AO Tennis review: fault, double fault

Rushed to release in order to coincide with the real-world Australian Open, AO Tennis looks, feels and literally is unfinished, offering a disappointing and inconsistent official take on the sport.

In only the short time the game has been available so much has been added via downloadable updates that it could be a totally different experience depending on when you’re reading this. At launch there were only a handful of players to choose from, performance was rough, and the Xbox One version didn’t even include the game’s centrepiece Career mode. Anyone expecting to buy the disc and play AO Tennis offline is in for a bad time.

Even after a patch that fixed some glitches and filled out the roster with a selection of real-world players, the game feels like an early version months away from release. Aspects of the presentation look great, like the game’s version of Rod Laver Arena, but weirdness like unmoving courtside photographers, a total lack of commentary and player reactions to completely ignore context all stand out. When Rafael Nadal wins the Australian Open, for example, he celebrates in exactly the same way as when he wins the first game of the match due to a double service fault.

Aside from Nadal, there aren’t a lot of top-seeded male players in the game, and the female side fares only slightly better. As the included roster of players has grown, I’ve also become less impressed with their likenesses to the real people. It’s clear the athletes have had their faces scanned into the game, and some are plainly recognisable, but something about the face shapes means many of them look somewhat alike. There’s something off about the player proportions too. Everyone seems to have the same general body shape, scaled up or down depending on their heights, making taller players look way more substantial than they should, and shorter players look like children by comparison.

Things are a bit wonky when it comes to actually playing too. As in many tennis games, each button corresponds to a different shot type, and you hold one down to charge your power before releasing at the right time and place to swing. It’s fortunate the system is so familiar, because AO Tennis doesn’t show you the ropes at all, aside from including a picture of the button layout deep in the pause menu.

The biggest issue is that the shots here seem completely canned, with players needing to be in the exact right position relative to the ball to swing at all. If you’re not at the right distance, your player may magically warp a few steps to make up the distance, or they may just not swing at all. This is basically the only way I lose points in AO Tennis, because early on I realised you can nail a drop shot extremely easily, regardless of how fast the ball is coming at you, or the angle or spin. The game’s AI rarely makes it to the drop shots (it also has a tendency to double fault way more than any human player could), which is understandable because running or changing direction to chase the ball is way more difficult than it should be.

Of course in the interest of testing the game I did play without relying on drop shots, but found most games ended when my player hit an impossibly fast shot or when I failed to get to the right place to hit the ball. There were a few memorable volleys, but no real moments of tension or drama. Overall I didn’t feel like the points, won or lost, were because of my own actions.

Things get even more frustrating in doubles matches, where your AI partner is a hindrance far more often than it’s a help.

You can play through an “Australian Open” mode, where you select a player and run through the brackets, although as noted earlier there’s no real feeling of stakes or flair. It’s just a series of interchangeable matches. More interesting is the Career mode, where you can create your own player and start from scratch in the bush leagues and earn money to make your character stronger. Still, I felt starved for anything to do apart from play matches over and over. Even some training minigames, a touch of narrative or some data on my games and achievements would have been fine.

The game is being readied for a global launch — on console as well as PC — later in the first half of 2018, so the potential is there for AO Tennis to become a more competent game as development continues. It’s just unfortunate that early buyers in Australia aren’t getting the full five sets.

AO Tennis is out now for Xbox One (reviewed) and PlayStation 4.