I have a lot of minor complaints that I and others have already mentioned, so I’ll just skip those in this feedback. I’ve also enjoyed a lot of the new changes such as the sliders and additional animations, so this isn’t all doom and gloom.
–Animations/Running–
One of my harshest critique has been and still is the running smoothness. There’s really only two things that need to be done to smooth out the scrambling, though I don’t know how easy a fix they’d be.
First, slow down the acceleration. In fact, acceleration and top speed should be two separate stats and not conjoined. Some players are quick to hit top speed, even if their top speed is slower, while others are slow to start moving but can reach a higher top speed. But even if they don’t get split into two different stats, the accelerations still needs to be tuned down.
Currently as it is, it takes one step to hit top speed. To make scrambling smoother, it should take a few, maybe three steps or so, to hit that top speed. Having sliders for acceleration would go nicely alongside the current running speed slider we already have.
The second problem is the turning speed. When scrambling, the turning is way too sudden. Somebody running at full sprint should not be able to turn quickly. Having to chase down balls while making large arcs would smooth out the running and capture that leaning “chase” that real players do on the court.
Currently as it is, we can sprint and turn in an L shape manner when really we should only be able to turn in a J shape. This cuts down on all that silly zigzagging that happens.
–Serve–
The serve is so close to being good right now. On the legendary timing setting, it’s challenging enough to give a realistic % hit.
The real problem is the return. It’s still way too easy to return serves. 90% of my returns are still just hitting a flat shot back and I’ll be able to perform decently almost always. This should not be the case.
A quick change would be to have directional movement (or LT/RT) be important. If a serve goes to the right, I should need to actively move right or press RT to hit a good return. If I fail to do either, my return should be slow and lofty. Stats would play a role in determining the loftiness of a return. For example, a faster serve may trigger a very lofty return if I don’t execute a proper return, whereas a slow second serve may just trigger a normal return.
The idea here is that returning a serve needs to be tactical. It has to involve making a choice. Preload your step early to hit a solid return or just play it safe by standing still?
Again, the serve system is so close to being good, we just need some tweaks. I’d even make serving more challenging, both for the players and the AI.
–Others–
Some important but not urgent requests.
AI needs to misstep more.
AI needs to fault more (or at least give us a slider).
Players should not be able to hit the sidelines as often as they currently do. Regular shots need to land closer to the center line and risky shots need a bigger landing zone, meaning you can hit out more. Too often I can just smash flat shots left and right, hitting the sidelines with nearly every shot.
That’s about it for now. The game is in a really strong state right now but it can still be better.