TopSpin 2K25 Review – A Rough Return For The Series

TopSpin 2K25 is a tennis video game developed by Hangar 13 and published by 2K, available for PC via Steam, PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X|S, and Xbox One. Known mostly for their work on Mafia titles, Hangar 13’s backing away from the Gabagool and onto the Tennis Court.

The TopSpin series started back in 2003 when TopSpin, originally developed by PAM Development, released for the Original Xbox. 2K eventually published the game’s PS2 port in 2005, before publishing the rest of the series in the following years. Between 2003-2011, four different Topspin titles released, with 4 being the most recent before 2K25.

2K returns to the series once again with developer Hangar 13 to lead the charge. So, how does the latest release compare to its predecessors? Let’s find out.

TopSpin 2K25 Review – Gameplay

I began my TopSpin 2K25 gameplay experience with TopSpin Academy. Overall, it serves as the game’s tutorial mode and teaches you everything you need to know. The mode itself is split up into three categories of training, each more advanced than the last. Furthermore, legendary Tennis player John McEnroe actually guides you through the first two categories, which is a nice added touch.

Overall, I quite enjoyed TopSpin Academy. In most sports games I typically just earn things on my own. However, the Academy mode taught me tips and tricks I would’ve never known had I not played it. As someone who’s admittedly not overly familiar with Tennis, the Academy mode helps you understand both the game and a sport a lot better. It doesn’t take long to complete, and you can re-play them at any time if you want to re-learn certain mechanics.

That said, I was a bit disappointed to see that John McEnroe is only there with you for only two of the three total categories. For the third category, which contains more levels than the previous two categories combined, someone else narrates the rest of the levels. Not the biggest issue, but it just makes me curious why he couldn’t be involved in the final category.

Afterwards, I tried my hand at Exhibition, where I did a quick 1v1 between Roger Federer and Carlos Alcaraz to put my Academy skills to the test. Right off the bat, let me just say that TopSpin 2K25 does not skimp out on court selections. Between the different terrain types, day and night variations, and geographical locations, you have tons of venues and tournaments to play in.

However, TopSpin 2K25’s roster, could be better. Overall, the game features 25 playable characters, the same amount TopSpin 4 back in 2011. Additionally, you can also play as your own MyPLAYERs in Exhibition. While the roster size isn’t bad, it’s weird that some big names like Jannick Sinner, Rafa Nadal, Novak Djokovic, and Alex de Minaur didn’t make the cut.

It’s not that the current size and selection of characters is bad, but with legends making up a whole quarter of the roster, adding a few more contemporary players wouldn’t hurt. Plus, I find that a game’s replay value is much higher when more recognizable faces are available. So while I’m not downright upset that I can’t play as someone like Sinner, I’ll always wonder why he’s absent.

Of course, there’s always a possibility that new pros will be added to the game. However, at launch, I feel the roster size is okay, but not as strong as it could be. It’s definitely not my biggest grip with the game.

In fact, my biggest issue with TopSpin 2K25 is a lack of modes, especially for offline players. If you don’t like playing online, then you’re pretty much stuck with MyCAREER, Exhibition, and TopSpin Academy. However, once you beat Academy, there’s little reason to return unless you took a break from the game. That just leaves you with Exhibition and MyCAREER.

Exhibition is nice, but there’s no sense of progression, and mostly works as a game-night mode. Playing with friends and family is usually fun because of friends and family. But alone, Exhibition provides very little reason to play except for playing as your favorite pros. But as I mentioned earlier, the small roster will make the mode’s ability to last difficult. If there’s only 24 players, and you only like a handful of them, then you’ll likely get bored after playing with your favorite players.

Overall, TopSpin 2K25’s MyCAREER mode follows a three step cycle, which involves training, challenges, and tournaments. All of these events take place in one month, with each month restarting the cycle. This is where you’ll be spending the bulk of your time, earning experience for attributes, climbing up the ranks, and completing goals.

The training events are little events that reward the player with rewards, typically VC and XP. They’re quick to complete, and focus on a plethora of gameplay mechanics. For the most part, you’ll be tasked with hitting the ball to a specific part of the court using a specific shot type. Overall, I do enjoy the training modes. They’re quick enough not to get monotonous over time.

Special Events pin you against an opponent (singles, or doubles) with a unique rule set. They provide a nice buffer between practicing and a full match, and also do not take as long. Like training events, special events come in four different difficulties (Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum). The different difficulties can only be unlocked by meeting certain conditions. Additionally, some of these events reward the player with new courts, cosmetics, VC, XP, and more.

And TopSpin 2K25 features a wide variety of real tourneys and venues. From the Rolex Monte-Carlos Masters in April to Wimbledon in July, watching the venues over the course of the year was pretty fun and kept the experience fresh. Your performance in the tournament influences your race and global ranking. Essentially, the better you perform, the faster you’ll reach first place.

However, it’s not as simple as that. TopSpin 2K25 includes an energy feature, which lowers as you travel and play matches. The lower your energy is, the higher the risk of injury. Minor injuries can be dealt with by resting, and can even be played through. However, a major injury will sideline you for a long time, which will negatively effect your rankings.

Ideally, you want to maintain a good amount of energy, and rest often to avoid risking injury. Your rank might drop, but you can easily regain it with consistent performances. While I like the mechanic, I also question why a flight to another location drains my energy. Was my MyPLAYER getting some reps in on the plane during the trip? I understand jet lag is a thing, but we’re talking about professionals here.

Throughout your career, you’ll hear a podcast that follows your character throughout their career. Depending on how you perform, they’ll either cheer you on or share disappointment on your progress. But in terms of presentation, I think TopSpin could do just a bit more. I think there could be more depth to the game outside of E-mails and podcasts. It would be cool to see results of other matchups, other tournaments, injuries, and other happenings in the world.

While I think Career mode is fun, the experience might become repetitive for some players. Sure, you unlock more features and challenges to complete over the years, but at a certain point you might find yourself with the typical sports game fatigue. What I mean is, like any other sports video game career mode, it’s fun at first before becoming boring to the point where you stop playing.

I also feel there are some other features that would’ve made it better, like a rivalry system, or perhaps a way to befriend a player and compete in doubles tourneys with them. There needs to be more than just practice, event, tournament, rest, repeat. Sure, you can buy homes and unlock other convenient features, but it needs a bit more substance.

But TopSpin 2K25 also offers some online modes for those who want it. Overall, TopSpin 2K25’s online modes include 2K Tour, World Tour, and Exhibition Online. Personally, most of my time was spent in the game’s offline modes, as we still await the game’s full launch.

Exhibition Online, as the name suggests, is your basic matchmaking mode. It allows you to play friendly matches as either one of the professional players or your own MyPLAYER. Not much to say here, but with Cross-play, finding a match shouldn’t be difficult come launch day and long afterwards.

2K Tour, on the other hand, is a more competitive mode that lets you earn 2K points by completing objectives and winning matches. It follows a seasonal leaderboard system where you climb higher the more you win. What’s nice is that the game includes a ranking leaderboard for both wins and points. So, if you don’t care for earning points, but want to build an incredible record, you can do so and still see your name at the very top.

And that basically includes all modes. Overall, TopSpin 2K25 features two types of exhibition modes, two online modes, a career mode, and a tutorial mode.

But for actual matches, there’s different rule sets you can use or unlock by playing the game. For example, the TopSpin rule set is my favorite. But there’s several other match types and rulesets to change up the experience. While these add more to the game’s content, I really only found 2-3 match types that were fun to play. After that, I just stuck with the TopSpin rule set for how its structure works.

Personally, I think just one or two more modes would’ve really improved TopSpin 2K25’s replay value. A 2-player career where you play doubles matches with a friend, or perhaps a court-designer mode would’ve been some cool ideas. And I’m not saying my ideas are amazing, but the idea of adding more game modes would help justify purchasing the game.

When you look at other 2K Sports titles, you usually have a nice selection of modes to choose from. Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for TopSpin, which did negatively affect my experience.

What TopSpin 2K25 does offer, is new seasonal content via the Centre Court Pass. This works like your typical season pass, where playing the game earns progress towards earning new rewards. For the most part, rewards in the Centre Court Passes mostly include cosmetics, animations, and new apparel. Along with the various unlockable rewards you can earn for playing the game, like new venues and match types, it is nice to have a good amount of collectibles. However, only there was more to do in the game, then the unlocking of all this content might not feel boring after some time.

When it comes to controls, TopSpin 2K25 has everything down to an exact science. Serving a perfect volley is challenging, rewarding, and fair. You can just serve a simple volley by tapping one of the face buttons, or attempt a more powerful volley serve with the right analog stick. Furthermore, you can use the left analog stick to aim your shot, and watch your opponent helplessly watch you earn a quick point.

Regular serves, forehand or backhand, also work very smoothly and with little to no error. Again players have the choice of four different serve types, as well as power shots and quick shots. Furthermore, you can influence the direction of your shots before each time you hit it to keep your opponent running. I love watching my competition run back and forth, draining all their stamina.

And that’s another thing TopSpin 2K25 does pretty well. While you can potentially send the ball flying too fast for your opponent to react, TopSpin 2K25’s greatest battles are those of attrition. The moment you play on harder difficulties, or tougher challenges in MyCAREER, the more you’ll notice just how much patience you need to win. You need to learn to conserve stamina, time your shots, and predict your opponent’s patterns.

Looking at TopSpin 4, you realize that not too much changed in the last decade, but that’s not the issue. In fact, TopSpin 2K25 is a perfect successor to the series in terms of gameplay. However, it just doesn’t offer much to do with it.

TopSpin 2K25 Review – Graphics

One area that TopSpin 2K25 definitely struggles to impress is its graphics. Firstly, player models for both professional characters and MyPLAYER models look pretty horrific up close. Specifically, its the hair on player models that just looks awkward, even when they’re not moving. At times, I could see patches of baldness on my opponent, who walked onto the court with a full head of hair.

The actual player models for real professionals like Serena Williams or Roger Federer don’t look much better either. While they at least look accurate enough for you to know who it is, let’s just say they could use some improvements.

On the other hand, the courts and venues themselves look fine, especially at night time. However, during some day time matches, I find that the lighting in some venues tends to look too bright, even after trying to adjust both the game and TV settings. Thankfully, TopSpin 2K25 offers a ton of venues to play on, so you’ll be able to play on your favorite courts most of the time.

Overall, we did not find TopSpin 2K25 graphically impressive. However, as someone who prefers gameplay over graphics, this did not effect the final score of my TopSpin 2K25 review.

TopSpin 2K25 Review – Audio

In terms of Audio, TopSpin 2K25 succeeds in delivering authentic sound quality. Between the ball bouncing on the court, and the impactful sound of the tennis racket blasting the ball away, it sounds extremely relaxing. Furthermore, I liked the added details, like the sound your player makes when serving a nasty forehand or backhand shot.

The sound quality of TopSpin 2K25 goes above and beyond to produce an authentic tennis feel in video game format. Everything sounds accurate to a real match, from the crowd celebrations, to the ball hitting the net. This was one area I felt TopSpin 2K25 really shines.

As for the Soundtrack, TopSpin 2K25 has a small but relatively good collection of songs to listen to. Most of your TopSpin experience will likely be in the court, but in modes like MyCAREER, you’ll spend a lot of time in the menus hiring coaches, planning your calendar, and distributing attribute points. I’m fortunate to say the song selection is a nice collection of head-bumping tunes.

Overall, there’s 18 songs, along with the original score from BT. For some, it might be a small number. However, I think it’s perfectly fine since you’ll be spending most of your time locked in to the game.

Verdict – Is TopSpin 2K25 Worth Your Time & Money?

TopSpin 2K25 shows that the series can, and hopefully will, make a successful return. However, while the gameplay is crisp, there’s not much offered beyond career mode along with a couple of online modes and exhibition. Furthermore, if you prefer to play offline, you’re then relegated to just three modes, all of which might get boring fast for you.

Personally, I don’t know if I can recommend a $60-$70 tennis game in good faith when outside of career, there’s not much to it. However, if you absolutely love tennis and the TopSpin series, then I’m sure you’ll get your moneys worth. And when the game goes on sale, then it becomes much easier to recommend.

But despite what I said about pricing, TopSpin 2K25, is, at the very least, a fun game with solid gameplay. There was very little that made me dislike my experience, and I do see how fun it can be for fans of the series. The controls feel good, career mode is enjoyable, and the amount of unlockable items makes you feel a sense of progression. However, I must also say that I felt, over time, that the experience wasn’t offering much else.

However, despite my thoughts on the game, I do believe the series has potential to grow and make a full return. Hangar 13 has the gameplay down, all they need to do next is add the elements that make it worthwhile to revisit. So while I give TopSpin 2K25 review a mixed score, I am optimistic for the series future.

Score: 6.5/10

Editor’s Note: ClutchPoints received review copies to allow us to cover this game. These copies did not, in any way, affect this TopSpin 2K25 Review’s final score and verdict.