Top Spin

one fun tennis game

Top Spin is a well designed tennis game published by Microsoft. It offers good graphics. The animation is done very well. If your on clay you slide when you come to a running stop. Swinging a racket feels and looks wonderful in this game. The controls are really responsive when you swing the racket to connect with the ball. As the ball and racket collide a well chosen "pop" is heard. The sound really reflects real tennis. These include sneakers grating against the surface to fans yelling player names. There is big omission in the game here though. There are no announcers calling the action. This is woeful when every sports game made has a commentary. You might get used to not having announcers while in the thick of the fast action though. The gameplay is wonderful. You can perform slice, spins, backhands, forehands and more. The players move really well. The game has several court surfaces. There is grass, clay, and hardcourt. The player models look great too. There a selection from stars like Sampras, Hewitt, Grosjean and others. There are however only ten or so real players. There should have many more to choose from. The stars look like the actual players though. There is a good player create mode. This feature is lets design choose your player's appearance and clothes and equipment. The stadiums are made well. The career mode is fun. This experience is very complete. You hand pick tourneys to play all around the world. As you win titles you improve your rankings. You get better endorsements and by doing so you more rackets and clothes.

Almost everything is done very nicely here. This an excellent tennis game.

Top Spin Looking Good

Top Spin is hands down the best tennis game on the market. It does have it's few flaws though. What game doesn't, but Top Spin covers those up with smooth gameplay and some cutting edge graphics. I got my hands on this, and being a tennis fan, was very impressed. The first thing was the career mode. It's very enjoyable as you work your way up to legend status. It has just the right degree of difficulty, too. But the thing that bothers me is the Grand Slam tournaments. These are pretty much impossible to win. You have to have some serious skills to take these on and I haven't won one yet. The gameplay is smooth. Sometimes your player will not cooperate if he's out of place on the court and he'll go the wrong way. This is fustrating, but doesn't happen very much. The realism factor is also very impressive. The graphics and the overall player movements are smooth and realistic. These factors make the game addicting and fun. Pro characters include Pete Sampras, Gustavo Kuerten, and Lleyton Hewitt. Anna Kournikova is also avaliable for the women. I was kind of disappointed that there weren't very many pros but the game makes up for it with addictive gameplay and nice graphics. This is a must have for tennis fans.

Not quite right

Can't figure it out but Virtua Tennis does it better on Dreamcast. Lets see what they do with a sequel.

5.0

I agree with the other two reviews, this is a great tennis game, no need for any others. Plenty of options, for me when i buy a sports game, the main purpose is head to head combat and this game delivers a fair, a balanced game. What compounds this is the fact that the one players is just as good and entertaining. The graphics are good enough, sound is fine, and controls are what really matter and they are right on.

Pong reinvented and boy is it fun!

I'm an avid tennis player and own Virtua Tennis and didn't think virtual tennis got any better than that. I was wrong. That said we wouldn't have Top Spin if it wasn't for Virtua Tennis, because if it ain't broke don't fix it! Sorry Sega, they have polished everything in Virtua Tennis and some. The first thing you notice is the more simulated approach to the game, even though there are a view arcadey things like a trail given off by a fast tennis ball. The cool control scheme, such as X for a back spin shot, make it easy to dive right in and can keep tennis masters hard at work developing strategies for months! The graphics take full advantage of the X-Box hardware with spotless player animation and cool lighting effects. The only graphical problem, I'm nit picking, is the crowd which looks really pixelated. All is well in the land of tennis, and what? Oh, yeah! There is great X-Box Live support that will have you up at night finding someone as devoted as you to test your tennis skills on. This is a great game and even if you don't like tennis this is well worth the price of admission. If only NFL Fever could have had this polish!