When I realized that Tennis was designed by Alan Miller, I had low expectations for it. Ice Hockey was also designed by him and that is my least favorite Activision game from this era, thus far. I was pleasantly surprised though as Tennis has some of the briskest gameplay I’ve seen on the Atari 2600.

Playing matches against a human opponent was great. There’s not much variety in the way of different shots (only one button on the Atari 2600) but the sheer speed more than made up for this. With a little practice, my friend and I were having contentious volleys that were won on errors more often than not. Playing against the computer is another story though. The computer is adept and winning a volley takes a lot of effort. More than I was willing to put in.

I’d like to think the more my friend and I trash talk each other, the more comfortable we feel with a game, and the more we like it. If that’s a positive sign then Tennis is one of the best multiplayer games we’ve played on the Atari 2600.

Winning a match against the computer nets both the commercial and the patch for Tennis in Activision Anthology. I could not triumph and so inserting the hyperlink to the commercial will also be the first time I view it.