Sega Superstars Tennis – NDS – Review

Ok, I have been playing games a
long, long time; not that I’m old, but the business isn’t really all that old
and it pretty much started when I was a child with the first mega-selling home
console the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (yes I realize Atari,
Intellivision and Colecovision were first but they didn’t move consoles quite
as well). Everybody had one of these systems and characters like Mario,
Luigi, Link, Samus and Solid Snake became very wel-known icons of the
industry. Well fast forward a few years and Sega experienced the same sort of
popularity with a certain blue Hedgehog named Sonic and some of his friends,
but where Nintendo has spawned many, many iconic characters, Sega still only
has one superstar. Sure, there are many characters that we are familiar with
but none of them have the lasting appeal that Sonic has experienced or the
sheer volume of hits that many of the Nintendo characters have had.

So, the reason I say this is
because of the idea behind Sega Superstars Tennis, the game is very similar to
other games of this vein, take a familiar group of video-game characters and
puts them in a tennis game where the wild antics of said characters gets to
come out along with a slew of mini-games and wacky craziness. So in an attempt
to catch some of the magic that has occurred with games like Mario Tennis,
Mario Golf and Super Smash Bros. Sega has attempted to bring out the same
controlled goofiness and charm, but falls a bit flat.

"Checkers anyone?"

First thing about the game is that
it is kind of difficult to control. With such a small screen and an even
smaller tennis ball, playing a series of volleys can be a difficult experience
because it hurts your eyes to try and track such a tiny tennis ball, and most
of your opponents are full of all sorts of surprises. You can choose to either
use the d-pad and buttons to return balls or the d-pad and stylus. Neither way
is particularly effective and the nature of the DS is not friendly towards
gameplay. You start out with some familiar faces with many more to unlock:
Sonic, Tails, Beat (from jet grind radio) and Nights to name a few. Pretty
soon you will have unlocked characters from Golden Axe, Virtua Cop and even
House of the Dead. In a way it is kind of fun because some of the characters
are really obscure and some players won’t have a clue about who they are and
where they come from; it’s like the game only relates to players who used to
pop quarters in the arcade machines of the late 80s and on.

Now, in a not-too-unpleasant turn,
there are several different tennis courts that carry a popular Sega theme. The
green rolling hills from the Sonic games, a dark and creepy locale from the
House of the Dead games, a Mexican-inspired court from Samba de Amigo and so
on. The courts look passable and I appreciated the little attempted nuances
that they featured like hanging vines, or sun-burned hues or even green
covered loop-de-loops. Additionally, the game contains several mini-games that
give a break to the tennis game. You can play tiny versions of other Sega
games but with tennis incorporated in it. In a bit of nostalgia, the game
actually has a mini-game of the Dreamcast game, Chu-Chu Rocket. Chu-Chu Rocket
was the very first video-game I reviewed. My wife, who never played the game,
did not understand how it worked and I realized that if you weren’t up on all
your Sega games, you could be left out in the cold as the game never explains
how the mini-games work. Other mini-games include a cool shooting game a la
the House of the Dead but instead of bullets you launch tennis balls.

Sadly, the characters themselves
suffer from serious graphic degradation as the DS screen is way to small to be
able to show any real detail. Tails, Aiai, Sonic, Ulala, Dr. Eggman, Alex Kidd
and others simply do not look any good on such a small screen and so far
pulled back in the long range third-person view. I will say again that seeing
the tennis ball and being able to judge your return swing can be difficult
because of not only the size, but you must also time the bounce of the ball
coming at you. I had higher hopes for what this game would have looked like.

"I don’t know how I can play tennis in
high heeled boots," said Serena Williams.

In a smart move Sega kept
literally all of the original music that comes from these games and depending
on where you are playing tennis and with whom, you can hear all sorts of music
from the Sega collection of games. The tunes are upbeat and meant to illicit a
certain nostalgic feeling. This is most apparent to me with the Sonic theme
and the Jet Grind theme. The music sounds pretty good and put a smile on my
face.

The game allows for different
styles of gameplay. You can choose to play a quick match, start a tournament,
play with singles or doubles, choose who you want the CPU player to be,
download single-card multi-DS play and multi-card multiplayer. There are a
surprising amount of play possibilities. Additionally each character has a
special tennis power that works almost as an attack while playing tennis; this
attack usually involves the ball defying the laws of physics and you missing
your return shot.

You do eventually find a happy
medium in controlling this game, but once you do, you find the tennis game to
be a bit blase’ and average. There is more fun found in some of the mini-games
than the actual tennis, which drives you to keep playing and unlocking more
and more characters. Ultimately the game is average with flashes of genuine
fun thrown in. I would think that the Wii version would be more exciting and
from what I am reading it is.

Gameplay: 6.1
You have the choice of stylus- or button-driven gameplay. Neither are
particularly riveting and it take a bit to get the timing down when dealing
with such a small tennis ball.

Graphics: 6.6
The game has some interesting
visuals but the characters are too small for any real detail and while the
tennis courts have distinctive themes from other Sega games, they are a little
washed out and not so sharp looking.

Sound: 8.0
The game’s best quality; neat
tunes from other Sega games are pretty much spot-on.

Difficulty: Medium
Once you get past the learning
curve of the controls, you can begin working your way though the tournament
and unlocking characters.

Concept: 7.0
It is a cool idea, and some of the
mini-games are wicked fun, but the game does feel unbalanced with some of the
mini-games out-enjoying the actual tennis part of the game.

Multiplayer: 6.1
I could only do the download play
for multiplayer and there is limited options for this style of tennis. You
need to ensure that all players have spent adequate time playing the game on
single player otherwise the rookie probably won’t even be able to return a
ball or use the special tennis attack.

Overall: 6.6
I was hoping for a seriously fun
game, and while there were snippets of real enjoyment, the game has lulls that
make you pine for some mini-games, and those lulls are the actual tennis
portions of the game.