Ace Tennis 64

Game: Ace Tennis 64

Developers: Jonas Mumm, John Fio

Platform: PC

Download link: https://jonasmumm.itch.io/ace-tennis

I cover quite a few microgames that get submitted to game jams. These types of games often get submissions that take advantage of their limitations and think outside the box. One of my favorite jams on itch.io is the annual Low Rez Jam, where aspiring game devs are tasked to create a small game in a 64x64 pixel resolution. This limitation allows for some fairly creative games that get submitted to the jam. One of those games I've been meaning to play was Ace Tennis 64, a low rez tennis game. Finally sat myself down to play it recently, and needless to say, I had my fun with it. After all, I played Mario Power Tennis on the Gamecube a ton as a kid. I figured my "super skills" would translate to playing this game. I guess they sort of did.

Ace Tennis 64 is a pretty straightforward tennis microgame. You serve the ball and hit it back and forth between you and your opponent until one of you scores a point. Repeat the process until you win 3 out of 5 games in a single set. The game itself graphically looks like if an Atari 2600 game got the mode 7 treatment like a Super Nintendo game. The use of 3D depth is done pretty well, although there really isn't a y-axis when hitting the ball, so your opponent can still hit the ball, even if it's like 5 feet above their heads, but I digress. The game on a graphical level looks pretty stellar with its limitations. Granted, the game jam version and version 2.0 that I played look drastically different in resolution. The game jam version looked akin to a Game Boy Color/Game Boy Advance game, with its heavy pixelation and limited resolution. Version 2.0 is drastically updated visually, with cleaner artwork and less pixelation, though it does forgo the limited resolution it had for the game jam. Both however still retain plenty of charm.

As stated before, Ace Tennis 64 is a very straightforward tennis game. No gimmicks and trick shots like in Mario Tennis games and no superstar players like Rafeal Nadal. Just two pixelated players looking for a great match on the tennis court with plenty of pixelated people watching. You have your selection of difficulty level by choosing which opponent you'd like to face, with their difficulty level being indicated by the number of stars beneath their name; 3 stars being the highest difficulty. You also have your pick of stadium, depending upon which color court best suits your taste.

Gameplay is simple enough to grasp, with a stamina meter that drains through each play, then gets replenished after each score and a power meter that affects the power of your strike. Some of my issues, however, deal with the direction of the ball with each swing. The ball, from what I have observed, tends to gravitate towards the opponent, making scoring on them a bit difficult. Getting a feel for the swing mechanics was also difficult to adjust to, as I'm more accustomed to Mario Tennis mechanics. Even with these issues I had, they don't detract too much from my overall experience of the game itself. After all, it is tennis, a game that's pretty easy to understand, be it in real life or in a video game. As far as a replication of regular tennis goes, it pretty much hits the nail on the head.

Despite some of my grievances in learning the swing and ball mechanics, as nitpicky as they are, Ace Tennis 64 is a pretty well-executed tennis microgame. I do recommend checking it out with the download link posted above. Become like me, a pseudo-connoisseur of microgames. Kidding aside, do give this game a look-see. It's fun : )