You can't find too much fault with any game that features video and still images of beautiful ladies. Considering the expanding demographics of gaming, it may be anachronistic to assume that Pocket Pool will sell on T&A alone. There aren't a wide array of pool games on the market for PSP right now, so you may find yourself attracted by the ladies, but enthralled by the pool. The sexy content spills over from the image and video galleries into the pool halls, which makes this whole joint very much about the eye candy. The music in Pocket Pool leaves much to be desired - it sounds like someone rocked out these tracks during one afternoon on a Roland workstation. Licensed music or just something less cheesy would have been easier to swallow.

Oh, how does the pool look, you say? You were expecting a review of the pool, perhaps? Some good news in the presentation department. Lots of extras you unlock during play help to keep things fresh with new sticks, balls, tables, and locations. The tables are often splashed with sexy images in keeping with the game's theme or you can play a clean, green felt. The sensation of play from a visual standpoint is good. Lots of different camera angles help you see the ball from all around the table by cycling through with the L and R buttons. The visual you'll use most often is the top-down view since it really showcases the angle of the shot. Watching the game play out with a partner isn't very exciting since you only see head shots rather than a real player at the table. Once your opponent decides to shoot, you'll see a disembodied stick jab at the ball and it's away to the races. In the head-shot department, there are times when the image of your player's face obscures the shot you are about to take. A few things on the screen can create this situation and become very annoying very quickly.

Pool is a fun game that revolves around a very expensive piece of equipment. Unless you are wealthy or very lucky on eBay and unless you have a nice large room or part of your house that you can set aside for play, you probably don't own a pool table. Pool halls were never incredibly classy and these days, you find yourself in unsavory company paying way too much per game to make pool a frequent sport among friends. Which is a shame, because pool is a damn fun game. Along with Solitaire and Darts, it is one of the best solo sports you can choose. Another solo sport may come to mind after you unlock a few of the classy broads that graced Pocket Pool with their images and videos, but let's not make this an M-rated review...

A key piece to playing pool is knowing the different variations for play. In the real world, this comes down to racking the balls in different configurations and applying different rules. Pocket Pool spells out over a dozen variations on the classic game that most people know. Yes there are more ways to play than just "solids and stripes." Easier variations where you only have to put a ball in each time you shoot are here along with more strategic modes that require you to score by putting in high-number balls to be the first player to reach or beat a total score. A tutorial for the game helps acquaint you with the controls. A multiplayer mode via wireless is nice, but what a dream to have a true online play mode for Pocket Pool!! Only a dream unfortunately, but being able to shoot some pool with a friend via the wireless connection is a good thing. The different modes of play are true to form and allow new or seasoned players to jump in and have the pool experience that fits their level of skill and awareness of the game.

Pool is a tough game. I heard it described as nothing but angles, so if you failed high school geometry, you might give Pocket Pool a pass. The physics of the game are good and the A.I. of the opposing CPU players is usually right on. Your opponents won't pass up easy shots and they rarely miss easy shots. They make a few too many of the hard shots and there isn't a consistent level per opponent. At one session, you'll play a character and beat him easily only to have him hand you your tail in the next session. Like life, you may chalk this up (no pun) to periodic luck and the inconsistency of human players. Even so, it would be nice to play the easy folks first and graduate to the harder players. Instead you find that each play style gets harder as you invest more time. Winning absolutely is the only way to get cool items; nothing is awarded for coming in second place. Apart from a few cheap shots on the part of the CPU, it was fun to play through each of the different game styles against a computer-controlled opponent. The more matched experience of a human player can't be beat, but "real" players will be impressed at how scrappy the CPU players are in games.

One of the more convoluted aspects of Pocket Pool is in this area. After winning a game and seeing what you won, you will be presented with a weird dialogue that tells you how much space a save-game takes up and asks you if you want to delete a file. Say "NO" and you'll save a new file with your progress and status. Say "YES" and you'll get to delete the old save file before you save a new file. There is no option to save over the previous file as a yes/no question and there is no autosave feature that updates your save file with new winnings. After each successful game, you end up managing your files and it gets annoying. Weird feature... Another weird feature is the very open-ended character selection options. No character seems any different than any other character and there isn't any mention of skill differences that might prompt you to select someone with say a stronger shot, ability to spin the ball, etc. Instead you are choosing based on appearance only and what you get during the game seems to run the same each round with occasional variation as you spend more time playing a particular type of game. The A.I. is well designed, but the overall design of Pocket Pool seems slipshod.

I saw recently that a game I reviewed years ago, "Hooters Road Trip," won the distinction of being among the Top 10 worst licensed game ideas. Pocket Pool isn't licensed and it also isn't a bad game. It lacks any real depth, but it is just supposed to be a pool game, after all. The sexy factor is kind of cool and would help make a lot of mediocre games worth playing. When you roll in the multiplayer mode and the fact that the pool action in Pocket Pool isn't bad at all, you just might have something that will appeal to a niche group of gamers. Combined with a set of bar games, such as darts or cards, Pocket Pool would have been a point of interest, but its lack of depth makes it more of an oddity. May we submit... a sexy oddity?