With the release of Super Smash Bros. Melee, Mario Kart: Double Dash and Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour, there is only more venture for Mario and his pals: Tennis.

Visuals:

As usual, Nintendos characters are rendered in vibrant colors so bright, you might need sunglasses. The characters move seamlessly from animation to animation and the ball is always visible (unless its engulfed in flames, more on that later). The Game Cubes capabilities are used liberally, although there is nothing revolutionary here, the game looks beautiful and is not at all choppy.

Sound:

The traditional Mario-esc music fills the background just as you would expect from Nintendo. Each character has their own grunt, which you might find annoying at first, but once involved in the game you forget all about it.

Lasting Appeal/Replay ability:

With 14 starting characters, 3 traditional courts, 5 gimmick courts, 8 different tournaments, 4 unlockable characters, 2 unlockable courts, 8 minigames, singles and doubles mode. There is plenty to be done in this game

Gameplay:

The controls are responsive and not at all clunky. This game seems pretty easy at first, opponents on Novice or Intermediate difficulty settings can be beaten using one button. When venturing into higher difficulties, however, the games control problems become apparent. In order to hit a hard shot, lob, or short shot you have to perform these annoying two buttons combinations with the A and B buttons. And while four commands are being mapped to two buttons, the X, Y and R buttons all do the same thing! Why Nintendo, why? In addition to this, the Power shot (which is mapped to the X, Y & R) brings the action to a screeching halt by playing these 3-5 second cut scenes every time they are preformed. Power shots can be turned off in exhibition mode, but not in tournament mode. If it werent for these two things, Nintendo would have a near perfect game, so much for that.

Overall:

This game is quite fun, but can be very frustrating at times, usually because of the crapy controls and badly timed cut scenes. If you have anger management problems, this game might not be for you, but if you can take these problems with a grain of salt then there is fun-aplenty to have here.

Visuals: 9/10
Sound: 8/10
Replay: 9/10
Gameplay: 7/10
Final: 8/10

 

-Dan (P_tato)