Spectrum · BASIC

Volley

Build a one-paddle rally game, then improve its colour and drawing without hiding how it works.

Start with Move a ball Browse lessons

Keep the ball in play. Move the paddle up and down to meet its return from the far wall; every successful return adds one to your rally. Miss, take a breath, and serve again. There is one court and a fixed starting serve, giving you a chance to learn its path.

A white ball inside a blue court, with cyan walls, a yellow paddle and a score strip.
The finished court, held still for inspection. We build its movement and appearance in separate, runnable steps.

Volley follows Bright Spark. The new challenge is a world that continues moving while the player acts. Position, direction and contact come before the acceleration and fuel we will explore in Touchdown. Each lesson explains the Sinclair BASIC it uses; neither assembly nor Foundations is a prerequisite.

Use a stock 48K ZX Spectrum, or that configuration in an emulator. The game uses the keyboard and character display. A and Z move the paddle, S serves, R retries after a miss, and Q quits. The game is deliberately silent: all the information needed to play is visible.

Build the game, then compare its drawing

  1. Move a ball: change a position repeatedly.
  2. Give it a direction: reverse a signed step.
  3. Use the whole court: combine two coordinates and draw boundaries.
  4. Move the paddle: read controls without stopping the ball.
  5. Make contact matter: decide hits and misses before drawing.
  6. Keep score and play again: finish the serve, rally, result and retry cycle.
  7. Colour the court: use PAPER for solid shapes and restore the background.
  8. Keep the ball visible: calculate before erasing and draw only what changes.

Every lesson has a complete checkpoint. The plain early versions let us inspect the rules; keeping a coloured erase-first version gives us something concrete to compare with the improved drawing loop. We will explain the differences, including why less drawing work can change the pace as well as the flashing.