Table Tennis Review (Xbox 360) By Wriggy

9 / 10
29 May 2006 at 18:38

Review by: Wriggy

When I say Rockstar, you think of Grand Theft Auto, The Warriors, Bully and any other game containing violence and/or swearing but when it was announced that Rockstar were making a game for the XBOX 360, everybody thought of a similar type of game but it turned out to be… Table Tennis. Not only would it be Table Tennis but it would also be the first game to be a XBOX 360 budget game (RRP £29.99) but is this budget title another game to miss?
On the game’s menu you can choose from Tournament mode (where you select either Bronze, Silver, Gold or All Star difficulty and you play a series of games), Exhibition mode (where you select a player and play against the computer or a friend), Training (where you learn how to play the game and for every 2 points you get, you get 1 point overall for that challenge), XBOX Live (where you can take your Table Tennis skills online by either watching others play or playing in a game yourself), Options (where you can change the loudness of the music, effects and the rest) and Extras (where you can view everything you’ve unlocked, see all your stats and more).
The Tournament mode is easy on Bronze but gets quite hard on Silver making Gold and All Star nearly impossible. Maybe they have made the game too hard but it is more of a challenge which makes the game more of a non button bashing game.
Training could be improved as you basically do the same thing ten times for each category making the training quite boring and also there is only one achievement for completing the Training but that only gives you 5 GamerScore which is pretty disappointing.
XBOX Live is needed in the game as quite a few of the achievements available to unlock include winning 3, 4 and 5 games in a row online, watching a match and playing a match.
The controls for the game are pretty simple and easy to get used to:

A = Topspin
Y = Backspin
X = Left Sidespin
B = Right Sidespin

Left Thumbstick = Move Character/Aim
Right Thumbstick Forward = Topspin
Right Thumbstick Left = Left Sidespin
Right Thumbstick Right = Right Sidespin

Right Bumper = Hold and Spin for Focus Shot
Right Trigger or Left Trigger = Activate Full Focus
Left Bumper = Hold and Spin for Soft Shot

BACK = Change Camera
Start = Pause

Once you get used to the simple to understand buttons, you really get the feel of the game.

There are 11 playable characters in the game; each has their own individual styles of play.
There is Haley (USA), who is very accurate but not very powerful. There is Jesper (Sweden) who is very powerful but not very good at serves. There is Liu Ping (China) who is a good all rounder. There is Kumi (Japan) who is very good at spinning but weak at getting shots on target. Juergen (Germany) I very good at spinning but weak with power. Luc (France) is very good at spinning but weak at power and accuracy. Solayman (Egypt) is very good at power but weak with accuracy. Carmen (Brazil) is very accurate but weak at spinning. Jung Soo (South Korea) has good power but weak accuracy. Mark (England) is very accurate and has good power but lacks at serving. Cassidy (Ireland) is accurate but has a bad serve.
Kumi, Juergen, Solayman, Carmen, Cassidy, Jung Soo and Mark all have to be unlocked by completing the circuits in Tournament mode.

The graphics on the game are very good, worthy to be called next generation graphics. Close ups show all the sweat and the concentration and every little detail. Also, the game runs very well and it is normally lag free online which is surprising for a budget priced game.

Overall, a very good game for a budget game which I would recommend to anyone who likes new challenges or to anyone who likes tennis.

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