Review by: Tom Chick

The original Virtua Tennis was not about pressing buttons. It was about positioning. You simply moved your player where you wanted in relation to the oncoming ball, and you held down a button. From there, the nifty animation took over and you had acquitted yourself admirably as a savvy player of videogame tennis. This made Virtua Tennis as accessible as Pong, but with decidedly better animation. But since your player's position had a lot to do with the power of the returned shot, and since different players had different strengths, and since timely positioning meant more control over aiming the return shot and therefore watching your opponent carefully, there as a lot more to Virtua Tennis than just getting in the way of the ball. As a tactical sports game, it had the nuance a tennis fan or tennis player would appreciate.

That was ten years ago on the Sega Dreamcast. If you're keeping score -- something that's never intuitive in tennis -- we are now up to the fifth Virtua Tennis, even though it's called Virtua Tennis 4. Virtua Tennis 3 was followed by Virtua Tennis 2009, which was really just an updated version of Virtua Tennis 3, but Virtua Tennis 3.5 doesn't sound nearly as dramatic as Virtua Tennis 2009. So here we are with a bona fide new Virtua Tennis, called Virtua Tennis 4, which apparently sounds more dramatic than Virtua Tennis 2011. So what's new in this version?

Not much in terms of the core gameplay. This is still a fantastically accessible but surprisingly deep game. You have a sort of adrenaline meter that you can fill, based on what type of player you're using. Some players fill the meter by drawing out a volley. Others fill the meter by playing close to the net. Still others focus on power serves, of hitting the ball before it bounces, or using a backhand. When the meter is full, you can use a faster power shot that might catch your opponent off guard. It's a bit of a concession to 2K's Top Spin series, which was a much more finicky tennis game geared towards players who wanted something more "gamey" (i.e. the buttons did more stuff). It's a minor enough factor in Virtua Tennis 4 that it doesn't undermine the game's basic simplicity. Instead, it gently encourages you to focus on different ways of playing.

As you'd expect, the graphics and animation are suitably up-to-date. Animation has never been a problem in the Virtua Tennis series, but the creepy zombie stares during cutscenes were always worth a laugh. That's not so much the case now, where the creepiness is no worse than your average Bioware game. But it wouldn't be Virtua Tennis without some laughably awkward visuals, so now you get sweat technology. As a match progresses and the players presumably work up a sweat, rivulets of milky white substance run down their faces, as if they're artificial persons in an Alien movie. Some of the more vulgar among you might get other ideas, but I'm quite sure I have no idea what you're thinking.

Various star players are, of course, included to help sell the game to tennis enthusiasts. You get Federer, Sharapova, Wozniacki, one of the Williams sisters, and so forth, each with distinct stats. Non-tennis enthusiasts such as yours truly can sidestep the celebrity players in favor of the world tour mode, in which you train your custom player. It's a bit like a boardgame, where you roll dice to move along a track of events laid out on a world map. As you travel across a region, you accumulate "fame stars", with a target number of stars required to be eligible for the big tournament at the end. You have to manage money and your player's energy level, avoiding injuries and mishaps, with cosmetic unlocks along the way. Many of the locations on the map are training exercises, which you use to improve your player's stats and to unlock new adrenaline modes. In the early stages of a career, it can be frustrating using an unskilled player, but that's just part of RPG progression, much like killing rats in the basement of a tavern before heading out to slay a dragon in its lair. Tennis Age: Origins anyone?

The training modes aren't quite as over-the-top as they've been in the past (where's my beloved alien invasion?), although the chicken gathering mode gets points for being cute. The best thing about these training modes is that you can play them as multiplayer party games. Virtua Tennis has always been perfect for local party gaming, and now it's even more perfect.