Mana Games

[manutoo]

pusher,
100-strike rallies may still happen, but they will be likely extremely rare, as now anytime you're late on the ball, you'll have a chance to send the ball into the net or long.

[Algo]

Two very quick take-aways

Clay: Sometimes the ball will bounce upwards too quickly, making almost a check mark curve. That may need some tweaking. I mean I have seen that pattern, but it's very specific to some clay courts in some conditions and I guess it shouldn't be the standard.
It felt like those days after big rains when the court was barely usable . This only happened in top spin v top spin rallies, which I'd guess would be the vast majority in clay
Stress: it needs fine tuning, getting good shoots down and celebrating should get you some relief.
On the other hand, being 15-30 on your serve is always a bit more stressful than being 40-0 and it could be so "live" that you could get it up a bit in the middle of a point. But remember this theory about needing a bit of stress to get your full potential going, so if it's just that tiny bit of safe stress you may get some luck in a passing shot or something of the sort.


Biggest take away tho:

I used to bully pro 10, 6-0s left and right but I feel like starting over which for me it's impressively good.

[manutoo]

Algo,
1) I checked and I think it's correct for the clay (more or less) ; it's a particularity of the clay to have the ball spurts up on heavy spin. Maybe it's a tiny bit too pronounced right now, but it's hard to be sure to tune it correctly without seeing some heavy spinner on clay from the side.
This one is from the back, so it's harder to judge, but it seems in par with TEM2 :


2) I'll likely tune the stress variations & effects from user feedback, so keep them coming

3) I'm happy to see you got a fresh experience, and that it's not too easy !
I didn't play in match much, but in warm-up I felt doing a winner was relatively easy, but getting in position to do that winner was more complicated, so I'm not sure how the 2 balance together. I'll play more when I'll be working on TE4.

[Algo]

Algo,
1) I checked and I think it's correct for the clay (more or less) ; it's a particularity of the clay to have the ball spurts up on heavy spin. Maybe it's a tiny bit too pronounced right now, but it's hard to be sure to tune it correctly without seeing some heavy spinner on clay from the side.
This one is from the back, so it's harder to judge, but it seems in par with TEM2 :

Yeah. Thing is my player had 10% and p2 40% but I know that it's not too far away from being right

[Spanish man]

Hi manutoo.


First of all sorry for my english, I´m Spanish.

I tried to play in TE2 with elite control versus cpu level pro-10. I like it, the game it´s very realistic, but I have found some things to change.

- It´s very dificult to defend a powerful shot. You could give more speed to players or less speed to the ball, because I can´t play like a defensive player.
- It´s very easy to return the second serve. I can be very agressive by returning the second serve, so It´s too easy doing a break.
- I make a lot of mistakes with slide shot.
- When you make a powerful shot, it never goes beyond the bottom line. It´s not realistic

[megadam]

Hi Manutoo,

Great job on incorporating this into TEM2.

I agree with a majority of what's been said in the fact that the variation in shots is overall more realistic. It is quite different from the 1100 hours+ I've played on TE3 hahaha!

Couple of things to note that I think should be improved:

1- Lateral movement or reaction speed on return of serves should be improved. I've found myself struggling to return serves at 115-120mph despite being within arms reach because it feels like I'm moving like a tank. For reference I was testing at Master Sub 10 and Incredible Sub 2-4.

2- I've also started to find that around 75-85% of my shots hit the service line and that an additional 5% hit beyond the service line and mid court between the baseline. I've found it incredibly difficult and feel it's more randomized how I add depth to the ball. I'd be interested to hear how maybe based on this physics change how you actually do this. I've even been struggling in just warm-up haha.

Can't wait to see more from TE4. Look forward to pre-ordering it soon and as a veteran of TE would be happy to do any alpha/beta testing

[manutoo]

megadam,
2) Average ball length has been shortened compared from TE3, as it was unrealistically too long (by design choice, because I was afraid most players would have some issues to manage their depth positioning).
To put a bit more depth, you have to prepare really early on, perfectly hit with the center of your racket strings, and have a very high Consistency in your FH & BH. A lower lift skill also slightly raises the depth of your strikes.

[megadam]

megadam,
2) Average ball length has been shortened compared from TE3, as it was unrealistically too long (by design choice, because I was afraid most players would have some issues to manage their depth positioning).
To put a bit more depth, you have to prepare really early on, perfectly hit with the center of your racket strings, and have a very high Consistency in your FH & BH. A lower lift skill also slightly raises the depth of your strikes.

^ Completely agreed on that front! I've been playing more on TEM2 and I have to say it is fantastic with rally lengths being a lot more realistic but also the variation now is a lot better.

I think it'll take time to get used to the fact that it feels and plays a lot slower and I still think the lateral movement could be giving some more fluidity and maybe turning and last minute movements a little bit more generous. Could this be because I'm playing on a keyboard?

I still think the movement on return is still too sluggish and very difficult to return slice serves or line serves that aren't even above 105mph.

[manutoo]

megadam,
right now, the keyboard is equal to the joystick, ie: you can accelerate your run only in 8 directions.
However, I think I'll change that so it'll be possible to accelerate in any direction with an analog stick, like the CPU does, which should feel more natural and gives a bit extra reach to the user. For the Keyboard, I'll add some little boost on direction change to compensate for the limited possible directions.

I almost didn't play in match, and when I'll be working on TE4 gameplay, I'll be sure to check the return of serve.

[megadam]

Thank you Manutoo!

Honestly, the changes are really fantastic! The variation that you've managed to capture in the shots is amazing, especially the variation on slices now which I know the CPU likes to take advantage of haha!

[jonh]

Could you put a small gameplay of the tennis elbow 4 gameplay ??

[manutoo]

jonh,
you mean of TEM2 ?
You'll find one here, done by Ethanovic, although it's not up to date as I already tuned the AI since then :

[jonh]

Thank @manutoo, great job .

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

[megadam]

Hey Manutoo,

Doing some more testing of Master Sub 10 and Incredible Sub 2/3. One of the things I've noticed the AI abusing is the slice that slides away from the body. I've found personally that to be a really hard shot to get back with these changes as there doesn't seem to be a sweet spot to timing it. Always seem to be overrunning or under running and hitting out or into the net as a result. It's a very very nasty defensive shot that the AI loves to pull in defensive situations and 7-8 times can win the point just on that.

The slice changes are nice, that shot however the AI likes to use a little too much, to too much effect haha

Thanks!

[manutoo]

megadam,
thanks for your report ; it's something more to check when I'll work on the gameplay !