It all began twelve years ago when Camelot released Mario
Tennis on the N64, one of the best games on the console and my personal
favourite tennis sim of all time! Okay, so Mario Tennis isn’t the most
realistic tennis sim out there but I find it to be the most enjoyable! It’s
essentially a simplified version of the sport with tonnes of action, loads of
vibrancy, and the Mario Brothers instead of the Williams sisters. However saying
that realism is definitely needed in some degree or the game simply doesn’t
work. Just look at the below-bar Gamecube effort Mario Power Tennis where
‘power moves’ were added allowing the player to make an unreturnable shot once they'd built up enough power. The only way to return one of these shots was to
have a power shot at your disposal too; you can probably see why this stopped the game from
being a success.
Power moves are common place in Mario games for obvious reasons;
however the degree in which they’re used is crucial to a game’s success. For
example Mario Kart would be rubbish without items but there’s a fine line when
it comes to figuring out how much is too much. Mario Kart Wii, as good as it
is, was hampered a little by unfair items, something that was thankfully
rectified on Mario Kart 7 on the 3DS.
So what of Mario Tennis Open, has it managed to rectify the
mistakes made by the previous instalment with its second serve or is this a double fault? Well, it pleases me to inform you that, in my opinion, Mario Tennis Open gets
it just right. Power moves are back, but they don’t get in the way of the
tennis anywhere near as much as Mario Power Tennis did.
In this game fundamental tennis takes centre court, if you
want to beat the higher levels you’re going to have to practice and perfect
your game to its maximum! There are six shots available in your arsenal, simple
shot, top spin, slice, flat, drop-shot and lob-shot; all of which need to be
deployed tactfully; one wrong move and you will be punished. Add on to
that the fact that each character has a unique ability attributed to them and
you’ve got yourself a very tactically astute little game.
As for the power moves, well they’re a lot more subtle.
During a game, coloured icons appear on the court underneath the ball that each
represent a type of shot you can power-up. For example, the slice can be given
an extra bit of curl by pressing the corresponding button while stood on the blue
coloured icon. These moves add to the game in many ways, firstly there’s the
ability to hit a more powerful shot but then there’s the bluff element where
you can stand on say a drop-shot icon, charge your shot as if you’re going to
drop it over the net and then smash it with a top-spin at the last minute!
There’s something extremely satisfying about bluffing with the power moves and
a large amount of intensity when you’re on the receiving end of one, especially
when you need to win a pivotal point!
In control
The controls are pretty seamless; you can pick this game up
and start playing an exhibition with little-to-no experience and figure out how
to play simple shots before slowly getting to grips with the more advanced
ones. The lower screen sets itself up as touch buttons for each individual move
so if you feel like you can’t get used to the buttons straight away you can use
the touch screen first and then move on if you feel more comfortable.
The gyro controls are also utilised in this game, if you
position the base of the 3DS at an angle, the camera will position itself
directly behind you for that base-line feel. This is great if you play in a
sitting position, say on a train journey, but if, like me, you often play lying
down (not on a train journey obviously) you’ll most likely want to turn it off.
It’s a-Mii
A new feature in Mario Tennis Open that is great to see is the
customisation element centred around your Mii character. As you win matches,
apparel and rackets will become available to buy in the pro-shop which can then
be used to customise your lovable little Mii. Each item comes with certain
benefits and corresponding weaknesses, some allow you to add some power to your
shots while others increase the slice of your shots, boost your speed or enhance your movement.
Fine-tuning your Mii becomes quite addictive; looking at how
each new item will affect your Mii’s game, trying it out on the court, choosing
against a useful item because you prefer the look of the other one. Yep, mixing
aesthetics with actual usefulness is a predicament I’ve become most accustomed
to during my play-time of this one!
Playing over the net
Once you’ve got yourself a formidable Mii, you can take him
online and play against others and see how you fair against their might. Online
play is very hard and takes a lot of practice to start to pick up wins, but it
is doable and because of this, much more rewarding. Beating other’s Miis online
will result in you winning a medal with their Mii’s face on it to commemorate
the victory! Let’s just say there are a fair few people out there who have a medal
with a picture of my Mii on it!
Of course you don’t have to play as Mii online, Mario and
Yoshi are still most welcome, but you will find that the majority of people
will choose to go on with their Miis and have a slight advantage in that
they’re customisable and you won’t be.
Multiplayer really is fantastic on this game whether it be
online against someone you’ve never met or a friend sat in the same room. Co-op
doubles is a complete riot and much more exciting than single player doubles
where you’ll find your CPU character will make mind-boggling shots straight at
your opponent when there’s an obvious smash winner on. In terms of longevity,
multiplayer is where it’s at for Mario Tennis Open; it certainly has a lot of
legs and is well worth getting into!
Mini games
As you’d expect from a Mario Tennis game there are a few mini
games thrown in for good measure, four to be precise. The classic Ring Shot is
back as you’d expect and the new additions are Super Mario Tennis, where you
play through levels of the original Super Mario World using the tennis ball to
hit enemies and collect coins; Galaxy Rally, where you rack up a big rally with
a Luma while collecting coins and avoiding the pitfalls that appear beneath the
floating Luma; and Ink Showdown, a game where piranha plants fire tennis balls
at you requiring you to hit return winners against a hapless opponent, missing
a ball leaves ink on the screen making it more difficult to see what you’re
trying to do! These mini games are enjoyable and are worth playing as they give
you the coins you’ll need to buy the Mii’s outfits. Of the four of them my
personal favourites are Ring Shot and Galaxy Rally, I feel they offer more
enjoyment and depth than the other two.
Faults
As with any game, there are positives and negatives and
Mario Tennis Open is no different. However, the negatives are not major ones in
my opinion and are easily outweighed by the positives. One aspect I found
quite sad is the lack of Toad as a playable character again. Toad has been an ever-present
in many Mario games whether it be Mario Kart, Mario Party, or the various sports titles, but for some reason he's slowly being phased out as a playable character. He's been given line umpire duties since Mario Power Tennis and is not available on the character roster again in Mario Tennis Open. I would personally use Toadsworth as the umpire as was done in Mario Power Tennis and liberate poor Toad. He’s a favourite with many people
out there so I'm bemused to see him consistently dropped from character rosters; hopefully this isn’t a sign of
things to come.
Other negatives include the aforementioned CPU AI when
playing doubles, it lacks a little bit of flair due to pulling away from Mario
Power Tennis (a sacrifice I am more than willing to make) and the pie charts
showing how your Mii’s attributes with certain items of clothing could have been
made a little clearer; but these are quite minor flaws in the grand scheme of
things and won’t end up causing you too much grief.
Game, set and match
Personally, I think Mario Tennis Open is a great game.
Nostalgia stops me from saying it’s better than the original Mario Tennis but
this sits nicely between that big hitter and Mario Power Tennis; and when I say
nicely I mean nowhere near the latter. Of course if you liked Mario Power
Tennis then you may be disappointed by the move towards more fundamental tennis
but for me this is a tennis sim with just the right amount of Mario goodness added
to it. The power moves add to the experience rather than hinder it and the
customisation and online aspects will keep you coming back for a long while.
It’s not a straight sets victory by any means but this is a comfortable three
sets to one win that Nintendo and Camelot should be satisfied with.
Final Verdict. 8
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