Review: 2010 Ultimate Tennis Hard Court

[EvilSpaghetti]

2010 Ultimate Tennis Hard Court
Mobile Game Review

Title: 2010 Ultimate Tennis Hard Court
Developer: Synqua Games
Publisher: Synqua Games
Release Date: Summer 2010
Format: J2ME
Game Features: 2 game modes with adjustable settings.
Reviewed on: SE K800i

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Summary

Experience the thrills of participating in the ultimate hard court tournament on the tennis tour. Play a variety of shots, dominate your opponents, fight back against all odds and make your way through tough opponents to win the championship.

Review

Right then it's been a year or so since my last review, I've whipped out my K800i and I'm back with 2010 Ultimate Tennis Hard Court, alright it may not be the the most attractive of names for a game, but as you may or may not know the title of a game isn't what actually makes a game good or bad, though it may put you off getting it.
So my question is, is 2010 Ultimate Tennis Hard Court worth the time playing or should it be brushed aside as a feeble attempt at a tennis sim? Well that's what I'm going to find out.

I've been playing 2010 Ultimate Tennis Hard Court for the past few days now and I have to say it's not bad but it's not ground braking, the graphics are average and it's pretty straightforward in terms of gameplay with the game only requiring a few buttons to play, so really anyone can pick up and play, though veterans of tennis sims such as Roland Garros will struggle to find the game a challenge even on the hardest settings as the game is that simple and easy, and when I say simple I really do mean simple, let's for example take returning a shot or as some people like to say making a return requires for you to run into position either with '4' or '6' depending on which way the ball is travelling, once in position either again with '4' or '6' return the ball in the desired direction with '4' being left and '6' being right or '5' for straight down the middle. For the more advanced player you can use backhands, slices and lob shots, backhands which can be accomplished with '1', '2' and '3', slices with '7', '8' and '9' and the lob shot with '0' these more advanced shots really don't need to be used unless you playing on the harder settings, you can breeze pasted any opponent on easy with just '4' and '6', and if like me you love watching long rallies but aren't particularly interested in being involved in one you can always used the 'Gamebraker' button '*' which if pressed at the right time will nine out of ten times send the ball flying past your opponent, though you will lose some direction in your shot, this little feature is a Godsend because don't get me wrong you can get involved in some rallies with some longevity to them they aren't the most exciting thing, well they're not exciting at all, they're pretty damn boring, serving is pretty simple as well press '5' wait for the power to fill and press '5' again to hit the ball.
Even with all of this 2010 Ultimate Tennis Hard Court feels somewhat lacking in variety both in gameplay and game modes, being that there are only two game; modes single match and tournament it's not a game you'll be playing for months to come.
Continuing with variety, 2010 Ultimate Tennis Hard Court isn't a licensed game so don't be expecting to be able to play as your favourite tennis superstars or legends such as Murray, Federer or Borg, but really, it doesn't take anything away from the gameplay itself just variety, though it would be nice if you could play as them. So who do you actually play as? Well there's not much choice when it comes to it, you get your all round player Smith, then you have your speed player Stuart and power player Ramos and that's it, so there's another area where this game lacks variety.
As you may have noticed I've not talked about sound, well that's because it's not really worth talking about, you get your standard midi soundtrack and your standard midi sound effects.
Though 2010 Ultimate Tennis Hard Court is a good and solid tennis sim the fact that it lacks variety in so many areas let's it down, it's not a bad game it's just not revolutionary.

Conclusion

So then I asked if 2010 Ultimate Tennis Hard Court was worth playing? Well... Yes it is, okay you won't be playing it for months or weeks but let's look at it this way, it's a bus stop game, something for passing the time.

Screenshots

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Graphics: 6/10
Average.

Sound: 4/10
Could do better.

Game play:6/10
Simple and easy, yet lacking variety.

Story: 4/10
Only two game modes.

Overall Score: 5.5 out of 10

Download the game: Here.