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So you think you're pretty damn good at this tennis caper and you reckon you've got a chance at being the grand slam tennis champion? I hope you've been getting plenty of practice then.

Starting out with the worst in the competition, you've got to get your ranking up by defeating those better players above you. You take on all comers in your quest to be number one and win all four grand slam tournaments.

Pro Tennis Tour: Great Courts on cartridge is a fine tennis game to play. It has some quirks and bugs but it oozes playability. This is also known as Pro Tennis Tour 2. AA gave this 90% back in September 1993.

The tennis play is smooth and easy to pick up. You can choose to undergo training before attempting to take on the world and it's highly advisable that you do this first. Get a handle on your serve, back hand and forehands. Learn to master them in training and then take on the world. Maybe you're one of these cocky sports jocks who oozes confidence who doesn't need to practice and wants to get straight into the tournament mode.

I suggest you choose the easy mode as advanced and professional settings are hard and will leave you frustrated that the CPU hardly hits the ball out and rarely misses a return.

The game starts off in Melbourne for the Australian open, then if you're successful you play the French, Wimbledon and U.S. Open titles. You begin with a standard game, then move into quarter finals, semi final and final. Four games per open to win all with a minimum of three sets per match.

Graphically it's well animated, particular the players. However, the rest of the court, like the referees, are small and a little ropey looking. The court changes colour for each Grand Slam tournament and the red clay in France is quite bright and glaring; a nicer clay red could have been chosen as it does make it hard at times to see players and ball. The players can really gather some distance on the court without any real slowness to the game.

Playing is a dream and getting into a rally of strokes is not difficult at all. Just watch where the ball goes and get your player into position near the ball and press the joystick button. The play is very simple and smooth. The difference between the cart version and the tape/disk version is that it's not as blocky and there's greater emphasis on court movement and a better play can be had. It still has the same options so no changes there, which I feel is a little limited. You can choose player two player mode, do some training and play a tournament mode but that's it.

There's a nice short tune on the main menu screen but then it's just the same hitting sound effect for both players. There is a small sound when the ball goes out or hits the net. This is an aspect of the game where I think there could have been minor improvements: like some speech for when the ball goes out or a small caption on the screen saying "out" would have made the game that much more enjoyable.

While you can perform some stunning passing shots, which look awesome when successful, I was really disappointed that there are no lobs or drop shots. Use of the second fire button could have overcome this and made the game even more playable and enjoyable at attempting such tricky shots.

Furthermore, I found that the game has a strange bug which occurs around progression into the French Open. The P1 and P2 change and become gibberish and stay that way, then around the U.S. Open, the game decides whether you win or lose a game, that you lost, and crashes and that's it: game over... bizarre! One more bug I found is that you can play a player with the same ranking than you as well, having played and defeated a player previously you can end up playing them in the next game - strange indeed.

Overall, a nice, well-animated and challenging tennis game that could get you hooked, but becomes frustrating when the bugs start to rear their ugly heads.

Win a game.

So just what are the differences between the disk and cart versions?

1. Title screen
   Differs slightly. The cart, as you can see on the info box to the right, has a tennis player swinging for a tennis shot, where as the disk version just has the title.
2. Graphics
   The graphics have been tweaked and improved for the cartridge version. Sprites have been smoothed over and the tennis playing area has been widened across the CPC screen.
3. Gameplay
   The actual gameplay on the cartridge remains the same as the normal CPC version.

Graphics 65%
Well-drawn and smooth moving sprites.

Sound 50%
It just passes.

Grab Factor 80%
You can get hooked quite easily.

Staying Power 86%
Three difficulty levels and four games per tournament.

Overall 72%
If it wasn't for the bugs it would definitely get a higher rating. Great tennis game and one you will love.