Beginner Rocket League Tips 🥇 to Become a Star Player

With Rocket League now free-to-play across all platforms, there are many new players who don’t know what they’re doing. Here we’re going to walk you through our top beginner tips for playing and hopefully give you a head start playing the game. There are no secrets that will allow you to beat other teams easily. There’s also no single skill that will let you dominate every match. It’s mostly about practicing the right things, and eventually, you’ll get good. Out top 10 beginner Rocket League tips are as follows:

1. Change Your Camera Settings

The camera settings in the base game tend to make a lot of people feel quite nauseous because of the motion blur. However, you can fix this before it even becomes an issue.

The first thing you should do is turn off Camera Shake; it makes it almost impossible to play the game. Then you should tweak the camera settings until they’re at a point that you can play the game without feeling like you need to throw up.

Read our Rocket League article for the optimal settings

I tend to find that a wider field of view helps me see other players to pass to more quickly and keep an eye on what’s going on. I also like to keep the camera stiffness low, because it keeps the camera close to your car even when at high speeds. Everyone’s preferences will be different, but this is probably the most important tip on the list for all new players.

2. Master the Powerslide

The Powerslide button differentiates across every platform, but you can find it in the game’s settings. Think of it like the handbrake turn button of driving games. It allows you to turn your car much faster while sacrificing the least speed possible. It’s still much faster than trying to steer your vehicle any other way.

Mastering this technique will pay dividends in every match you play. A good way to practice is to load up the Training Mode, and Powerslide around the ball. This will give you a good feel for how your car handles during the move, meaning you’ll be much better at it when it comes to a real match.

You’d be surprised how important a Powerslide is in a pinch. If you need to get to the ball fast, and there are no teammates around to help you, a Powerslide can see you get there much faster, and on target.

3. Learn How to Air Roll

The Air Roll button is one of the most important in Rocket League. You’ll be spending a lot of time in the air, whether that’s smashing the ball, another player, or because someone just scored. You can also drive up the edge of the arenas and launch off to travel to the ball more stylishly.

Mastering the Air Roll will help you land on your wheels, meaning you can get up to speed faster, and hopefully closer to your target in a way that’s more efficient for every match.

I found it difficult to land on my tires for the first few matches. However, after some practice, utilizing real matches and Training Mode, I got the hang of it. If you do the same, you’ll notice a massive difference in the way you play.

4. Use Ball Cam

This is another one of our beginner Rocket League tips that every new player should pay attention to. Ball Cam is another camera setting. When it’s on, your camera will always focus on the ball in every match you play. This means that your focus is never away in a different direction. When you turn it off, the camera will instead focus on the direction your car is facing, which isn’t always where the ball is.

Ball Cam has its advantages and disadvantages, but for the most part, it’s good to turn it on. For new players, especially, being able always to see the ball will make it possible to keep the action in your sights. While you’re still figuring out the game’s controls and your playstyle, Ball Cam gives you one less thing to worry about.

Once you’ve played a few hours of Rocket League, it might be worth experimenting with Ball Cam off. It’s better for dribbling and performing tricks, but it’s a big change if you’re used to having the feature turned on. My best advice is to experiment between the two once you’ve got a few hours under your belt.

5. Don’t Default to Goalie

When you first start playing Rocket League, it can be easy to stick back and hang around the goal. Don’t do this though; it’ll actually make your life much harder.

Rocket League is a game in which all players need to get out on the field and try to score together. If just one player is holding back, it makes life so much harder for the rest of the team. With one less player to fight for possession, the opposition will constantly be trying to score, pushing everyone further back.

Instead, keep an eye on the ball, and head back to the goal if you notice that there’s no one there to defend it when the opposing team is getting too close for comfort. Rushing in and saving the day last minute is what makes Rocket League so exciting. Plus, you’re missing out on a lot of fun if you’re not even trying to score.

6. Demolish Freely

One more essential on our beginner Rocket League tips list, don’t be afraid to get in a quick Demolition. This is when you boost towards a player, hit them, and they explode. Some players at the highest level call this cheating, but they’re wrong. It’s a core part of the Rocket League formula, and it’s a lot of fun.

It can take quite a lot of boost in order to get a Demolition, but it’s worth it. It’ll leave the opposing team, one member, down for a few seconds. Even when that member rejoins, they still need to drive to get back in the action. In the meantime, you and your team are in a better position to score.

One word of advice, though. Don’t just try to get a Demolition if that player could dodge you, or if they’re out on their own. If you miss, or if you get a player out in the corner of the arena, you need to get back into the action. However, if you’ve used up all of your boost fuel, you’ll take longer, and potentially risk the opposing team scoring.

Keep an eye on the arena, and judge each potential Demolition accordingly.

7. Do Quick Aerials

There’s a key difference between an Aerial and a Quick Aerial in Rocket League. To perform an Aerial, you jump, move your car to face the direction you want, and then hold boost. A Quick Aerial sees you do this all at the same time, moving and holding each button together.

The difference that a Quick Aerial provides over a standard Aerial is the same as that between high-level players and casuals. With a Quick Aerial, you’ll be in the air and on the ball faster. This allows you to get some extremely impressive shots at the goal. You could also use a Quick Aerial in order to hit another player off target.

This might seem a bit advanced for a beginner tips list, but it’s a technique you should be learning if you want to win more matches.

8. Use Community Training Packs

Rocket League has a base set of lessons in Training Mode. These are great for getting you off the ground and into your first matches, but they’re far from comprehensive.

This is where the Community Training Packs come into play. Think of these as the Training Mode players from around the world have made. There are hundreds, if not thousands of these.

A good place to start is with the following packs, courtesy of Sir Timbers, which we have the codes for. You just need to enter the codes in the game, and the packs will be brought up for you to play.

9. Party With Players of Your Skill Level

Rocket League is fantastic, but sometimes you’ll find yourself against a team with a composition that’s too difficult to take on. Sometimes this happens. You’ll find that you face off against teams who practice every day or week, and they’re unbeatable for someone of your skill level, and a team who isn’t partied up.

However, you have the advantage that you’ll almost always be placed with players of a similar skill level. When this happens, and you enjoy a match, ask to party up with those players. It’ll mean that you stick together through future games and stand a better chance of winning.

More than anything, finding players of your skill level is a good way to make friends in this game. Send out a request if you have a few particularly good matches with someone. You never know what might come of it.

10. Don’t be Toxic

For some, this might be the most important entry on our beginner Rocket League tips list. Toxicity is something that plagues every online gaming community. There are always some players who want to start trouble and others who feel that they deserve more free content, and badmouth the developers for it.

I can’t stress enough how far you need to remove yourself from this behavior. Not only is it harmful to others who are just getting into Rocket League, but it’s also not going to help you have a nice time either. If all you do is complain and swear at other players, you’ll grow to dread playing the game.

Instead, always be kind, and if you have nothing nice to say, then just say nothing. Always say the nice things, though.

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Conclusion

Those are our top 10 beginner Rocket League tips. If you take all of these into account while starting out, not only will you improve faster, you’ll have a better time too.

Rocket League is a fantastic game, with a community that is largely positive and helpful. Everyone just wants to have fun, including the developers, and there aren’t that many other games out there that provide this level of enjoyment for free.

Check out our guide if you want to know what the best car combos in Rocket League are.

If there’s a tip that you think beginners need to know, and we haven’t included it, please let us know what it is in the comments.