Mario Tennis

Way back when the first home video games were being developed, the socially-inept, cardigan-sporting programmers involved needed a game that was both jaw-droppingly simple to pick up, and frighteningly addictive to play. Having rejected cross-stitch, stamp-collecting, flower-arranging and cultivating watercress in a dark attic as game ideas, they eventually settled – mercifully – on tennis. The basics of the game that became known as Pong were so addictive that the game sold in thousands, despite the 'players' being nothing more than white sticks, endlessly batting a small white square back and forth until one player missed, and a fight broke out. Well now those days can be revisited on the GBC – with better graphics, more gameplay and less fights – thanks to Mario Tennis!

Turn Down That Racquet!

Anyone with more than six grams of grey matter rattling around in their noggin will understand the basics of tennis, and should be able to work out why it makes such a great subject for videogames. Tennis, you see, is all about gameplay. Mario Tennis takes the fairly ancient GB title Tennis as its basis, and adds LOADS of ace new features, like doubles, tournaments, great mini-games and even an excellent 'RPG' element. In this, you enter the Royal Tennis Academy and have to go to training sessions and win matches to improve your ranking, all within a Zelda-style environment. This lends the game great longevity, and makes the whole experience of playing this already-great game all the more involving. Despite not being a huge fan of the whole RPG 'thing', I found this element the most compelling, simply because it's never been done before.

As you would expect from a top-drawer Nintendo title, the graphics in Mario Tennis are gorgeous, and all the character animation is spot-on. The matches crack along at a pretty good rate of knots too, with rallies often degenerating into tense, "You Cannot Be Serious!" epics. Great stuff!

Zelda With Balls!

The one-player games are great fun, but two-player link-up matches are where this cart really comes into its own. While the team here are all responsible adults, and couldn't possibly condone physical violence, there's nothing quite like (metaphorically) smashing a tennis ball right into someone's hapless face! Take that!

If you don't buy this game, everyone will laugh at you. People will cackle loudly in the street, shouting "Idiot! Idiot!" and throwing rotten vegetables at you until you get yourself a copy. Mario Tennis is fantastic. Buy it now.

Nintendo TBD -- String up your racquet and wash those whites-- Mario and his pals return to the court for this 'Cube sequel to Mario Tennis on N64. From these early screens, you can see what the smooth new character models will look like. Look at the shine on Mario--you could blind someone with that. And just check out the fuzz on that tennis ball. Makes you wish you were playing it now, eh?