Article bradenton.com 18-02-07

New 'Virtua Tennis' is reminiscent of past versions

GAME INFORMER MAGAZINE

Though it's lost some ground to the excellent "Top Spin" series in recent years, Sega's "Virtua Tennis" is still considered the premier tennis game of all time by many fans of the sport. Now, the franchise is moving onto the powerful next-gen systems and hopes to recapture its world title. We've been lucky enough to get our hands on a very polished, playable build of the game, due out March 20, and have been running it through its paces.

Based on what we've seen, your opinion about "Virtua Tennis" as a whole will be a strong indicator of how you feel about this third entry. Simply put, it doesn't really seem like much has changed. From the menus to the on-court action, nearly every aspect of the game is reminiscent of the past versions.

Your career, which can be played as a custom-created male or female, works off a large global map and calendar system. As a pro, you rise through the ranks by taking part in training at the tennis academy, entering tournaments or improving your stats via "Virtua Tennis'" trademark mini-games.

Although some games are repeated, such as "Pin Bowling," it seems that a good deal of the development effort on "Virtua Tennis 3" has gone into creating new contests. Many are adaptations of past contests.

That said, there's definitely some creativity at play, especially in strange events like "Feeding Time," where you hit the ball at large spools to keep hungry alligators from consuming the meat on the court, or "Avalanche," which has you dodging gigantic tennis balls while catching as many apples falling down an incline as possible.

Otherwise, it's the same highly competent racket action.

The control scheme is the same, with a two-click serve and face buttons for flat, slice and top spin returns. Despite the lack of innovation, "Virtua Tennis'" gameplay has always been its strongest aspect, and we're happy that the control is as tight and responsive as we expect. While it won't blow you away visually, the character models transition between animations very fluidly, which adds to the responsive feel. Both versions of the game play similarly, but only the Xbox 360 edition will feature online play. The PS3 "Virtua Tennis" hopes to overcome this deficit by including special Sixaxis control.

The roster of pros is also very impressive, featuring some of the best-known players in the world. Most important is the inclusion of the game's two most dominant and compelling players, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. Unfortunately, the structure of the career mode somewhat diminishes the impact of the pros, as they are unceremoniously dumped into low-level tournaments early in your progression, rather than being something that you build toward. Also, your world ranking doesn't seem to take into account the quality of your opponents. For example, even after being undefeated through four individual tournaments, defeating Federer, Nadal and Andy Roddick, and a doubles title with Federer as our partner, our player was still only ranked 246 in the world. Strange.

We'll have to see if "Virtua Tennis" can win back some of the fans that enjoyed "Top Spin's" more realistic vision of pro tennis. The gameplay is definitely there - now Sega just needs to fine tune the overall experience.

"Virtua Tennis 3"

Platform: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360

Style: 1 to 4-player sports (up to 4-player via Xbox Live)

Publisher: Sega

Developer: AM3 (PlayStation 3), Sumo (Xbox 360)

Release date: March 20

http://www.bradenton.com/mld/bradenton/business/16719019.htm?source=rss&channel=bradenton_business