Virtua TennisIn Virtua Tennis you join the ranks of the tennis elite as your character starts from scratch and works its way up to being the #1 ranked player in the nation. Play against 16 professional tennis players as you test your skills on the court.

18.5/20 Game Play:

Virtua Tennis is one of the most utterly addicting sports games I\'ve ever played. It\'s balance in every game mode (Quick Match, Tournament, World Tour Matches, and World Tour Training games) makes it a enjoyable game to pick up and play, yet allows depth to the game. In the game you start off in the World Tour mode with two plain characters (a male & female) that you create. Your rank is starts at 300 and you have to work your way up to #1. However, the tennis matches have rank exclusions, so your character has to be ranked high enough to get into most matches. So, to fill in the void of time spent in the early stages of character development, you play mini-games to “train” your character. Instead of being given out points to divvy up between skills at the beginning of character creation, your stat go up depending on how much you train and how well you do in the mini-games. In the beginning of World tour you get slightly tired of always playing mini-games, and towards the end of always plain matches, but for the most part the world tour mode does a great job of balancing the types of games you\'ll be playing, and the amount you play them. In addition to the main world tour mode, you can pick up and play an exhibition match, or play a tournament outside of the main story mode if you feel like it. This is good for a quick time-killer when you don\'t feel like diving right into the story mode. Lastly there are the ball games. (Blockbuster, Balloon Smash, Blocker, and fruit dash) each of these test your playing skills in various ways (accuracy, response time, etc...) and are a really addictive diversion from the main game. Virtua Tennis does support up to 4 player multi-player via ad-hoc, but unfortunately doesn\'t have any online features.

6.5/10 Graphics:

The graphics in Virtua Tennis is adequate but not awe inspiring. The courts look very good, with realistic marks from the balls being hit, and from the normal view, characters look fine. However, cardboard looking audience, and mediocre looking character models make the graphics on this game lacking slightly.

9/10 Sound:

Sound in Virtua Tennis blends in nicely to the game play. The sound effects, while not entirely noticeable on their own, add a great deal of realism. The background music is upbeat, and fits the game well.

4/5 Stability:

Virtua Tennis is a very stable game. In the world tour mode, it takes a while to load sometimes, but other then that loading times are semi-normal. The only other compliant I have is every now and then in doubles matches, the AI player just stands there and lets a ball by. (as if he/she is saying “that was yours”) I suppose that\'s actually realistic, but it\'s annoying none the less.

4.5/5 Controls/Interface:

Virtua Tennis is was on of the first games I\'ve played that really made good use of the analog nub. You\'ll end up pushing one way to reach for a ball and then spin it around to change the direction of your shots aim. You can play with the d-pad, but you nearly have to play with the analog nub to really experience this game, which is nearly the opposite of most games.

Appropriateness

Virtua Tennis is a sports game. No violence, no blood, gore, swearing, etc. The worst thing in the game is a shirt on a female character that slightly reveals the midriff. Violence category 10/10 pts. - No Violence - No Blood - No Gore Language 10/10 pts. - No Foul Language - No sexual dialogue. Sexual Content/Nudity 10/10 pts -No Nudity -No Sexual Content Occult/Supernatural 10/10 pts - There is no occult or supernatural in the game. Cultural/Moral/Ethical 10/10 pts - No authority issues involved with this game. - No prejudicial bias in the game. - No gross humor in the game.

Final Score 92.5/100