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Winning Wimbledon is the pinnacle of any tennis player's career, as Andre Agassi would surely testify. One day he's a grungy Californian tennis outsider, unknown in this country. Then comes triumph on the centre court, and suddenly he's rubbing shoulders with the likes of Gareth Hunt, talking about "richer, smoother flavour".

How does one affect the transformation to caffeine flogger extraordinaire? By taking the knocks of the tennis circuit along the way. Spending hours practising those backhand volleys, dealing with hamstring problems, and avoiding the affections of Martina (not one of Andre's biggest problems). Agassi's tennis is an attempt to recreate the horror of it all, for one or two consenting players, on grass, clay, indoors or anywhere you fancy.

This tennis game is centred round Andre Agassi, winner of Wimbledon 1992 and star of Nescafe ads.

Return the ball across the net by positioning Agassi behind it. Games are awarded by scoring four points, with six games making a 'set'. Matches are best of three sets.

Choice of shot is the most fundamental element of tennis. Agassi Tennis allows you to play a variety of shots, at a variety of strengths, depending on how the ball is placed, and how fast it is moving. Here's your forearm arsenal:

1. Volley
   Hitting the ball before it bounces is the way to keep pressure on the opponent and maintain ball speed. Playing volleys should be part of a strategy to move towards the net. You need fast reflexes and an accurate player to use them to advantage. Volleys are also low shots.
2. Lob
   A lob is a high, slow shot designed to bounce behind the opponent. It's a risky shot because a 'lobbee' in the right position may power it back to the 'lobber'. It's best used to break the net domination of one player, and force him back to the base-line.
3. Topspin
   This is played either on or off the volley. Topspin may lok like a normal return, but is designed to lose height quickly, or 'die'. Hopefully your opponent will misjudge the distance the ball 'penetrates' his court.
4. Smash
   A singularly devastating shot, available only when you're under a lob. A smash powers the ball downwards to a position deep in the court and is very hard to return.

The Skins tournament is not as sinister as it sounds. Don't get too excited - it's not an X-rated nudey rudey game but skins of the money variety which is awarded to the winner of each point. The amount depends on the length of the rally. The kitty starts at $10 and doubles for each shot. So a rally increases like so: $10, $20, $40, $80, $160... and so on. Naturally, fortunes can be made in a very short time.

It takes two baby, to play doubles on Agassi. Well, you can choose to play singles or doubles against a human opponent, or a solo doubles game against the computer. Your computer-aided partner does tend to hog the court a bit. So sit back, relax.

The 'circuit' consists of pretty ugly characters (except for Andre, of course). They're rated according to their forehand, backhand and service, on the counts of strength and accuracy. As you might expect, the gents possess most of the wrist power, whereas the ladies are better at placing their balls. Agassi can do everything with equal flair - because that's the kind of guy he is.

Four court surfaces from the standard of established tennis. Each has its own speed and bounce characteristics you'd do well to learn:

1. Grass
   The fastest of surfaces, because the ball bounces low, therefore net rallies and volleys are the best tactics. Ruins whites as well.
2. Clay
   A slow court, as the clay takes the speed out of the ball as it bounces. Mucks up your trainers.
3. Hard
   Quite fast, with accentuated bounce. Balls go everywhere on this surface. Avoid knee-burger misery and don't go diving on it.
4. Indoor
   Very like hard court, but with less bounce. The sort of flooring that makes squeaky noises (but not in this game).

Before you have a touch of the Billie Jeans on the international circuit, take time out to practise with the machine. There are practice courts for all surfaces, each with a machine pouring out balls at measured intervals. The height and direction of the launches are varied, to test all your shots.

What a crock! This is one of the worst pieces of... software that I've ever had the misfortune to play. And, believe me, I was forced. Forced until tears of blood sprang from my eyes.

The horrors of this game are manifold. Firstly, it looks awful. It's an obvious game for a scrolling routine but the action stays on a single screen. 'Grass' means green with yellowish pixels. After hiring a Dalek with a cleft palate to announce the scores, our game coder came to the thorny routine for player control - and made a further spoon of the entire process.

The players just don't follow your directions properly. They try - oh, they do try! - but just can't seem to walk in a straight line. So, in the end, it consists of eight characterless players. Agassi has become a grand debacle long before any of its frivolous faults are noticeable - it's simply an awful, awful mess.

Although I haven't played many tennis games and thus have little basis for comparison, I do think Gus is being a little harsh here with this damning catalogue of complaints. I do see his point to a certain extent - it sure isn't going to win any beauty contests and the controls are difficult to get the hang of but it does get easier with practice and on the whole, I quite enjoyed it - especially in two-player mode in the skins tournament where the battle for cash gets quite frenetic.

The options, as far as I can see, are adequate with a veritable choice of tournaments, players and courts and the whole thing is really fast and, to my mind, pretty good fun.

Presentation 58%
P. A two-player and doubles option - the skins tournament marginally boosts the interest value.
N. The game suffers from the lack of a decent international circuit.

Graphics 42%
N. Marginally better than Sinclair Spectrum Matchpoint from 1982. Awful backdrops, sprites and bad use of colour. A potent mix.

Sound 61%
P. Serves its purpose as far as it goes - the umpire keeps score fairly competently if monotonously.
N. But crowd must be heavily sedated because they don't seem to respond.

Playability 43%
P. It's certainly fast...
N. But it'd be more playable if the players precisely followed your joypad directions. They do not.

Lastability 41%
N. The fatal problems on the playability front serve to spoil any long-term enjoyment which might have been derived from this game.

Overall 46%
A potentially strong licence sadly let down by basic programming and graphical flaws which shouldn't have been let through the net. When he sees it, Andre will want something stronger than coffee.