One might think that the only way to hit a return from way way back would be to take a Lob Shot, but that is not necessarily the case. Back Spin can be added to a shot to make it 'float' longer in the air. This allows even Fast Shots to make it across the table from far away.

Normally a Fast Shot taken from far back hits the net as shown :

And the only way to return from this distance would be to do a much slower Lob Shot :

However if we take a Fast Shot, and add lots of Back Spin, the ball 'floats' along :

We get a much faster and lower return , and with a lower bounce !

And they're not that hard, when you get used to them. :-)

Here we see a normal Lob Shot :

It is usually not very effective at defeating computer players, at least not against the good ones.

However if we add Extra Power to the shot and also add a lot of Top Spin, this shot can catch out your opponent, especially if he or she is back away from the table :

The power added to the Lob Shot would normally cause the ball to go out beyond the end of the table, but the Top Spin keeps it in and close to the net.

Combine this with Side Power and/or Side Spin and you have a very cool shot indeed :

Yep - that's a lob shot !

There are heaps of other cool shots possible using combinations of Shot Type, Power and Spin, but its more enjoyable to figure them out for yourself ...

Have Fun !

There are 12 preset cameras and each can be activated by pressing the F1 to F12 keys on the keyboard. These preset cameras can all be reprogrammed as desired in the Cameras menu.

The cameras can be setup in a load of different ways, but one parameter, the "Camera Catchup Rate" is not so obvious. Try changing this to see its affects. It is only available in the moving camera types.