Tennis in the Face Review

                                           

Thanks to X Box One for the code for this!

From the makers of the equally surreal King Oddball, comes Tennis in our Face which has a story  line that's just as bizarre as King Oddball. Disgraced Tennis champion Pagassi, has a problem with the makers of an energy drink called Xplodz. ( Am I the only one here thinking of the excellent Sunset Overdrive?).

He is disqualified from a tournament, stripped of his title so our angry tennis star goes on a anger fuelled rampage to dispose the truth. To do this he goes through multiple waves of geeks, security guards and boffins armed with only a handful of balls (stop sniggering at the back) and a tennis racket!

It's cartoony graphics and jaunty soundtrack help sell the tale, and as unlikely as it is, it can draw you in. The developers 10 Tons seem able to come up with whacky ideas and to some extent make them work well indeed. Like King Oddball this started life as a 'finger flicker' game on mobile devices, and as a port to consoles works OK enough. I would guess though that on mobile devices there is a way to adjust not only attack angles but the power put behind each shot. If there is a way to adjust shot power I could not find it.

Also working out angles is sometimes a seemingly fruitless exercise. For instance on a level where you have three balls to fire, or drinks cans, or a combo of the two, you may well score bonus points for a head shot or two and leave enemies standing but not complete that level. So you think 'hey bouncing the ball from that wall there should..' BUT (You knew there was one coming) chances are pretty high that it will NOT go the way it should, so in most cases it's a case of pure luck rather than judgement that you can repeat the action, or at least that's the way it seems.

King Oddball was a little more forgiving in the above instance, but had the same issue. Maybe on a mobile device you have more control over such factors, I wouldn't know. Certainly there just seems to be one power setting for launching shots, unless it's button sensitive but if it is I didn't notice it.

This is not the world's longest review and indeed this is not the world's longest game. Once you have completed the main puzzles and the extra levels, there is no real replay value here unless you wish to strive to beat your highest scores and get a crown for collecting all of the bonuses.

At least King Oddball had a hidden world to play with, this lacks that element. There a 100 plus levels true, but Oddball gave you that and the extra hidden world. Once this is done and dusted with there's very little to draw you back so it has a limited replay value.

Still there is fun to be had here but the novelty could well wear off quickly for some folks.

Fans of King Oddball will probably appreciate this more than those of you jumping into this without playing that first. 

Like Azkend 2 which I reviewed recently, it's a marmite game, some will like this, others will want to give it a wide berth.  I find it's amusing and fun, but in moderation.