Rocket League: How to play the high-octane football game

Extremely popular among the younger generation, Rocket League is basically a game of football played with cars. Instead of players scoring goals, users control rocket-fuelled vehicles to put a giant ball into the opposition’s net.

Rocket League was one of the three gaming titles that featured at the Commonwealth Esports Championships 2022 in Birmingham.

Developed by Psyonix, the game was first released in 2015 for only PlayStation 4 and Windows but was later made for Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, macOS and Linux.

However, updates and support for macOS and Linux were stopped in 2020. Online support is no longer available.

Rocket League is one the most popular games that offers cross-platform gameplay, allowing users from different consoles to play together. This is one of the major reasons the game still enjoys a strong user base.

Moreover, in 2020, the game was made free to play for all users.

The developers released a mobile version of the game called Rocket League Sideswipe but without the cross platform option.

How to play Rocket League

Rocket League is one of the easier games to play, where users have only one major objective – score more goals than the opponent using rocket-powered cars.

However, it’s better to understand the physics and the mechanics of the game to help you learn quickly.

For starters, the cars, apart from the basic driving and turning, can perform various acrobatic moves like jumping, rolling in the air, dodging and even double jumping (mid-air).

Mastering aerial gameplay, however, takes a lot of practice.

But there are other ways to increase the performance of your car.

The field, which is covered with a cage, has boost packs scattered all over that a player can obtain by driving over them. These boosters give an edge over opponents by increasing the speed of the car for a short duration.

There’s also a handbrake option available that allows users to turn the car quickly.

A combination of these boosters and manoeuvres helps dribble, pass, defend and shoot the ball better and win matches easily.

However, playing the game directly can prove to be difficult for some users so there is a Free Play mode available to polish their skills.

Other than Free Play, there are three other types of matches – 1v1 duel, 2v2 doubles and 3v3 standard.

As the name suggests, 1v1 is a duel, while 2v2 is a two-on-two match with two players sharing a split-screen. The 3v3 is the most popular mode with three players in one team.

All these matches are available in Competitive mode whereas the Casual mode allows a 4v4 format as well.

Apart from the 1v1 mode, the others require communication, coordination and teamwork to win matches. Players from one team can practise together by creating a private match.

Rocket League system requirements

While consoles like PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch run Rocket League without any hindrance, there are some system requirements to play it on personal computers and mobile phones.

Rocket League system requirement for Windows PC

• Operating system: Windows 7 (64 bit) or newer (64 bit) Windows OS
• Processor: 2.5 Ghz Dual core
• RAM: 4 GB
• Storage: 20 GB
• Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce 760, AMD Radeon R7 270X, or better

Rocket League Sideswipe requirements for mobile

• Operating system: Android 6.0, iOS 12 and later versions
• RAM: 2GB
• Storage: 2GB or more

Rocket League ranking system

There are different tiers in the Rocket League called ranks, that determine the skill level of a user.

Players can climb up the ranks by winning Competitive matches but can also drop down if they lose.

The ranks are Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond, Champion, Grand Champion and Supersonic Legend.

Each rank is further divided into divisions; numbered I, II, III and IV

So, the first rank for any player would be Bronze I.

However, the ranks are different for each game mode. For instance, you can be Platinum III in 2v2 but only a Bronze II in 1v1.

However, when players are just starting out with Rocket League, they don’t need to worry too much about the ranking system.

They can start with the Casual mode and when confident in their skills, they can switch to Competitive mode.