Added new swing animations:
- Powerful strikes that allow you to punish opponents if they throw defensive lobs at you (often nicknamed “penalty” strikes).
- Quick counters to add hard-hitting options when receiving a fast ball.
Hundreds of animations have been adjusted to feel more dynamic. The inertia of many animations has been reduced to allow quick come backs in the rally.
Added a new “3D View” to official players’ profiles that allows you to have a close look at their 3D models, outfits and animations.
Players will automatically let the ball go out instead of volleying it when they are close enough to the bounce.
New texture added for the clay courts’ grounds.
Added clay FX on slides and cutscenes on clay courts.
New cutscene animations at the start of points, some dedicated to clay courts.
Improved graphics (lighting and shading has been reworked for all venues).
Balancing (gameplay)
Greatly increased the overall pace of the game. All shots have been reviewed and tweaked to provide higher ball speeds, and speeds that are better suited to stroke motion.
Serves are more powerful and will pass the net at high speeds more often.
Smashes & volleys are much more agile and easy to use, and smashes are much more powerful.
Increased the sprint speed in all directions.
Reworked the lateral slice: it will now be applied to inside-out sliced forehand shots.
Reworked Madison Keys stats and skills to make her more of a hard-hitting baseline attacker.
Balancing (career mode)
ATP/WTA players ranking and performance has been tuned to match their current real world ranking in the Career Mode.
Tuned the ranking points earned each tournament to better reflect the real rewards and give more points for the bigger ones.
Opened 3-stars tournaments to players up to rank 20, making them more challenging.
Reduced the amount of Rest given by events, to balance the fact that you can choose 2 events per month.
Better seeding for the top players in big tournaments. Up to 16 players will benefit from top-seed positions.
AI improvements
New serve strategies for AI.
Tweaked AI’s response to serves, effectively enabling the player to serve Aces, especially on easy difficulties.
Improved AI positioning.
Tweaked the AI’s use of lobs (depending on difficulty).
Improved the AI’s behavior when a ball seems out of reach.
The AI will react more aggressively when taken out of position or running to a dropshot.
The longer the rally lasts, the more aggressive the AI will become.
The AI will more consistently break the diagonal rally, especially with harder difficulties.
SFX
Reworked most stroke and rebound SFX to make them sound more powerful.
Fixed a bug with backhand hit SFX, making them sound like they were played twice.
Reworked the crowd ambience and reactions.
Added new SFX to cutscenes, serve rituals, the training ball machine, and more.
Reworked groans types available (4 male / 4 female).
Improved the variety of audio commentaries.
Bug fixes
Fixed sidestep teleportation and sudden opponent sprints during online matches.
Fixed a bug where the player would be rotating during a strike, when they’re not supposed to.
Fixed a bug where the point could end as soon as a let occurs, instead of giving the players the opportunity to catch the ball.
Fixed the end of match cameras for left-handed players.
Reworked the transition between the rally and the end of point.
Fixed a bug that was penalizing accuracy in training mode, making all trainings harder to complete than they should be.
Fixed a bug that was generating unforced errors on charged slices.
Fixed a bug where two-handed topspin volleys could be used by one-handed backhand players.
Fixed a graphical glitch with Agassi’s 2018 outfit.
Fixed a minor bug on the display of community objective thresholds.
Fixed the shadows in the Mexico venue.
Fixed a texture on the Paris Major’s ads.
Fixed some small inaccuracies with London’s court lines.
Fixed the issue with reversed Yonex bags on the court.
