Top Spin 3 is the latest tennis game by 2k Sports and PAM Development in the Top Spin series, and is a solid effort in the genre. Released this past June, the game aims to provide the most realistic and fun tennis experience around. The PS3 release does have a mandatory download, which weighs in at about 3.63 GB, though the download seemed to fly by.

Read the full review of Top Spin 3 below.

Visuals
The first thing you will notice when popping in the game is the strength of the visuals. If you have played Top Spin 2, or even seen screens, it is immediately apparent that the graphics are better in this entry. Skin faces and hair is realistically drawn and really are stunning at times. As games progress, players gradually start sweating in a realistic manner. If you have a tough game going on, by the end of the game your tennis player will have a realistic looking sweat soaked shirt. The sweat on the skin looks natural and it never feels like the person is soaked in baby oil (like some other games). Even created characters can look very realistic, which I think is sort of rare in game where created characters normally look like they were whacked with a baseball bat while in the womb. Finally, crowds and referees look fine. There was no time during the game that I was taken out of the experience by an ugly looking crowd or referee model.

The player movement in Top Spin 3 is also very realistic. In fact, the motion of the players as they dart left and right across the court are one of the graphical highlights, since the motion capture is done so well. Serves, backhands, etc. all look very convincing, as do other things such as between-the-legs shots. Though, for a noob like me, the time it took for the swing animations to unfold through me off just a bit.

No game is perfect though, and visually, Top Spin has its fair share of troubles. The most annoying thing is that when you load up a new tennis court and are ready to start a game there is a 5 to 10 second space where the camera just looks around the court. Normally this isn't a problem, but the reason it is 5 to 10 seconds is because the game is running at a super slow framerate. Thus, you can't really skip looking around the court and taking in the scenery during this slideshow. After this ends thankfully we get back to the solid frame rate that is almost constant throughout the game. The second problem with this game is that the design is a bit bland. Now, don't get me wrong. I don't demand that a game have super awesome light shows with spinning menus, but a little more creativity would have been nice. As it stands the game's menus seems a bit....empty.

Aside from these nitpicks, Top Spin 3 is a game that really looks good though on the court, but maybe not so great off court.

Audio
The audio in Top Spin 3 leaves a bit more to be desired as it shares the same issue as the menus....blandness. There are only seven songs in the game to begin with, so this easily leads to songs getting stale really fast. And on top of this, there aren't really many other unlicensed in the game either. What this leads to is feeling as though each feature (create-a-character, career) has its own single dedicated song. Overall it just gets old a bit quick. Also, there's an odd glitch where at the end of the game there is loud applause which fades as it should. Then, the camera switches to a different angle and it's as if the crowd never stopped clapping, and they are applauding like it increases your life span. Though this oddity isn't that bad, it will be strange when you have your surround system set high and are into the experience of the game.

Everything else, such as grunts, ball impacts and other ambient noise do their job perfectly. If the ball hits the net as opposed to a racket, it sure sounds like it.

Gameplay
Finally, the gameplay is another strong element of Top Spin 3. First of all, the controls themselves are well planned and work fine. However, at first it might take time getting used to the fact that you can't just mash the backhand button right when the ball is five feet away. Instead, you need to be holding the button down in preparation for the ball ahead of time. This isn't a problem though, and is just a function of how the game is. Animations and the their interactions with the gameplay never feel out of place and it never seemed to me as though I was cheated out of a point because my player hadn't finished his run animation. The game has a good set of features which include, career, tournament, online, exhibition, split screen, and player creation.

The career is a fun section which has gamers rising through the ranks using a created player. You then start all the way at the bottom at a Chicago tennis club and start playing your way up the tennis ladder. It is a very straightforward affair that keeps things simple. As you continue to play, you are given points that can be used to upgrade your tennis player's skills or buy merchandise such as shirts, shoes, rackets, etc. All this works very well to add replay value to the game, but I would like to see more elaboration on the customization in future games.

Speaking of the Create-a-player feature, it's really a nice part of the game, and as I mentioned before it can make some fairly realistic looking tennis players. First, the game starts you off with a base character which helps you have something already decent looking without doing much. Then, you are given the option to adjust hair, facial structure, lips, clothing, eyes, eye color, swing animation, grunt sound, etc. The options are plentiful here, and when the game can't provide a certain look, you can always make it yourself using the handy free-form facial tool. With this you can select a variety of points on the persons face, and then proceed to tug and squeeze to your liking.

When you get tired of the career, you have other options such as multiplayer and tournament mode. Tournament mode lets you start up a tournament with either bots or friends, and then you can modify various parameters such as match length, etc. The multiplayer part of the game includes singles and doubles play (with up to four players), as well as an online component which includes all the standard features (quick match, and so on). The online worked perfectly the several times I used it and I found little to no lag even though my connection is generally only mediocre. Online is exactly what the box says it is: Online tennis matches...no more no less.

Overall
Overall, Top Spin 3 is a fun game that is visually a stunner at times. The audio is mediocre, but luckily you won't be paying attention to it that much because the game plays great, and has good career features to boot. The replay value is fairly good and the game will surely suck in gamers who want to build up their own personal tennis player from a lowly tennis wannabe into a seasoned pro.

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