Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

[The Visualizer]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

How long have you been playing the game today because you already are beating everybody on hard. Were you playing the demo non stop because I'm a little worried that Hard will be a little bit too easy and very hard will be way too difficult and cheezy.

Or maybe it's because you're playing serve and volley and that's easier to beat the AI that way?

Seymour, I've only played 3 matches today so far, I pretty much didn't lose to the CPU on the demo on Hard, I didn't think there was anything "hard" about it. The 2 matches I won today were hardly walks in the park. I consider myself an above-average player to good players so I'm not sure what you can take from that...keep reading though.

Played my 3rd match, Ivan Lendl vs CPU Boris Becker, decided to move the difficulty up to Very Hard...yeah that didn't turn out very well



-to answer someone's question from the last page, I created a player and you were right, it wouldn't allow the CPU to play with them, it said "Not for CPU" when I tried to have the CPU use them in an exhibition match. Also for Create-A-Player, there are only 4 slots. I was looking forward to maybe making some other legends and players to add to the roster, but I guess that's not happening.

-OK, back to the "Very Hard" match I played. I won the very first match primarily because I had 2 aces and forced Becker into some bad shots. Was pretty confident at that point, then he decided to completely annihilate me in straight sets. I won one other game, the first one at Match Point, but he completely outclassed and outsmarted me. So I don't think you guys should be too wary of only 1 difficulty level about Hard because it's def tough.

-As far as a 6 set match, I noticed stamina didn't drain as much in each game & set. Some of this was that the CPU was destroying me pretty quickly so there weren't the number of long volleys I had on Hard difficulty, but there were a few and I noticed the stamina bar jumped back up to almost full right after them. On Hard, the stamina bar would be down in the yellow at about halfway after almost any long volley that wasn't at the very beginning of the match.

-On Very Hard the CPU punishes pretty much every mistake and does a good job of keeping you off balance. I could def see their missed opportunities when playing on Hard. They took full advantage of them on Very Hard.

gonna take a break for awhile, and lick my wounds from that last match...

[Panicshade]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

I remember reading the same, but it's not there unless it's unlockable, there are 5 difficulty levels displayed

very easy
easy
normal
hard
very hard

You unlock "Expert" Difficulty by winning a Grand Slam Tournament in Career Mode on Very Hard

(sorry I forgot to put the whole thing in there at first)

[Yeah...THAT Guy]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

If you jump into the career on hard, can you drop back down to normal if you are getting crushed? Or vice versa?

I started beating the demo on hard about 50% of the time or so..seems like the game moves a lot better on that level though..normal felt sluggish.

Yeah, you can change difficulties throughout. I also recommend turning off the in-game helpers and changing the cameras around too because I personally don't like the default and turning the in-game helpers off leads to a lot more unforced errors and things like that. The only thing I leave on is the fatigue bar.

[Yeah...THAT Guy]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

Also note worthy, User Andy Roddick = User LeBron James x12480971241. I played my brother and used Roddick... literally had an ace every single serve besides like 2 where he guessed which way I was going to hit it.

[Seymour Scagnetti]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

Also note worthy, User Andy Roddick = User LeBron James x12480971241. I played my brother and used Roddick... literally had an ace every single serve besides like 2 where he guessed which way I was going to hit it.

Uh oh this is not good. Were you using those Captain Hook serves and positioning yourself to the farthest point near the doubles line when serving because I complained with TS3 that people online would keep doing that and get an ace almost every serve. An easy fix would be just not allow the server to reposition himself by moving up and down the line when serving. Program it in a way where they have to be stationary in one spot near the middle of the court when serving, like the pros do, and problem solved. Much like how the pitchers in the Show can't move around until after the pitch is thrown. I guess none of the devs were listening. I guess everyone will be using Roddick after a week.

I'm not liking the way you got spanked on very hard either. I'm hoping maybe it's a strategy thing rather than the AI just being superhuman.

I just bought the game and now I'm a little bit afraid to to open it but then again online has always been cheezy for every sports game ever made so maybe I'm overreacting because i want this for career mode anyways. And maybe play online with someone who doesn't play as Roddick.

[Yeah...THAT Guy]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

Uh oh this is not good. Were you using those Captain Hook serves and positioning yourself to the farthest point near the doubles line when serving because I complained with TS3 that people online would keep doing that and get an ace almost every serve. An easy fix would be just not allow the server to reposition himself by moving up and down the line when serving. If they have to stand near the middle of the court like the pros do and problem solved. I guess none of the devs were listening.

I'm not liking the way you got spanked on very hard either. I'm hoping maybe it's a strategy thing rather than the AI just being superhuman.

I just bought the game and now I'm afraid to to open it.

Regarding Andy Roddick, I just served from where the AI places you by default so I wasn't moved outside. I was blasting it past my brother with the right stick serves (fastest serve was 139 MPH), I mixed in a couple Captain Hooks too, but you can get aces with the Captain Hooks even serving 80 MPH if you catch the opponent off guard. The scary part was that I could do a regular right stick serve and just pick corners with it (I've gotten pretty good at serving from playing the demo a ton) and it was just too fast for my brother to react at all. He was using Andre Agassi at the time, and when he served, he was able to score pretty well against me because Agassi is incredible, but man, Roddick is so strong in this game when you can hit a power shot.

** I should also note that I'm just flat out better than my brother. I play on hard difficulty and he plays on normal. And when we played each other again, he made me use Tomic and he used Rafael Nadal and I beat him 6-2 6-1 6-2.

And in regards to the AI spanking me on Very Hard, that was a different guy that posted that. I haven't tried Very Hard yet because my matches on Hard have been very competitve for at least 1 set in each match. I think I may try Very Hard for my next tournament though.

[The Visualizer]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

Uh oh this is not good. Were you using those Captain Hook serves and positioning yourself to the farthest point near the doubles line when serving because I complained with TS3 that people online would keep doing that and get an ace almost every serve. An easy fix would be just not allow the server to reposition himself by moving up and down the line when serving. Program it in a way where they have to be stationary in one spot near the middle of the court when serving like the pros are and problem solved. Much like how the pitchers in the Show can't move around until after the pitch is thrown. I guess none of the devs were listening.

I'm not liking the way you got spanked on very hard either. I'm hoping maybe it's a strategy thing rather than the AI just being superhuman.

I just bought the game and now I'm afraid to to open it.

Very Hard never felt cheap, like you speculated I pretty much got outstrategized and didnt focus enough once I dug a hole for myself.

As far as the serves, I agree they seem easier than TS2 and TS3, but one thing I noticed as they don't let you setup as far wide as they did in previous games.

[Seymour Scagnetti]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

OK now i feel better. I did remember reading somewhere that the devs thought the very hard level was the best to play at for sim players. Thanks guys. Time to go tear open the case.

[Seymour Scagnetti]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

Yeah, you can change difficulties throughout.

Luckily they didn't screw up that part. Nothing would be worse than finding out the game is getting too easy on a certain difficulty after awhile in career mode and than having to start all over again like what happens with alot of action\shooting games.

[Yeah...THAT Guy]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

Very Hard never felt cheap, like you speculated I pretty much got outstrategized and didnt focus enough once I dug a hole for myself.

As far as the serves, I agree they seem easier than TS2 and TS3, but one thing I noticed as they don't let you setup as far wide as they did in previous games.

To expand on this, if u line up wide they can return it for a winner pretty easily

[rangerrick012]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

Just played a match on Very Hard vs CPU: Sampras (me) vs Nadal (CPU); lost 3-0, 4-2. Was a tough challenge, but I felt at certain points that I was doing the right things. Nadal was just ridiculous though.

The stats
Sampras (me): 24 winners, 11 UEs
Nadal (CPU): 24 winners, 0 UEs

The 0 UEs is disconcerting. Definitely felt like Nadal could not miss at all. Hoping this has more to do with Nadal being that good than everyone on Very Hard playing flawless tennis.

[Panicshade]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

Yeah...THAT Guy, did you get your Agassi code to work? I responded to your other thread when you were having problems with it.

Also I responded back to the person who was wondering where the extra difficulty setting was at. You have to unlock it in Career Mode by winning a Grand Slam Tournament on Very Hard.

[Seymour Scagnetti]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

Just played a match on Very Hard vs CPU: Sampras (me) vs Nadal (CPU); lost 3-0, 4-2. Was a tough challenge, but I felt at certain points that I was doing the right things. Nadal was just ridiculous though.

The stats
Sampras (me): 24 winners, 11 UEs
Nadal (CPU): 24 winners, 0 UEs

The 0 UEs is disconcerting. Definitely felt like Nadal could not miss at all. Hoping this has more to do with Nadal being that good than everyone on Very Hard playing flawless tennis.

Nadal is good but not that good. I guess it's pretty hard in a tennis video game to make the AI very challenging and still allow them to make a fair amount of unforced errors or in this case any at all. Oh well.

Maybe if you play a 6 game 3\5 set match fatigue plays more of a part in Nadal screwing up.

[OhioBobcats]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

I'll tell you right now, maybe I had too many expectations for the game, but I am really disappointed. This coming from a tennis player and fan.

Load times are rough.
Nadal has one wristband and hair from a couple years ago.
Federer has two wristbands. (what if NBA 2K11 put a headband on Kobe and took it off Lebron? Same type of deal here with detail mishaps)
Can't edit your created player's face or body or anything after making it (so you better create them right from the beginning)
Playing with the move is really disappointing. I thought I would get something better than Grand Slam Tennis for the Wii. The use of move in this game is really bad and unrealistic.
Not sure if this is the true limit, but only 4 created players? Come on.
You can't rename the random players in the tournaments. I just want to make it realistic somewhat. Let me rename these guys and tweak them a little (like in other sports games).
"Sparring matches?" Real tennis being called classic tennis with a bunch of silly other ways to keep score like it is table tennis? Come on, just seems like an insult to the tennis game.




Anyway, I know I rattled these off and might come off mad, but I just really wanted something different. The gameplay is better, but so much more could be done. Having the ball boys and umpire move for one could have also been a nice touch.


Hopefully online is fun (no one on yet) and we can get DLC players. Otherwise, I guess I'm waiting to see what Virtua Tennis 4 can bring to the table.


If you need any more information on the game I'll answer it for you. I like to think I am pretty unbias towards the game, and I stated the bad things above but there are good things as well.




Also, I just remembered this. The rating system is flat out bad. Everyone a 20, except the two young guns? Nadal is a 20, Blake is a 20 and Dinara Safina is a 20!?!?!? Not only is this flat out wrong (again, in NBA 2K11 you can tell a difference between Lebron (a top player) and say, Shawn Marion (a guy who is still decent like Blake, but certainly not on his level). It could be another challenge if they made the women realistic. Serena is the only female player who could maybe win a game or two off the top guys. Everyone else would be blown away. Should have made it tiers.

Finally...players. I know I know, licenses. You know what? That's a bad excuse and I'm not buying it. I've seen guys like Ferrer, Lopez, Isner, Querrey, etc. play video games. These guys are good, not great. Which means in all seriousness, how hard would it be to get their permission? My guess is a lot of the younger guys would LOVE to be in a video game. Don't have money? Market it this way. Kids play the video games and learn the players. You don't think more people will know Bernard Tomic after this game? It's another way of interacting with fans. Think of it like Twitter. Not having at least double the roster we have on this game is unacceptable. That being said, I'll buy every single DLC player they give us (men's anyway, women's I'll wait and see).


All in all, I am fine with the game and I am not one who is going to just quit and return it or something. I love tennis, I follow tennis, I play at a decent level (4.0 to 4.5 if you wondered...good, but certainly not unreal). I just really wish this 2K game could be as good as the NBA one. Money and budgets are tight, so it's time to think outside the box to create a more realistic roster. Let us at least edit these random green-haired players in career mode. Let us create a lot of players. Give us DLC. Something.

[OhioBobcats]

Re: Top Spin 4 Impressions/Questions Thread

To quickly add on to all my negativity above, this is the most realistic tennis game ever by far. Playing Roddick-Sampras right now on hard and as expected it's near impossible to break serve. Tied 3-3 right now (playing 1 full set). I almost feel like they were on there way to making this game truly great, and then simply ran out of time and resources.