with NO magic whatsoever, and the CPU was too slow to get to the ball and I got a point. Yet when I use King Lion’s Brilliance, which literally whites out the whole screen for a couple of seconds, the computer has no problem finding the ball and sending it back to me, making it so I was mashing buttons like crazy and hoping I was in the right vicinity. These effects are fun and tricky to use against other humans, but make no difference to the cold and indifferent computer player.

Additionally, some of the effects are further hamstrung by the game’s attempt to be helpful. FAIRY TAIL: Beach Volleyball Havoc has a constant reticule on the ground for where the ball will be headed, and this remains even when the magic dictates the ball to go crazy in mid-flight. There’s no setting to turn this off, just as there’s no setting to adjust the difficulty level, so you simply get what you get with the game. The only way to really have fun with it is in a true PVP sense, or at least co-op vs computer so that you can commiserate with each other. The ball’s outline was a godsend when playing with my daughter, who figured out how to track the ball more accurately than trying to guess the air trajectory. It was a ton of fun, and I really enjoyed playing with her.

Supposedly we’re still playing volleyball. I can’t even begin to tell you where the ball might be.

But, as a last complaint, not everyone is going to have a friend nearby, and FAIRY TAIL: Beach Volleyball Havoc has no online multiplayer. This game is barebones as it is, but to not recognize that most play sessions take place remotely nowadays instead of in person is a baffling choice by the developers. As much as it’s a fun distraction, it would have legitimate replay value if I didn’t need to call friends over to flop around on the court in my own home. I imagine it’ll impact a lot of potential players’ decisions without having that online play component.

I like the look, I like the sound, and I like the absurdity of FAIRY TAIL: Beach Volleyball Havoc. It’s rather silly and I’m not the target demographic, but I had a good time in spite of the flaws. Yet I’m certain that, once I stop playing, I’m hard-pressed to think of a reason to pick this back up. All the unlocks can be done in under three hours (closer to two if you fail on purpose) and there’s no dessert once you’ve finished this light meal. It’s not bad, but there just isn’t enough to make anyone sit up and pay attention. In a world with wildly detailed and engaging anime-related games, this one is just a quick glint on the beach that gets washed away in a second.

FAIRY TAIL: Beach Volleyball Havoc is available now on PC.

Reviewed on PC.

A copy of FAIRY TAIL: Beach Volleyball Havoc was provided by the publisher.