Slice of Life

Genre: Sports (Tennis)

Players: 1-2 Competitive (Local)

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Review:

Slice of Life is a Tennis game released on Nintendo Switch in 2021. This game builds on the core tennis gameplay with elements of RPGs, Visual Novels, Graphic Adventures, and even some mild Dating Game elements, with players forming relationships with others in their tennis club to improve teamwork and gain access to various perks.

The presentation this game uses is appealing, combining some cartoony hand-drawn character portraits with colorful pixel art graphics, with these visuals being backed by a chill indie pop soundtrack. The style of the visuals and soundtrack make this feel like a relaxed but stylish presentation that works well for the game.

Much as with games like Golf Story, Slice of Life looks to combine its sport with RPG elements and a story, complete with a small cast of characters for players to befriend and build relationships with, with stronger relationships enabling you to add perks to your stats based on the character. And much as in Fire Emblem: Three Houses, players must manage their time carefully, as there are only so many activities players can engage in within the span of a day. It’s a solid framework for something more than just a simple game of Tennis.

The only problem is… the actual game of Tennis at the center of all of this is terrible. There seem to be input delays, hit detection issues, agonizingly slow character movement speeds, and I cannot for the life of me figure out how I’m supposed to be aiming my shots.

I really wanted to like Slice of Life more than I did. There are a lot of good ideas at work here, and an appealing presentation too. Unfortunately, all of those good qualities don’t amount to much when the core Tennis gameplay is just plain terrible. Those craving a Sports RPG like Golf Story but for Tennis may just be better off waiting for Sports Story, whenever that finally releases. Sadly, Slice of Life gets everything right except the Tennis, and in a Tennis game that’s hard to forgive.

tl;dr – Slice of Life is a Tennis game with RPG elements that has players building relationships with a colorful cast of characters while managing their schedule and Tennis training regimen. Unfortunately, while the presentation is good and a lot of the ideas in use here hold a lot of potential, it’s hard to get past the fact that the actual Tennis game at the center of all of this is terrible, suffering from numerous issues. Despite how good this game looks, I cannot recommend it.

Grade: D+

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