Losing last night on Hard 6-0 today losing 6-3 and getting better,i am 61 years old and if i can improve overnight these younger players with better reflexes should just put in the hard work and practice. That being said i think it might take a while for me to win on Hard and i was surprised that Medium plays so well also. The big thing i tried out today was go back to AO2 on Grand Slam difficulty the highest and i have not played it in ages and i used a player with lower stats and i won the set 6-4,so as of now the CPU in Tiebreak is much harder for me on Hard than the highest difficulty in AO2 which is great to see. I always thought the higher difficulties in AO2 did not get much harder as you reached Grand Slam.
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I agree, now game is very good and enjoyable, aiming sensitivity slider?! Devs you are really close…
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For me this update is one step forward and two steps back.
The player movement feels better – more responsive and less lethargic without making it too easy to reach every ball. I am also enjoying the improved AI and the greater variety with which they play. The serve returns from the opponent are also much better balanced and the ridiculous rockets they would often fire back at you are largely gone and I am still enjoying serving in this version.
However, there are some issues that have suddenly appeared in this build or gotten worse with it. The first of these is that my player is often not initiating a shot/return command, despite this being my input on the controller. This is especially problematic when the cpu opponent plays a slice. It doesn’t matter how close to the ball I am, and how early I power up the shot and the direction I want to play the shot, the return animation does not begin and my player just runs away from the ball. This mostly happens after a CPU slice but has frequently happened to me when responding to other shot types.
It also now feels like desperate/hopeful defensive shot animations are triggered in situations where my player is actually in a fairly good position to return the ball. Perhaps not a perfect position but definitely a good enough position to play a considered shot, with a proper swing and intentional direction. The result of this is that I end up in rallies where my player looks like an amateur whose best strategy is to just get the racket to the ball, get it over and hope for the best. It’s so much less satisfying to play like this than it has been before. People will say ‘oh you just need to practice and get better at the game.’ This is not my issue at all. My issue is that if you have to get in the perfect position for a perfect return every time, you end up playing the same shot with the same shot animation over and over. It becomes repetitive and unrealistic. In real life, the best players often manage to play great shots in difficult situations and this is what makes the game exciting and surprising.
I have exactly the same issue with the fact you can no longer get the ball anywhere near the lines unless you stand still, in the same spot and power up for about 5 seconds before the ball comes back to you and you play your return. In some ways this makes the rallies appear realistic because it looks like players are being cautious until an opportunity to really go for something opens up but I just feel that the reason you don’t paint the lines prior to such an opening should be because of the risk element, not because the mechanics make it physically impossible to do so. Again the result of this is more repetitive and predictable rallies that end with the same winning ball every time. Don’t get me wrong, the improvements to the AI do help make the game feel more varied, particularly as they now frequently come to the net or play a slice, but the changes made to the user mechanics mean that I now feel in much less control of how I play, where I can put the ball and I’m winning most of my points in the same way every time. It is just not satisfying.
Whilst the AI is much better, there are times when they come to the net and force me to play a high defensive shot but then don’t punish me for doing so? Often the obvious/logical shot for them to play is to slam a volley into the ground that I have no hope of returning and they just don’t do it. Instead they play a gentle volley back and I’m able to reach it and get back into the rallie.
Net play for the user is still the weakest part of the game for me. This is not something new for this update but the fact that the CPU is now coming to the net, has encouraged me to at times try the same. It’s just totally underwhelming. No matter what I press or how I prepare, my player either taps it over or scoops the ball up into the air? I want to slam it into the ground!! Please let me play my volleys into the ground! This is not helped by the shot animations either. The volley animations need work. As do the slice animations.
I hate to come off negative because I love the game and appreciate what the developers are trying to do. It’s such a fine balance I’m sure but the game needs to feel satisfying in your hands and at the moment it is in some areas but overall it just isn’t.
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I am stuggling to win on Hard at the moment with men or women but i am not really experiencing anything you are saying. I feel the cpu slice that goes mid court looks to have that much backspin it nearly stops dead which has just left me standing there. I can hardly win a game yet but i get to dueces but the cpu just keeps out smarting me. Every point is a mental challenge and you certainly cannot relax,it is full focus at all times. I might even give Medium difficulty a go for a while as when i checked it last night the cpu was excellent there also without hitting too many quality winners. I won’t even look at Expert until i start winning on Hard. Went back to AO2 today to check the AI and i played on Grand Slam the highest difficulty and i won 6-4 which showed me after this update that even on Hard in Tiebreak it is way tougher now than AO2 which is great. Back to practicing now.
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I think gameplay is going the right way. But somehow they need to let AI make more Unforced errors without weakening his general play. I mean on 40-0 or 40-15 AI can make U.E without direct consequences.
I still would like that the remove the silly stepping aside by AI when I choose a slice serve. Also the response time of AI to a drop volley just over the net is too fast i.m.o . Already before the ball has left our racket they move to the net , at least that is how it look to me.
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new update coming today
Just got another patch right now ,cannot find info on it yet. I am sure the devs fixed that damn slice shot from cpu that stops dead mid court and leaves us flat footed,i just had quite a few rallies and when the cpu slices the ball it is now bouncing and coming through with a natural flow so we can hit the ball not stopping dead which was definitely not right,this has made the rallies even better.
Yeah definitely harder and I welcome that. Just wish it was more/all about improvements to ai but as I mentioned, I feel some of it has also come from making the user player less capable. Slightly more agile which is good but returning feels so rigid/restricted to me. I’m going to try playing as a variety of players tonight and see if that makes a difference. Last night I just used on or two players that had suited me in the past.
I lost my first match on expert against Medvedev 0-6 1-6. Then a second match 1-6 1-6. Dropped down to hard after a while which feels better for me in this version. Good to know there’s a high ceiling now as far as difficulty goes which will hopefully give the game some longevity.
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The slice shot that stopped dead instead of flowing through from cpu now is fixed tonight with small patch and makes a big difference
Ah great. Yeah that will definitely make it less frustrating. I’ll hopefully be able to put some decent hours in over the weekend.
the lack of Al unforced errors is really frustrating, some al only bomb winners
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Exactly my thoughts to ^. AI still just can’t make any errors during the game (long, wide), and net errors are happening far less as well.
Just tried the newest update on Hard and I had about 20-25 errors, while AI had 3 or 4 (and winners were somewhat equal).
Don’t get me wrong, these last 2 updates feel great (general balance, speed, players weight, shot variations, etc), and in my opinion, this should be the base for any future gameplay improvements. But what’s killing the immersion/ it’s really frustrating, is still the lack of any AI’s long/wide errors.
This gets me to another issue I just noticed, and that’s the risk factor for the Player again. I was waiting and looking so hard for AI to make any mistake/error that I didn’t notice initially (and that goes for yesterday’s update as well) that we now need to try so hard to put the ball long/wide again as well. This risk factor thing was brilliant (again, at least for me) a few updates ago, and it was again nerfed down almost completely. I play with Tiebreak movement exclusively, and it’s almost impossible for me to miss any shot (top spin, flat), with or without R2/L2 now (aside from hitting the net)
To sum up, the gameplay in general feels great now, aside from these 2 (for me at least one of the tennis basics/essentials) things mentioned above.
I don’t know man. I’m not experiencing those issues tbh.
There’s a lot of variation from AI, and now more than ever, it looks like our inputs (positioning, using/not using sprint/scramble) have greater impact how AI plays.
And what someone else already said, we now need to be constantly focused, even on Medium/Hard difficulties, which again in my opinion is a great thing.
But 2 things I mentioned above are still killing the full immersion (gameplay wise) for me.
tennis game without unfoced errors
20 / 25 errors and you finding timing to easy ? I mean you are correct and it is to forgiving but how did you manage the 20 plus lol
u will notice once u download today small patch not the one from yesterday
Ahaha…I know, right 
All of them were into the net. And actually, maybe about 10 were forced errors (usually after AI drop shots). Was a bit relaxed, a fair bit behind the base line, and didn’t start scrambling on time.
The rest were actual unforced errors, but mostly me trying to miss so hard to AI’s easier returns, and the ball was going into the net. It’s another issue someone mentioned recently that’s happening from the the release, where the game doesn’t separate (or exclude) different types of errors.
And yep (^), my last 2 messages were based after trying the most recent/today’s update.
Maybe i am just too good. This is on expert lol. I return just with slice and win almost every point ahaha. But now is more fun than past patches. But too easy and not challeging for me honestly.
I was only messing man lol strangely on the discord people were suggesting that tie break assisted movement is actually harder than tie break movement… Sounds bit weird but maybe worth a shot. Also on discord the developer did confirm that the aiming system is currently been worked on so hopefully when that gets adjusted it will make the timing harder… I’ve personally had ai miss long occasionally and miss long and wide at the net , but not wide in a baseline rally. So they do miss just not enough especially wide . Very tricky balance tho as to much and we back to twt and 40 ai errors a set and clearly that is just unpalyble.
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add sliders and save one year of patching and misery
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