Here is version 1.0l of TEM2, with a big bunch of improvements & a few new features from TE4, as usual.
I hope you'll enjoy it. 🙂
New Features :
- World Tour : rankings updated to end of 2025 (this will not allow to start the game in 2026, though) ; if you have a Mod with its own player base, this will have no effect on your World Tour
- World Tour : if you want to edit your opponent's outfit (in the Match Presentation screen), add this line to your Tennis.ini, under : (HowTo => https://www.managames.com/Forum/topic19-32161.php )
EditMatchOutfit = 1
- HUD : added Settings -> 3D Match -> Show Info On Error -> On ball bounce
- Modding : it's now possible to play the grunt sounds before hitting the ball (HowTo => https://www.managames.com/Forum/topic60-33725.php - "Grunts" section )
- Controls : the keyboard (or a controller with a ton of buttons), pressing a couple of additional buttons will now still detect a close strike combination (like with the default controller) ; for example, this allows for easily switching from the normal strike to the slice while aiming left./right without having our player start running left/right.
- Modding : "Crowd_" sounds are now moddable
- Modding : added the possibility to have different grunt sounds for the service and the acceleration
- CPU : you can now fine-tune the CPU SubLevel if you feel a jump of 1 SubLevel is too big ; it's especially useful when playing against the Incredible level, where each SubLevel matters more than in other difficulty levels ; to do so, add this line to your Tennis.ini, under :
NbSubLevel = 100
- Replay : the previous game camera is now automatically restored when exiting the replay if you had activated a saved camera
- Localization : Russian translation updated, thanks to strannik !
- Modding : added support for multiple ambient tracks for each stadium (chosen randomly at start)
Changes :
- Helpers : slightly raised the Aiming Zone size by adding a white zone around it, so very few balls will end outside of it
- AI : the CPU positions himself better against short strikes & short accels, and repositions himself a bit more dynamically when he's too much out of position ; this should improve his defense a bit but noticeably
- AI : the CPU player will now often make 1 or 2 steps before stopping to chase a too-far ball
- AI : the CPU player was always chasing too-far balls ending near the net when he was standing around the baseline
- Strike : tuned the Shoulder Height Acceleration so it's much less penalized when done in the Danger Zone, and even getting an accuracy bonus ; the effect is quite strong for the Acceleration and medium for the Short Acceleration ; this should allow you to attack high topspin balls on clay if you position your player well
- Strike : lowered a bit the Short Acceleration accuracy, so its aiming zone width is closer to the Acceleration's one when standing a bit after the baseline
- Strike : tuned the physical imprecision a bit so the topspin strikes have a tiny bit more chances to end long or in the net when prepared late, and the slices have a bit more chances to end short when prepared late
- Strike : the drop shot is now easier to do on very falling balls, and a bit harder on raising balls
- Strike : the service strike speed now varies according to a Gaussian curve (before, the extreme variations were too frequent)
- Strike : lowered the physical imprecision on the spin, greatly lowering the chance for the ball to end outside of the Aiming Zone (this affects especially the Accelerations and strikes done with low precision)
- Strike : raised the minimum service speed for men by 5km/h (so at 50% power, the average service speed is raised by 2.5km/h)
- AI : tuned the return position of the women
- AI : the CPU is now a bit smarter to decide whether to rush the net or not
- Audio : increased the stereo spread for the on-court FX
- Rendering : changed the ball impact mark from a blurry 2D sprite to a 3D shape so its rendering is very accurate and allows for judging correctly if the ball was in or out (with the Ball camera in Replay mode)
- Strike : shortened a bit the dropshot when done near the net, after the bounce and crossed (ie: mostly for counter drop shots)
- AI : when playing doubles, boosted the volley efficiency a bit for the Master CPU and some more for the Incredible CPU
- AI : now, in doubles, the CPU will sometimes aim in the hole between his 2 opponents
- Strike : raised the speed of the smash after the bounce for the normal strike, the topspin strike, the acceleration and the short acceleration
- Controls : the AutoPos will now position your player for a Shoulder Height Acceleration if you're very close to the bounce of a lob and positioned to do a Forehand ; however, if the ball bounce is too strong, you'll make an error
- Audio : the crowd is now a bit more reactive on break points & game points won from an error
- Stadiums : tuned the lighting a bit for night sessions, so the brightness is a bit more stable from one stadium to another
- Tutorial : the strikes of the 1st phase of the 3rd lesson ("Correct Positioning") were sometimes not validated even if you were correctly positioned, and raised the positioning tolerance a little bit to validate the strikes of the 2nd phase
- Acceleration Trait : the Heavy Hitter is now a bit less slowed down after hitting accelerations
- World Tour : lowered a bit the strength of the singles players who play only doubles at the end of their career
- Animation : in doubles, now all the players use their return animation while waiting for the service
- CPU : removed the topspin preparation boost for the Incredible CPU, so only the topspin specialists will be able to hit heavy topspin balls consistently ; idem for the slice
- Physics : it's not possible anymore to hit a very low ball ; now, under 10 cm high, the likelihood of a mishit is very high, and under 5 cm, it's a sure miss
- Strike : the smash can now be hit a bit more on the sides
- Strike : the topspin is now more realistically capped depending on the ball's speed (ie: medium-speed balls can't have too much topspin anymore)
- CPU : tuning a few positioning behaviors in doubles
Bug Fixes :
- Animation : running diagonally backward was leading to the running back animation instead of turning and running forward
- Animation : the player could be doing strange things when lobbed on his backhand side
- Strike : when running forward, the net jump could sometimes not trigger, especially if the ball was on the backhand side
- Strike : in the doubles, the Human player was sometimes prevented from jumping to the ball at the net if he's partner wanted to play it
- Strike : the player could play a ball ending quite long if he was standing just a bit inside the baseline
- Strike : the slice (and possibly some other strikes in some special situations) could be way too slow
- Gameplay : in some situations, the net jump wasn't triggering for the human player (usually when standing near the service line)
- AI : fixed a couple of glitches in the CPU when his doubles partner is human
- AI : when playing doubles, the CPU could get stuck in no man's land (ie: between the baseline and the service line)
- Recordings : the match replay could desync for Junior matches
- World Tour : too many players were regenerated in the fictional years (eg: in 2025 and after, in the unmodded game)
- World Tour : regenerated players' best ranking distribution wasn't respecting existing singles & doubles specialist distribution (ie: could end with too many or too few top players in singles or doubles)
- World Tour : having very old saved games could prevent loading recent ones in Word Tour -> Load Game
- World Tour : generated doubles specialists could get a playing style not compatible with doubles, making them too strong in singles
- AI : your doubles partner could end up wrongly positioned if he thought he could catch the ball, but then let you play it
- Strike : the normal strike after the bounce (ie: not a volley) could end too long, even when prepared for a very long time, when standing near the net
- World Tour : Pure Junior Players (the ones who will never make it Pro) could get an incorrect skin color
- World Tour : some Junior streaks weren't tracked at all
- World Tour : in the Country Cup, the hosting country's stadium selection could be incorrect
- Gameplay : the jump at the net could be done in the wrong direction when trying to reach a very crossed ball
- World Tour : going to the Load or Save screen with Modded Tour bases could lead to corrupted draws, leading in turn to corrupted rankings
- Gameplay : the net jump was sometimes not triggered despite being needed
- Animation : fixed a couple of cases where the player wasn't rotating in the correct direction
- World Tour : the CPU could save his energy even during 1-set match, leading to unexpected defeats
- Animation : the players could look too much at the ball in their back while moving, leading to very strange positions, even possibly jerking
- Animation : lowered the stumbling when the player runs back diagonally, slowing down and re-accelerating
- Strikes : when prepared very early, the strikes could get deep but not accurate enough, thus ending out
- AI : because of the previous point, the Incredible CPU was doing Safe strikes instead of good shots ; it should be now significantly more efficient, especially at the Incredible-10 level
- AI : in doubles, the CPU partner at the net wasn't switching sides when his partner at the baseline was chasing a ball on its side
- Strike : the ball could go through your player's racket when you were a bit far from it
- AI : the doubles CPU could stay in the wrong position after its partner hit the ball, especially after an interception
- Desync : match replay could randomly desync from a wrongly initialized CPU parameter
- World Tour : in fictional years, doubles specialists could get way too strong when there were not enough of them
- Controls : the net jump could wrongly trigger in some rare configurations
- Controls : the volley jump wasn't considering the AutoPos movement, and thus it could trigger when it was not required
- Animation : when running towards the net, the backhand smash could be wrongly replaced by the regular smash
- Strike : the ball hit detection could fail when a player was running very fast towards the net or away from it
- Animation : the head could be slightly misoriented in some cases, especially with some waiting-for-the-opponent-to-serve animations
- Animation : your player could do some gestures by himself
- Animation : fixed a couple of weird animations
- Animation : the prediction strike could alternate between the smash and the forehand (or the backhand), making your player stutter a lot
- Animation : the dynamic strike animation wasn't smoothed when your player was starting or stopping to run, leading to abrupt changes
- Menus : the controller selection screen's option "Only when 2 controllers or more are connected" wasn't working (ie: it was showing the screen when there were fewer than 2 connected controllers)
ManuTOO
=== Mana Games ===