On the gameplay side of the court, Actua Tennis 'serves up' a whole 'set' (going pun crazy here) of different ways to be played. If men's singles isn't to your liking then you can try out ladies singles, doubles or even mixed doubles. As with past Gremlin sports games player names and stats have been accurately represented so all your favourites such as Pete Sampras make an appearance. Full commentary is also provided by three Brit pundits that you'll most likely never have heard of.
Customizable options also allow you to tamper with the gameplay itself as well as the skill levels. With a choice of amateur/professional tournaments and/or tours, Actua Tennis should harness some added longevity, which to my knowledge isn't exactly common place in past tennis games on the PC (count all two of 'em eh?). If you've got access to a LAN, then multiplayer game improve things as the AI of the computer controlled players isn't much better than Jeff Tarango (some pretty average US tennis player that swears a lot). If you don't then you can always link up via modem as well.
Although throwing your racket and swearing at the umpire in a McEnroe (spelling?) fashion isn't possible, for Actua Tennis, Gremlin Interactive has indeed tried to provide a tennis simulation sports game, with some thrills and grunts to recreate real tennis. Let's face it- recreating Tennis on the PC is an uphill struggle to start with. It's by no means an arcade game and wasn't all that easy to pick up. So expect a few hours of frustration before actually serving up some fancy tennis.
In sum, if Tennis is something that you live for, then by all means give Actua Tennis a go or better still give Blue Byte's Game, Net & Match a try. But if Tennis is only a passing interest for you, then steer clear. After all there are plenty of other types of sports games around that have oodles more fun to them. Anything else just wouldn't be Tennis eh?
