STOPSHOP (beta)

STOPSHOP is in beta. It is playable today and marked BETA in the app because it is still being developed — scoring, layouts and graphics may change between updates.

STOPSHOP is a stop-shot game. With its Volcano theme the room plays dark: the table light switches off when the game starts, the table becomes a projected lava field, and the camera sees the balls only in two white discs — a ring and a small pad. Pick Lights on instead and the table light stays on. Either way, you strike one ball into another and stop it dead: yours stays in the ring, the other one leaves it. Every round puts the ring and the pad somewhere new, so every stop shot comes from a new angle.

How a game works

1. Set the balls. Each round a ring appears somewhere new, with a spot at its centre, and a small pad appears a shot's length away. The ball on the pad is the one you strike; the ball on the ring's spot is the object ball. With Volcano, strike the 8 into a coloured ball; with Lights on, strike the cue ball into any other ball. Each ball chimes when it settles in place. There is no button: once both sit still for a second the round arms and the headline says STOP SHOT! (the line under it turns green while it waits).
2. Play a stop shot. Strike the ball on the pad into the object ball. To score, your ball has to finish inside the ring and the object ball has to leave it.
3. The verdict. STOPPED or DEAD STOP — or what went wrong, such as ROLLED THROUGH (your ball followed out of the ring), DREW BACK OUT, GLANCED OFF (a thin hit sent it out sideways), OBJECT BALL STAYED IN, SHORT (your ball stopped in the ring without reaching the object ball) or MISSED (no contact). If the table never sees a real shot, it asks you to set the balls again and nothing counts.
4. Next round. After the verdict a new ring and pad appear. A game is the number of rounds you chose; the results show your points, stops, dead stops, success rate, best streak and average drift.

Scoring

Result	Points
Stop — your ball stays in the ring, the object ball leaves it	+3
Dead stop — a stop within an inch of where your ball met the object ball	+5
Any other result	0

The best possible game is 5 points a round. After each shot the game screen shows the drift — how far your ball finished from where it met the object ball, as follow (+) or draw (−), and how far off the line. The board keeps your STREAK and your AVG DRIFT: how far, on average, your stops finished from that point.

Settings

Choose a theme on the STOPSHOP start page, then set the rest in the pre-play settings. They are remembered for next time.

• Theme — Volcano (the room goes dark and the table becomes a lava field seen from above: the ring is the crater's white-hot vent and the pad a pool of white light. A stop sets off a small blast inside the crater; a miss makes the volcano erupt across the whole table before the next layout rises). Lights on keeps the table light on: the ring is a drill-style striped zone that turns green on a stop and orange on a miss, crosshairs mark where each ball goes, the drills' sounds replace the volcano's, and after each shot the drift is drawn on the cloth in inches. The rules and scoring are exactly the same.
• Ring size — the ring's radius, 1.75 to 6 balls. Each round draws a size between the two thumbs; put them together for one fixed size. A smaller ring asks for a deader stop.
• Shot distance — how far the pad sits from the ring's spot, centre to centre: 4 to 36 balls. Each round draws a distance in the range.
• Rounds — 3 to 30, one stop shot each.
• Brightness — how bright the projected light is (Volcano, single player). The same slider is on the game screen: turn it up if the camera stops seeing a ball, down if the cloth glares.

NEW LAYOUT on the game screen gives you a fresh ring and pad for the round before you shoot. Nothing is counted. In a match it sits beside the headline and on the shooter's card.

Playing with others

Pick LOCAL MULTI or INTERNET beside PLAY on the STOPSHOP start page.

• Local multiplayer — 2 to 6 players take turns at one table, one stop shot each per round. Repeat layouts gives everyone the round's same ring; Unique per player gives each player their own, with the ring size and shot distance drawn from the same ranges. Most points wins; a tie at the top plays sudden death.
• Internet — invite online players (2 to 6). You take turns, each on your own table, one stop shot a turn, and the shooter's table is shown to everyone else — with CAST TABLE on, it's projected onto your own table while you wait. Every table plays the host's settings; your theme and brightness stay your own.
• The player cards show everyone's score. Tap a card to fix a score — online, your own rounds, or anyone's if you're the host. Online, the game screen shows every other player's live table instead of the cards; tap a table or a standings row to fix a score.
• Go Live and Record show every player and their score on the bottom bar, with the player who's up outlined.

Things to know

• Volcano needs a dark room. The camera only sees a ball where the projector lights the cloth: the ring and the pad. If you use a supported smart plug, the table light turns off when the game starts and comes back when it ends. Want the light on? Pick Lights on.
• Use two balls the camera can tell apart. In the dark a white cue ball can vanish on the white pad, so strike the 8, and put a coloured ball on the spot — not one the colour of your cloth. If the two balls look alike, the round won't arm and the screen asks for two different balls.
• If the game's card or start page says Coming soon, Paused or Unavailable, it isn't open for your account right now.
• Go Live, Record and instant replay work the same as in the other games, and every shot is saved to your game stats.