Review: Everybody's Tennis - Anime style slog

Mike Bantick
Monday, 23 April 2007 16:09

Opinion and Analysis

Like Everybody’s golf before it Clap Hanz brings an accessible fun version of video tennis to the PS2.

Everybody's Tennis
	Developer	Clap Hanz
	Publisher	Sony
	Rating	G
	Released	May 3
PS2

Pong is one of the oldest video games around, and ultimately it was a early simulation of lawn tennis that has continued through the ages to today.

Just about every gaming platform around has some version of Tennis available to the gaming public.

With PS2 sales still exceptionally strong, along comes Sony and developer Clap Hanz with a follow-up to the whacky Everybody’s Golf, imaginarily titled Everybody’s Tennis (ET).

Like the Golf game before it, ET presents a  clean cut cuddly world full of sweet talking (mostly) Japanese style cartoon characters to represent you in a world wide Tennis tournament.

There are many locations to explore, with lots of off-court action to catch your eyes, from fences being flattened by well timed shots to cartoon onomatopoeia sound effects.

Game-play is pick-up and play easy with the only difficulty being getting used to directing the player and the subsequent shot using only the left analog stick, many other tennis games today give you independence between player and shot direction.

ET is a pure unlock-the-toys games with players directed to play through a number of “tiers” in order to get to higher challenges and grab costumes and other gear for their on screen tennis avatar.

As a single player game, ET is a breeze, with computer opponents offering only a mediocre challenge, as such ET is more highly recommended as a multiplayer party game, which is exactly how Sony wants to market this aging console.

Grab a friend, pick up the controller and bask in the long cartoony rallies of Everybody’s Tennis.