Innings: Test Cricket

Innings is Test cricket, played the way it is meant to be played: one batsman, five days, and every ball a decision.

You bat. The rest of the match is played for you. The bowlers read the pitch and the weather, the captain sets traps, and a good ball is a good ball whether it is the first over of the morning or the last before stumps. Survive the new ball, build an innings, and cash in when the bowlers tire and the pitch wears.

WHAT YOU GET
• A real five-day Test in a compact 1990s end-on camera that stays readable on a phone or a television.
• Day/night Tests with a pink ball. It keeps its shine longer, reverses less and grips less for the spinners, and the last session is played under floodlights as the sky goes dark.
• Six grounds that behave differently: green and damp, hard and fast, dry and turning. Each pitch changes through the match, so the fourth day does not play like the first.
• Pace, swing, seam, off spin and leg spin, each with a plan. Bowlers aim where they can get you out, and the side you face is picked for the pitch it is played on.
• Reverse swing: an old ball on a dry, bare pitch goes the other way, at its worst just before the second new ball.
• Read the seam out of the hand: it is canted the way the ball will move, and from the bounce to the bat is under a third of a second.
• Defend, push, attack or loft, then choose the stroke: straight drive, cover drive, on drive, square cut, upper cut, pull, sweep, reverse sweep, flick and more. The wrong shot to the wrong ball edges, just as it should.
• A career with four rungs: Class A, the domestic game, an A tour, then the Test side. You are ranked against every other batsman in the competition on runs scored, and only two go up - so a good average is not enough.
• A career that ages. Start at 18 to 24; a season is a year, the selectors grow less patient after 35, and at 40 it is over.
• At the top, a World Test Championship. Twelve Tests against eight other nations, ranked on the percentage of points won, and the top two play a Final. Some series include a day/night Test.
• A Hall of Fame for the great careers, judged on Test runs, hundreds and average, with a place for a Legend.
• The toss decides who bats first, and your side and theirs each have a captain of their own.
• Recorded sound: the bat, the stumps and a Test crowd that applauds a four, roars a wicket and stands for a hundred.
• Two commentators call the match. They welcome you to each ground and call your fours, sixes, fifties, hundreds and wickets, and your captain has a word before a hard innings. Turn them off in Pause or Settings.
• Quick play for a single match, and a training net where you set the bowler, the length and the line.
• Between-overs recap, the bowlers' plans, where every ball pitched, a wagon wheel and the full scorecard.
• Android TV support with a remote or gamepad.

WHAT YOU DO NOT GET
• No ads. Not between overs, not ever.
• No in-app purchases. Nothing is token-gated.
• No account required, and no internet permission is asked for. The game plays fully offline. Signing in to Google Play Games is optional and only adds leaderboards, achievements and a cloud copy of your career.
• No 800 MB download. Innings is under 100 MB.

Test cricket is hard for batsmen. That is the point. If you want a six every ball there are plenty of other games. If you want to grind out fifty on a fourth-day pitch and feel every one of those runs, this is yours.

CONTROLS
Pick defend, push, attack or loft, hold the circle to bowl, aim with it, and let go as the ball reaches the bat. Let go with it centred to leave the ball. Advanced is one swipe on the pitch: which way picks the shot, how far picks how hard, and letting go is your timing. On a television, the arrows pick the shot and how hard, and OK plays it.

Innings is made by one developer. Reviews and bug reports shape what gets built next.