Recent reviews by Vampes

At launch, I can't recommend this game on Steam Deck or Mac (M1).

Steam Deck - initially seems to run well with some control tweaking but some aspects of the interface are Inaccessible on Deck, specifically the mission tree menu where half the window is lost off the right of the screen and the devs have failed to make that window scrollable left / right. There is an experimental UI scaleer setting but to get this window to fit you need to drop the text size to the point it is unreadable.

On mac, it loads buit crashes before the tutorial starts.

Wait to see if a patch fixes these issues if you intend to purchased for Deck or Mac Mini.

Initial Impression - A joyless career mode that I'm just not having any fun playing.

I am actually a big fan of AO by the same devs, and even got a little bit of fun out of the patched up TWT... but this feels joyless - such a shame as I really wanted to like it. Technically it's far better at launch that TWT (not hard I know) but even then, I've had one crash to desktop in 90 mins played. I can see remnants of the AO player creator but its a cut down experience with less flexibility and customisation options. Some of the AI opponents look terrible in close ups - not just dodgy shadows but deformed faces. However, the overall look of the game is OK from the game play camera and general presentation is good. Its the career mode that's killing the game for me - this game requires very precise timing which is made worse by your players initially very low stats. The animations also seem a little out of sync with the button presses, making learning the timing even harder. Thus even on easy modes, every shot has to be perfect to have any chance of winning and gaining xp and gold to upgrade... meaning it throws you into a terrible grind from the first match.

Losing constantly as you learn how to play is not fun and strangely, not something I experienced with TWT or either AO game. Unless some sort of balance patch is coming, I'm struggling to find the will to carry on playing / improve my timing for a game where the core game mode is not really fun to play at even the lowest settings. Happy to update this review if the timing starts to 'click' once my player stats have improved or its patched but at the moment, its a thumbs down for me from a game play / fun perspective.

It's.... OK. Above average even. Ignoring the name and it's legacy it not a bad casual racer and quite fun. Definite performance issues at launch but I managed to find a balance between fps and anti-aliasing that was OK using the Nvidia control panel. Some say it looks and feels like a mobile port but I think that unfair. It's definitely NOT next gen looker though. On the plus side different cars and track conditions do feel different and it plays well with a controller. On the other hand, it lacks a bit of character - take out the name and the logos and I doubt anyone would guess this was a project cars game whereas something like Forza Motorsport series has a more definite look and feel. Overall a solid if average game - not the train wreck some are saying but I also get why fans of PC2 are annoyed at the new direction.

Ok, I'm only a couple of episodes in but so far, this is a tentative thumbs up. Its only my second of these modern FMV games (having played Late Shift on the Xbox when it came out). The tech seems a lot smoother (although it is installed on an ssd which might help) so the scenes flow better than that early attempt. The acting and writing is a bit campy but it sort of works in a sort of panto type way. The male character is unlikable and a bit creepy but it sort of works in the context of the episodic series of stories. The female lead I quite like, although her dialog is off sometimes but she also takes some dark turns with some choices. So lots of caveats but the overall tone and scenarios are sort of working for me... it does create a suitably creepy atmosphere at times and I am going back and replaying episodes to see what happens.

Overall, this is a genre I like in small doses and this one fits the bill for me. Tempted to try a couple of the others in the series.

As a casual football game player, this game is obviously not aimed at me - I mean, the graphics are pretty good, it has partial Ultra Wide monitor support and whilst I didn't enjoy it, if it was just about the game play, I wouldn't have written a negative review because that would be unfair imho. However, in terms of a AA games by an established publisher, this has one of the worst user interfaces I've come across in modern pc gaming. After the initial load, if you want to go back and change resolution, the settings program is hidden in the game folder? There are no obvious difficulty settings, poor explanations of the various modes and unless I missed it as the text flew by, you're thrown into the game with little explanation of the controls. A shame as the free 'lite' version seemed like a good deal.

Its good, an improvement on the first, smoother launch, better animations and lots of nice touches in career mode etc. Character creation is great with lots of 'unofficial' official players already here on day one as its backwards compatible with the original (in terms of sharing players and Stadia). However, the control scheme / assisted movement is still here - you can tweak it in the settings but if you didn't like that in the original (and wanted something closer to Virtua or Topspin) you probably won't like it in this one either. However, I did so no complaints from me bar ADD ULTRAWIDE MONITOR SUPPORT.

Definitely a bit rough around the edges but an extremely fun rally game with a unique, exploration / navigation style hook. In rookie mode (with a 4 wheel drive car), it feels quite arcadey albeit a bit loose and slidey as you blast across the sand dunes. The navigation can be tricky at first (rookie mode adds a compass heading indicator for offroad that helps a lot though) but after a while you pick it up (though getting lost is all to easy if you lose concentration 30 minutes into a stage). Physics do feel a bit wonky / OTT but its still fun to drive. Lots of niggling problems with wheels and controllers being reported byu others but I've actually found it to be quite stable and well behaved. Gruelling LONG stages in the middle of nowhere are actually quite exciting - you really don't know whats on the other side of that dune you are climbing (HINT - its probably a steep drop :-) ). GFX are good (not triple A but functional and well designed on highest settings).

Overall its an above average game with teething problems, sim style navigation but arcade driving physics but the whole package is elevated by the fact its a niche thats not often seen in the race genre (open world rally navigation across huge distances), giving it a fresh feel for me.

Update - much i mproved, now a fully featured racing game with a full release. Happy to retract my review from the pre-release state.

I'd love to give this a positive review but I just can't - at the moment this is nothing more than a glorified tech demo. GFXs are good (upto to last years PC2 but much better than origianl AC) and no crashes but at the time of writing the controls are extremely limited (no customisation options, my wheel is not properly supported and I couldn't get my steam controller to work even via trick profiles so had to resort to using the cursor keys for control), most menu options are blanked out and when I changed the available weather settings, nothing happened. I trust in the devs to fix all of this and the roadmap seems reasonable but really, this is a preorder discount with a demo attached - thats fine for what it is but proabably should be made clear to all purchasers - I've played other early access titles with a six month to release plan that were in a better state than this one (feature wise). I will update my review after a few patches if the game progresses as planned.

If steam had more rating oiptiuons I give it a qualified meh but as it is, thumbs down.

Please note - I bought this on sale to see what all the fuss was about and compare it to AO International tennis which I've played extensively on XBOX... I'm a casual tennis fan but the parralells between the two games and subsequent controversies (including disastrous launches and reviews) are quite striking - I found AO to be much better than I expected so wanted to give this one a chance as well. The review has been written in that context i.e. to compare the two games.

Despite TWT already being 2nd place on a 'worst game of the year' list after just a couple of months on sale, its OK... not great and lots of issues BUT there is a playable game of tennis buried in there - not as fun as the similarly derided but now patched AO Tennis but it IS playable.

+ Presentation is OK to good (I like the menus bettwer than AO, more varied cut scenes etc), GFX are OK but with a mix of good and bad animations - I give it to AO overall but that too is far from perfect.

+/- Ball and court sounds are better than AO (crowd and commentary by McEnroe are sub par and worse though). Music is not as offensive to my ears as some have found it but lacks variety, AO is more tracks but again could still do with more.

-/+ Compared to AO you have more control over positioning BUT the controls are not as snappy as you would expect and theres a little anmation skipping to get the timing right - AO gives you less control (more added via a recent patch though) but for me AO flows better from shot to shot once you get used to it's timing system. AO give more visual indicators of shot positioning whereas TWT requires you to 'feel' the strength and positoning through your own experience - some prefer that but I prefer AOs approach.

- The career and player stat system is superficially more interesting than AO with skill points and 'card slots' that confer in game bonuses. Has a few more 'official' stars BUT very limited cusomtisation of players - AO is king here and there are hundreds of player buit 'custom' tennis players that are spot on receations visually - also, AO lets you create custom courts and logos etc

Based on other reviews of TWT I was expecting a car crash of a game that would barely load (I saw no crash bugs of technical errors of that sort) but its not quite that bad. However, IS a bad game by triple A standards - the dumping of advertised features including online play days before launch with a promise of later patch fix (not arrived as of Aug 2018), glitches (the ball and racket often don't make contact), no patches at all despite all the issues, little to no communication from the devs,etc etc - I can see why thouse that paid 60+GBP for the 'legends' version are SO angry! For me, the attitude from the publish (BigBen) sums it up as in an interview he said they knew the game was no where ready for retail but was happy it would make a profit as presales were good from physical disc sales and they were non-returnable - that sort of thing makes me angry too.

So - not as good as AO but not as bad as I thought it would be - I can't recommend it at anywhere near full price but I paid 12.99 GBP and its just about worth it as a budget game for me (no options for okish on steam so I went for a thumbs down due to above). By comparison, AO launched in a similar state but the publisher apologised and asked for feedback followed by several patches that got it into a much better state - its now a fun game to play so I recommend AO over this for casual play... but both could have been so much better.

A delightful little work in progress that's already very polished - character creation is surprisingly fully featured and detailed, AI plays a reasonable game, movement is fluid and controls are simple but with just enough subtley to raise the game above something like PONG into an actual arcade sports game. At the current price it's well worth it even if this is the finished product,,, but its got plenty of updates in the first couple of months.

NB - No online at the moment so its local multiplayer or solo plus bots at the moment.