Virtua Tennis 4

ENG: I played through the entire "career" of this game, and I did terribly. I probably only placed in the top 20-30 on the hardest difficulty, so it was entertaining. It makes you want to improve and it's distracting for a while. ESP: Jugué toda la "carrera" de este juego, me fue muy mal, habré quedado top 30-20 en el modo dificultad más difícil, así que estuvo entretenido. Te hace querer mejorar, y te distrae por un tiempo.

Virtua Tennis 4 has some great aspects to its gameplay. The arcade style on the court and humorous sound bytes from the players ensures some fun when whacking your balls back and forth with a friend. The 3D creates a new experience, showing that the future has some exciting things in store.

Virtua Tennis 4 is dependable and reliable. You know exactly what your getting. Unfortunately for Virtua Tennis it's becoming a bit standstill and not really doing anything, its the same stuff except just a different number on the end of the title. As an arcade game it's always done what it has set out to do. Be fun and entertaining whilst maintaining the high standards that have made it the best tennis series around. Career Mode has been altered and freshened up but it isn't as addictive as previous outings and whilst the activities you play to improve yourself are always enjoyable you just feel that they are lacking in ideas certainly compared to TS4. For a simple exhibition with a friend Virtua Tennis is still great. And that's where it will always deliver. The one area where the game is arguably better than TS4 is its roster. Online is same old what you'd expect but thats not a bad thing! So the big question is Virtua Tennis stikk the number 1? Not a chance, this year that has changed. Top Spin 4 delivered the most authentic tennis outing to date and established itself as the grand slam champ and leaves Sega with work to do. If it's just an arcade fun approach your looking for then you won't go wrong but for real tennis fans all the appreciation will be shown towards 2K's offering this time around.

Okay, so we all know the difference between Arcade and Sim right? Virtua Tennis 4 never proclaimed to be a Tennis Sim, everyone knows that it is a Arcade and the Virtua Tennis series always has been. Having played Top Spin 3&4 and the Grand Slam Tennis games, I had sampled both ends of the genre, both Sim and Arcade. Virtua Tennis 4 is a mixed game. The actual Tennis matches are brilliant fun, but the way they've (the Devs) decided to set out World Tour is disappointing and quite frankly, pointless. World Tour plays like a board game. Imagine Monopoly but with Tennis players. Each turn, you are handed some 'tickets' which determine how far you can move. You land on a variety of spots, such as Training, Practise Matches, non-playable charity and publicity events and the VT4 equivalent of 'Jail', Stolen Wallet. Which does what it says on the tin: loses you money. This idea is awful. It made me miss out on the vast majority of matches that I could participate in, lowering both the fun and my Star Ranking, which is VT4's version of the Seedings in real Tennis. I don't know what the Devs were thinking with this idea. It's absolutely, one hundred percent disastrous. The game does, at points, seem completely broken as well. I was one step away from a Championship, had a One Step Ticket and the game wouldn't allow me to move to it. The Arcade and Exhibition modes, on the other hand, are fun and pretty much without flaw. You get to play as your favourite Tennis pros, such as Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Andy Murray, Maria Sharapova (not as hot in-game as in real life :3), Ana Ivanovic (likewise) and Laura Robson. Wait...Laura Robson? Yes, I do know who she is, but many don't and I wonder why they decided to put a little-known Tennis player in, who really isn't that good, when they could have put in the likes of Sabine Lisicki, Serena Williams (arguably better than her sister Venus) or Maria Kirilenko. Sega seem to have put MUCH more focus on the male Tennis pros than the female, with 11 male and only 7 female pros. I could easily think of another four to fill the gap. Overall, I think they have had poor judgement with many of the players, some don't even play competitively anymore or have slipped down to low Seedings. The Graphics aren't anything special. The players to slightly resemble their real-life counter-parts but not by much. Some players seem to have had much more effort in making them seem lifelike, such as Federer and Nadal, while others have been left alone. Other than a slight graphical improvement, not much has changed from the times of Virtua Tennis 3.

You cannot play Career mode nor Online Mode using the Move controller. Also I get the filling that Playstation Move is not fully integrated into game mechanics: no support for twist of the hand moves. PS Move is just an afterthought in this game and if you buy this game to play with motion controller you will be very disappointed.