TopSpin 2K25 Review – Focus On the Tennis

1 week ago 25

TopSpin 2K25 on PlayStation 5

It’s been 13 years since the last TopSpin game and the last mainline Virtua Tennis game released. Now, in 2024, one of the high-profile tennis series is making a comeback.

Developed by Hangar 13, who made Mafia III and the upgraded version of the first game in that series, TopSpin 2K25 is a little bit of a departure for them. On the court, tennis games have come a long way in the last decade. Away from it, though, 2K25 isn’t much of an evolution.

It’s arguably the most important aspect, and TopSpin 2K25’s gameplay is excellent. With each of square, R2, circle, triangle, and X, you can play a different type of shot. You can tap the button for a controlled shot, or hold it down for a power shot, getting it in the green for perfect connection. On top of that, you can aim quite specifically with the left stick. There’s a lot more precision and shot variety than in older tennis games, giving you much more control over how a point plays out, provided you time shots well. It feels so good when you get things right.

Hangar 13 has also done a great job of refining how points play out and the level of reward for good shot selection and perfect timing. Hitting the ball with the power bar in the green results in a far more accurate and powerful shot, making it harder for your opponent to return.

AI players also do a good job of taking advantage of any shots that you miss timing on. Bounce short and they’ll power a shot back at you. Don’t send them wide enough with a return and they’ll fire a shot back across you. There’s a good flow to almost every point, playing out in a really realistic and satisfying way.

All approaches are viable too. Power serving, coming out on top in long rallies, and serve and volley are all ways to win points, and you really need to think about the best tactic for each point as they play out. Mistime a return and you may need to slice the next shot to slow down the rally and get your composure back. If your opponent drops deep, you can get closer to the net to overpower them. How well-designed the tennis action is means you’re always having to react to what’s happening, much like a real pro would.

It’s also helped by the fact that the animations in TopSpin 2K25 are excellent. Aside from a few too many instances where my player wouldn’t lock onto an incoming ball, refusing to hit it back, every movement looks natural. Serving, sliding on clay courts, stretching for volleys, and disguising drop shots are all spot on.

a player hitting a forehand shot in TopSpin 2K25

The visuals of the courts look phenomenal too. All four major tournament venues are playable, as are a load of the ATP tour venues, and they all look great. The tennis players themselves, not so much. Some are better than others, but 2K25 really made me appreciate the quality of the face scans in the likes of EA FC 24. If you were to give me ten guesses, I don’t think I’d have said the Andy Murray character model was Andy Murray.

While the on-court action is great, it’s not without the need for a couple of tweaks. It’s somewhat realistic, but serving a slice out wide and hitting their return back across the court is too reliable a way to win points on your service games. Your player can also be frustratingly slow to react to reverse shots back where they’ve come from. I expect them to happen, but they seem to be too regular an occurrence.

I also think the difficulty levels could be tweaked a little. In the five in-game years worth of the MyCareer mode I played, I haven’t lost once on Normal difficulty, or even been close to doing so. On Hard, though, it’s like my opponents are playing with their food.

Generally, though, TopSpin 2K25 is excellent on the court. Learning the timing and developing your playstyle is a lot of fun.

What’s disappointing about Hangar 13’s game, however, is the content that houses the tennis action. The first thing you’ll notice is the underwhelming roster of real-world players. There are some of our current-day stars, both male and female, as well as a couple of legendary ex-players, but far too many are missing, making for a really lackluster roster.

The choice of modes you can play is okay, if nothing spectacular. There’s a tutorial mode that you’re led through by the voice of John McEnroe, a MyCareer, and online modes for you to face off against other players in seasons. My biggest issue is with how basic the MyCareer mode is.

You create your own player and start from the bottom of the rankings, playing training drills, showcase events, and tournaments in a monthly system to get XP, level up, and upgrade your stats, getting closer to the Grand Slams as you progress.

Weirdly, though, a lot of progression is tied to an energy system. Each tournament match you play affects your energy, reducing it from 100%. You also lose energy if matches are long or, for some reason, you have to travel far to get to the event.

To get energy back, you have to rest for entire months, which affects your ability to earn XP and climb the rankings. Not only is that not a realistic way to show the progression of a tennis player – you’d never see Carlos Alcaraz taking a month off because he got too tired traveling from Spain to Australia for the Australian Open – but it never really matters to your player’s progression. It just means it takes longer to unlock the ability to compete in the more high-profile tournaments.

Aside from hiring a coach to negate a little bit of the energy loss, it’s not something you can ignore entirely. Let the percentage go below 35% and you WILL get injured, reducing your stats. The whole energy system is such a forced and unnatural way of limiting progression.

Player progression in MyCareer is strange, too. Because you have to hit certain player classification ranks to enter certain tournaments, you’re disqualified from even entering for a long time. In year four or five, my player was a top five player in the world, had won every tournament they’d ever entered, and embarrassed world No. 1s every month. But because I hadn’t played enough to hit Star level, I wasn’t even allowed to enter any of the majors. Progression isn’t realistic at all: you’re simply ticking off a couple of objectives, using your six stat upgrade points every time you level up, and continuing the grind. It’s all very bland.

That continues into how matches are presented. Pre-match cinematics and post-match trophy ceremonies are repetitive, and players are given no personality at all. Compared to Player Career modes in most other sports games, TopSpin 2K25’s is extremely underwhelming. There’s not much to unlock bar cosmetics, and there’s little to no real sense of progression throughout the mode.

On the court, TopSpin 2K25 is brilliant. It’s realistic, satisfying, and feels great to play, especially as you get to grips with the timing needed for every shot type. It’s just a shame that such good tennis gameplay is housed in bland modes that have you grind for very little sense of progression.

TopSpin 2K25

On the court, TopSpin 2K25 is brilliant. It's realistic, satisfying, and feels great to play, especially as you get to grips with the timing needed for every shot type. It's just a shame that such good tennis gameplay is housed in such bland modes that have you grind for very little sense of progression.

Pros