Tennis Manager 2022 – Test: game, set and match all along the line?

The Tennis Manager 2022 scores well when it comes to management aspects, but it still weakens when it comes to technology and character creation.

What Football Manager is to football, Tennis Manger 2022 would like to be to tennis. A simulation that deals with pretty much every aspect of the life of a tennis player. Here you don’t direct the fortunes of an athlete yourself, rather you direct the management part and influence the development and performance of your protégé from the outside.

It’s even more one-player at first, but you can build your own talented academy and take care of multiple charges at the same time. In any case, with Tennis Manager 2022 you get a unique perspective on the sport of tennis, since in most other tennis games you control the characters directly and deal less or not at all with the management aspect.

The devil is in the details

You should definitely be ready to invest some time to learn all the intricacies that Tennis Manager 2022 has to offer. It is not without reason that there are extensive tutorials that explain individual areas in more detail. Of course, those who are already familiar with other manager games have advantages. Newcomers might feel a bit overwhelmed by all the data, numbers and so on. However, this does not apply to the design of your own manager, here the options are rather poor and superficial.

In your own tennis academy you have a lot of options. It depends on the support of your protégés, as you do not actively intervene in the events. You take care of pretty much every aspect you can think of. You choose tournaments for players to participate in, find the best training method, negotiate contracts, expand your academy, hire staff, and so on. Everything you would expect from such a management game.

You sometimes find yourself the center of attention when conducting interviews and having to choose what answers you feel are appropriate. Ultimately, you have the choice of watching your players’ matches or having them simulated. The interaction options during this time are limited. You can try to motivate them or change the match plan midway through. Fast forwarding is also possible, although I ended up resorting to simulating the matches, which is less boring in the long run.

As much as personal customization options are limited, you have plenty of clothing and other gear to customize your players with. This also brings you something, since you conclude contracts with the manufacturers here and there and thus secure an additional side income. At the same time, racquets and shoes influence the performance of your protégés, as they can change the values ​​​​of the shots and feet. It is important to weigh up the advantages and disadvantages, after all they should benefit from it in the end and not get worse.

A lot of data, but the technology is weak

All the data presented to you in Tennis Manger 2022 is no less important. This allows you to keep track of progress and development, analyze performance and generally have a career overview. This is how you find out if you need to make any adjustments to your training to compensate for weaknesses. At the same time, you will receive important information about your opponent before upcoming matches, which will show you their weaknesses, among other things, which you can use to turn the chances of success in your favor.

Admittedly, from a purely technical point of view, management games are never among the most technically complex games in terms of match display. The Tennis Manager 2022 is no exception and presents the duels on the tennis court in a relatively practical way. Players aren’t the most detailed you’ve ever seen, the animations aren’t perfect, and the physics effects aren’t in the top league either. As I said, the match display has never been the strength of management games. All the better if other areas vote for it. In the end, you can always simulate and not notice anything.

Tennis Manager 2022 Review – Conclusion

The Tennis Manager 2022 is by no means a bad game. On the contrary: For fans of tennis, it offers a good simulation of everyday management and all the nice statistics and tables that you expect from such a game. Overall, it behaves similarly to Football Manager. It’s not a game for those who just show some interest in tennis. They are better off in a tennis game where you control the player directly. But if you like to dig into all this as a manager and can overlook the weak match display and sparse options when creating characters, this is a good choice. The developers are definitely on the right track with their Tennis Manager.