Should I be using the Ball Cam (focusing the camera on the ball)? | Controls Rocket League Guide
Last update: 11 May 2016
Ball Cam is one of the most useful features of Rocket League and you should be using it the moment you start playing the game for the first time. Its purpose is very simple - the camera automatically focuses itself on the ball and turns towards it no matter if you're driving yourself in a straight line or not. This makes the games much easier, especially if you're in a very dynamic match and you can't spare even a second or two to pinpoint the current location of the ball. The Ball Cam also comes in handy when you must perform a precise shot that should end with scoring a goal, when you have to hit the ball located above your car or when you're acting as a goalkeeper and must defend the goal line from the attacks of the other team.
All of the things mentioned above are really great, but this doesn't mean that the Ball Cam doesn't have any disadvantages. It may be problematic to play properly with Ball Cam turned on when you're acting defensively on your half of the field or when you have to quickly retreat towards your goal right after an unsuccessful attack from your team. In situations like these you may have some serious issues trying to establish how far you're from your goal or what trajectory you should choose in order to hit the ball and prevent the other team from scoring a goal. Another type of a situation when the Ball Cam is not welcome is when you're driving on the walls of the stadium. The Ball Cam always focuses on the ball and that can make driving in a straight line a difficult task. You may also get confused on where precisely your car is located and that's never a good thing.
To summarize, you should keep the Ball Cam turned on for the entire time spent on getting to know the game better, learning the basic moves and improving your skills. Once you've completed a lot of matches (like more than a hundred) and gained some precious experience, you may consider turning off the Ball Cam in certain types of situations in order to gain more freedom and to maintain full control over what's happening on the field. Playing the game with the Ball Cam turned off for the entire time is not necessarily a recipe for disaster; however, if you want to be successful without it, you must be great at driving, know the ball physics really well and look around a lot on your own (notice the markings on the ground - they will tell you where the ball is even if it's currently in the air).