I had high hopes for this as i loved Mario Tennis on the GBC and GBA, however what we have here is quite frankly rushed and lazy.
It would be easy for me to attack this from the off, but i am going to try and keep a more structured view to my thoughts.
The game opens with a fair amount of modes and options
Single player is the only one i have tried so far, so will focus upon that. Within the single player option you have:
tournament - Play matches under each cup if you win you advance to the next level of the tournament
exhibition - Quick play option gets you right into the action
special games - These include Super Mario Tennis, Ring Shot, Galaxy Rally, Ink Shot.
While i have only played through the first cup in tournament (Mushroom) i was offered no challenge even upto the last opponent, by no challenge i mean the computer controlled AI would not move in enough time to return the ball and on the few occasions i hit my shot at the computer characher, it was returned but all i had to do was aim either side on the return to win the point. However bad AI is not the only let down. The tennis courts might as well be all standard grass courts as the ball acts no different between courses and the world of the Mushroom Kingdom and other Mario thesed courses are there to serve as backdrops only, which is a huge shame. To me this game is like Nintendo wanted to do a serious tennis game and gave that brief to Camelot, but thought it would not sell well if it was not skinned with Mario so added all of that purely to drive sales. The Marioness usually adds value in a Nintendo game but in this it could be skinned with anything and would not have any impact on how the game plays.
During a match you also have item panels that appear and for the life of me i can't work out why they never activate when i use the buttons, but using the touch controls they activate every time.
I am also having great issue with controls, you can use the buttons or the touch screen but i think you are rewarded for using the asy touchscreen. If you use the buttons you can charge your shot before returning by holding the button of the shot you want to make, however this serves little use. If you use the touchscreen (you can swap between them any time) and you hit an item panel you always get the item shot. Further to this you have to sit perfectly still, if you move the 3DS slightly your view changes and this has happened to me time and time again mid match mid shot, very fustrating.
However what angers me the most is how little effort has been put into the single player yes you have 100s of items to unlock but these can only be used on your mii and so far what i have unlocked has always kept the stats at a base level. so if an item makes you faster it will give you less power. It is also worth noting that the Nintendo characters you can choose all appear to be better than your mii. I would have much preferred a ranking system, as you win matches you get points to add to your characters ability.
The one saving grace is the special games but they can only keep you interested for so long. They are well thought out and make you improve your skills requiring you to make different shots on the fly in order to meet the objective. As you beat them you earn coins to spend in the shop and harder challenges.
Camelot are capable of so much more than this average experience
It would be easy for me to attack this from the off, but i am going to try and keep a more structured view to my thoughts.
The game opens with a fair amount of modes and options
Single player is the only one i have tried so far, so will focus upon that. Within the single player option you have:
tournament - Play matches under each cup if you win you advance to the next level of the tournament
exhibition - Quick play option gets you right into the action
special games - These include Super Mario Tennis, Ring Shot, Galaxy Rally, Ink Shot.
While i have only played through the first cup in tournament (Mushroom) i was offered no challenge even upto the last opponent, by no challenge i mean the computer controlled AI would not move in enough time to return the ball and on the few occasions i hit my shot at the computer characher, it was returned but all i had to do was aim either side on the return to win the point. However bad AI is not the only let down. The tennis courts might as well be all standard grass courts as the ball acts no different between courses and the world of the Mushroom Kingdom and other Mario thesed courses are there to serve as backdrops only, which is a huge shame. To me this game is like Nintendo wanted to do a serious tennis game and gave that brief to Camelot, but thought it would not sell well if it was not skinned with Mario so added all of that purely to drive sales. The Marioness usually adds value in a Nintendo game but in this it could be skinned with anything and would not have any impact on how the game plays.
During a match you also have item panels that appear and for the life of me i can't work out why they never activate when i use the buttons, but using the touch controls they activate every time.
I am also having great issue with controls, you can use the buttons or the touch screen but i think you are rewarded for using the asy touchscreen. If you use the buttons you can charge your shot before returning by holding the button of the shot you want to make, however this serves little use. If you use the touchscreen (you can swap between them any time) and you hit an item panel you always get the item shot. Further to this you have to sit perfectly still, if you move the 3DS slightly your view changes and this has happened to me time and time again mid match mid shot, very fustrating.
However what angers me the most is how little effort has been put into the single player yes you have 100s of items to unlock but these can only be used on your mii and so far what i have unlocked has always kept the stats at a base level. so if an item makes you faster it will give you less power. It is also worth noting that the Nintendo characters you can choose all appear to be better than your mii. I would have much preferred a ranking system, as you win matches you get points to add to your characters ability.
The one saving grace is the special games but they can only keep you interested for so long. They are well thought out and make you improve your skills requiring you to make different shots on the fly in order to meet the objective. As you beat them you earn coins to spend in the shop and harder challenges.
Camelot are capable of so much more than this average experience
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