Knockout It's Not

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As a tennis fan, I was delighted to receive this game but soon discovered that, despite its success in the software charts, this was a case where low price meant low quality.

The inlay card promises five opponents of reputedly increasing skill, but I haven't yet seen anyone get past the first round opponent, Manual Fawlty. Your viewpoint is from behind your own player who's controlled with four directional keys plus Space to hit the ball.

In theory, the game sounds promising - all the expected facilities seem to be here: a ball boy to collect stray shots (always mine), a giant electronic scoreboard, sound and 3D graphics. However, this is the kind of program which gives budget games a bad name - the graphics are crude and unconvincing Mode 5 chunks, there's no two-player option, the use of sound is indescribably poor and, worst of all, the response from the keyboard is pathetic.

Maybe, I thought, things would get better with practice. And here Tennis proved its complete lack of potential - the game is not only utterly boring, it's also so difficult, in both Electron and BBC versions, that I didn't manage to win a single game.

By then I think even the micro had had enough. I certainly had.

Geoff Bains