There are a few certainties in life - death, taxes, clichéd opening sentences like this, and Virtua Tennis' game design. Honestly, watching Virtua Tennis evolve is like watching grass grow - it's pretty bloody slow, and you can basically shut your eyes and still know where it's headed. That's not to say that the Virtua Tennis games are in any way bad - as far as grass growing, this is pretty good stuff; it's just that with each iteration, it's harder to justify spending more money for what is essentially a very similar experience. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with Virtua Tennis 3, and in fact, the core gameplay is as good as ever, but it just doesn't take the step forward that it could, and probably should. Particularly in its PS3 incarnation, but more on that later.

Somewhat critical introduction out of the way, there is a lot to like about this game. SEGA nailed the sense of movement and the ball physics right from the first game in the series, and these elements have continued to improve. Player animations are stunning for the most part, only falling down occasionally by virtue of the fact that they are so good. When you see a player sprinting back down the line in an attempt to reach the ball while he's still facing forward, for instance, it doesn't gel with what you know the player's intent would be - to simply get to the ball. If anything these moments are a compliment - as with any game that emulates real life, the closer you get to reality, the more you'll pick up on minor flaws. By and large Virtua Tennis 3 is a joy to watch, and even after extended play you'll still see the odd animation you haven't come across yet.

From the title, I honestly couldn't put it together with bumper cars. So I had no idea what to expect from Big Bumpin'... until I saw the packaging and all was made clear. Big Bumpin' is very difficult for me to review since it depends heavily on color identification for telling which player is yours and there are various color-related identifiers in the levels for various game types, as I'm red-green color-blind. So this game is confusing, but fun. The game types all work online, and include some obvious and some not-so-obvious variations on smashing bumper cars into each other. The whole idea seems somewhat like a paintball game to me, in that you play bumper cars to knock people in cars around because you can't have the actual experience. Just like you play paintball because you aren't going to have the actual experience of a fire fight. However, unlike paintball games, in this game the bumper cars do explode.