Roland Garros 2005: Powered by Smash Court Tennis

By combining a Roland Garros license with their tried and tested tennis engine, Namco brings a third Smash Court Tennis title for the PlayStation 2. It was released exclusively in Europe, and was based on Smash Court Tennis Pro Tournament 2.

In gameplay, the game isn’t much different from other tennis games in the market, but it differs from games such as Virtua Tennis by having some emphasis on stamina (some players get tired faster than others, and not only run slower but also lose power to return the ball on longer matches) and by forcing the player to hit the ball as well-timed as possible – a “nice” ball (with a yellow visual cue near the racquet) will be much harder to return, as it will bounce away faster from the player.

Featuring 15 real players from both ATP and WTA, the game features several game modes: Roland Garros allows the player to compete in the namesake, exhibition, and spectator, where the player can just sit back and see a game played by the computer, choosing one of the many cameras available, including the classic TV presentation or from the main stand.

The beefier mode is the ProTour, where the player creates and customizes his own player, from appearance to playing style, and start a career, taking part in tournaments and completing training sessions in order to improve the player, so he or she can break into the elite. Challenge mode includes the training session mini-games of ProTour, as well as Bomb Tennis, a special mode where the court is filled with bombs, and as a player wins points, the opponent’s side is flooded with even more. The goal is to detonate the bombs by pushing them into the flames, and forcing the opponent to get caught in one explosion. Also included is a complete training mode, which explains in detail the differences between shots and allows newcomers to adapt themselves to the gameplay style of this title.

By completing certain goals, the player unlocks additional items, such as clothing, music tracks, trivia cards, player information and even secret players.