Cue sports, also known as billiard sports,
are a wide variety of games of skill generally played with a cue stick, which is used to strike billiard balls and thereby cause them to move around a cloth-covered billiards table bounded by elastic bumpers known as cushions.
Eight-ball is a pool game popular in much of the world, and the subject of international professional and amateur competition. Played on a pool table with six pockets, the game is so universally known in some countries that beginners are often unaware of other pool games and believe the word "pool" itself refers to eight-ball. The game has numerous variations, mostly regional. Standard eight-ball is the second most competitive professional pool game, after nine-ball, and for the last several decades ahead of straight pool.
English billiards, called simply billiards in the United Kingdom, where it originated, and in many former British colonies such as Australia, is a cue sport that combines the aspects of carom billiards and pocket billiards. Two cue balls and a red object ball are used. Each player or team uses a different cue ball. It is played on a billiards table with the same dimensions as a snooker table and points are scored for cannons and pocketing the balls. English billiards has also, but less frequently, been referred to as "the English game", "the all-in game" and (formerly) "the common game".
Golf billiards is a pocket billiards game usually played for money. Unlike the majority of such games, it allows more than two people to play without compromises or rule changes. The game borrows concepts from the outdoor game of golf, which is historically related to the cue sports. It is usually played on 10–foot or 12–foot snooker tables as their size and structure are more appropriate.
A billiard ball is a small, hard ball used in cue sports, such as carom billiards, pool, and snooker. The number, type, diameter, color, and pattern of the balls differ depending upon the specific game being played. Various particular ball properties such as hardness, friction coefficient and resilience are important to accuracy.
Russian pyramid, also known as Russian billiard or simply billiards in Russia and Ukraine, is a form of pocket billiards played on a table similar to a snooker table. It is popular across Eastern Europe as well as countries of the former Soviet Union/Eastern Bloc. A variant with colored balls modeled on those of pool is known as Russian pool. Another variant, kaisa, is popular in Finland. In Western countries, the game is known as pyramid billiards, or simply pyramid within professional circle.
Pool is a classification of cue sports played on a table with six pockets along the rails, into which balls are deposited. Each specific pool game has its own name; some of the better-known include eight-ball, eightball pool and its variant blackball, nine-ball, ten-ball, seven-ball, straight pool, one-pocket, and bank pool.
Four-ball billiards or four-ball carom is a carom billiards game, played on a pocketless table with four billiard balls, usually two red and two white, one of the latter with a spot to distinguish it. Each player is assigned one of the white balls as a cue ball. A point is scored when a shooter's cue ball caroms on any two other balls in the same shot. Two points are scored when the shooter caroms on each of the three object balls in a single shot. A carom on only one ball results in no points, and ends the shooter's inning.
The following is a glossary of traditional English-language terms used in the three overarching cue sports disciplines: carom billiards referring to the various carom games played on a billiard table without pockets; pool, which denotes a host of games played on a table with six pockets; and snooker, played on a large pocket table, and which has a sport culture unto itself distinct from pool. There are also hybrid pocket/carom games such as English billiards.
Five-pin billiards or simply five-pins or 5-pins, is today usually a carom billiards form of cue sport, though sometimes still played on a pocket table. In addition to the customary three balls of most carom games, it makes use of a set of five upright pins (skittles) arranged in a "+" pattern at the center of the table. The game is popular especially in Italy and Argentina, but also in some other parts of Latin America and Europe, with international, televised professional tournaments. It is sometimes referred to as Italian five-pins or Italian billiards, or as italiana. A variant of the game, goriziana or nine-pins, adds additional skittles to the formation. A related pocket game, with larger pins, is played in Scandinavia and is referred to in English as Danish pin billiards, with a Swedish variant that has some rules more similar to the Italian game.
A trick shot is a shot played on a billiards table, which seems unlikely or impossible or requires significant skill. Trick shots frequently involve the balls organized in ways that are unlikely or impossible to appear in normal play, such as balls being in a straight line, or use props such as extra cues or a triangle that would not be allowed on the table during a game. As an organized cue sports discipline, trick shot competition is known as artistic pool.
Cue Club, or International Cue Club is a sports simulation video game developed by Bulldog Interactive and released for Microsoft Windows on 10 November 2000. It is a realistic interpretation of pool and snooker. The game was initially published by Midas Interactive, but since 2012 it has been distributed exclusively by Bulldog through the official Cue Club website.
Blackball, also known as reds and yellows and English eight-ball, is a pool game originating in the United Kingdom and popular across Europe, as well as in some former British colonies such as Australia. In the UK and Ireland it is usually called simply "pool". The game is played with sixteen balls on a small pool table with six pockets.
Sinuca brasileira, often simply called sinuca, is a cue sport played on a snooker table, using only one red ball instead of snooker's fifteen, with the normal six colours of the standard set of snooker balls. Each ball carries the same basic point value as in snooker. As with other pocket billiards games, a white cue ball is used to pot the red and other coloured balls. The game is played almost exclusively in Brazil and is little known outside this region.
Pool Revolution: Cue Sports is a sports simulation video game video game published by Hudson Soft for the Wii's WiiWare service. The game simulates a variety of cue sports. It costs 800 Wii Points to download in the PAL region and only 500 in Japan and North America.
Carom billiards and pocket billiards (pool) are two types of cue sports or billiards-family games, which as a general class are played with a stick called a cue which is used to strike billiard balls, moving them around a cloth-covered billiard table bounded by rubber cushions attached to the confining rails of the table.
American snooker is a cue sport played almost exclusively in the United States, and strictly on a recreational, amateur basis. Diverging from the original snooker, rules for American snooker date back to at least 1925, and have been promulgated by the Billiard Congress of America (BCA) since the mid-20th century. The game is in decline, as the standardized international rules have largely supplanted it.
Steve Davis World Snooker is a sports simulation video game developed by Binary Design, and published by Artworx Software. World Snooker simulates different types of cue sports, specifically Snooker, Pool and billiards. Released under licence from 6-time Snooker World Champion, Steve Davis, it is a sequel to CDS Software's 1985 8-bit video game similarly titled Steve Davis Snooker.
