Top Spin 2

Top Spin 2 for Xbox 360 – I know what your thinking, your wondering why anyone should care about playing Tennis on a next-gen console, well for anyone who has ever played Virtua Tennis on the then “next gen” Dreamcast well knows, it can be great fun and horribly addicting!

Top Spin 2 (TS2) is the first Tennis game for the 360 and shows in some very rough corners that it was rushed to market to beat the grand daddy of all tennis sims – the aforementioned Virtua Tennis to the 360.

On the positive sides TS2 shows some big steps in the future of Tennis sims in the very robust player editor, the detailed career mode and the technical top spin (B), slice (X), Lob (Y) and safe (A) shot selections. The other smart point? The Price – The game regularly sells for $39.99 (Like most 2K Sports games) while most other nre 360 games come in at 59.99.

The bad notes is what takes this game from a Solid “4” to my ranked “3”, the problems are something I expect that will be solved should 2K sports build the next year of sports games from the ground up on the 360 – The eyes of all the characters have the same “dead eye” problem that plagued Polar Express at the box office, The music is hair-pullingly repetitive, which is a bad thing for a game that you want to be played hours on end. And then there’s the killer – camera angles – I cant tell you how difficult it was to get used to the poor AI angles in this game. If you are serving at the bottom of the screen it is fine, but if your character is on the top of the screen (Even in 720/1080i) it’s VERY difficult to return shots. Changing the angles from overhead to 1st person helps but does not solve this very annoying problem.

Overall, if your a huge tennis fan you will likely really enjoy Top Spin 2 especially at the lower price for the next 3-4 months while Virtua Tennis is finished, but unless your a die-hard tennis fan or sim player, rent this game for now.