The training the practice challenges give you is well worth completing - they're a great way to discover the difference nuances of the controls, ranging from serving into bowling pins, knocking giant cubes off the court, to hitting targets and so on, all geared towards developing different sorts of shots. The best fun in Virtua Tennis can be had from the championship mode, where you can work your way through championships around the world along with various stages of practice courts. If you're up for a bit of PC tennis, we heartily recommend you use a PC analog joypad - it makes all the difference. Unfortunately, being as this was an arcade and console title first, this is ideally suited to a small thumbstick or joystick for direction - arrow keys really don't cut the mustard when it comes to fine control. It relies entirely on the player's ability to direct the player and his shots with directional keys, with a single button for normal hit, and a single button for lob. The strength of Virtua Tennis lies in its immensely simple control system, meshed with the huge range of control this gives you over your chosen tennis ace. The courts haven't suffered from the conversion, and there's even slight improvements, with the availability of increased resolutions that comes as standard with a PC variation.

All the original visual goodness is entirely present and correct, although to be entirely fair, having seen the gloriously rendered figures present in the sequel, it's hard to admire the well-animated characters in quite the same way as we might have done in the year 2000. Hastily superseded on the dying console by the sequel Sega Sports Tennis 2k2 (I ask you, what's wrong with Virtua Tennis 2?), it's now time for the PC geeks to get their turn as Virtua Tennis serves, volleys, and lobs its way onto our Geforce-enabled boxes. Although, let's face it, there's really not all that much competition - Mario Tennis on the N64 anyone?

Sampras!) and a great set of modes, Virtua Tennis was the pinnacle of tennis gaming.

Combining sublimely realistic simulated tennis with big-star names (although not certain stars thanks to the faces being far too important and expensive. One of the many, many gleaming gems in the Dreamcast's now tarnished crown, Virtua Tennis is unusual in that it has a special place both in the hearts of fans of sports sims and other, less sweat-obsessed gaming aficionados.

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