Free Tennis

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(Click on pictures to enlarge)


Grass, camera low. The player above is serving.	Grass, camera low. The player below is doing a passing shot. Notice the visible parabola. Passing shots must be low above the net, otherwise the opponent will play a killing volee.	Cement, camera height medium. The player below is playing a topspin backhand. As you change the bounce point and the height above the net, you see the parabola change.

Cement, camera very low. The player below is transparent in order not to hide the scene. Notice the shadows reflect the gestures.	Clay, camera height medium. The player is doing a backhand volee.	Grass, camera low. The player above is doing a backhand. You don't see the parabola because it is a computer-driven player.

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Since version 0.4.8, compiling the game is much easier. If you were unable to compile, try again. See changelog for more info.
It looks like we have a gentoo ebuild for Free Tennis. Look here.
In version 0.4.5, a major bug was fixed: the game would not start on fast computers. If that happened on your machine, give it another try.
Try to play at the highest resolution available for your display. The game seems to be smoother at high resolutions. For example, try ./freetennis -xres 1000 -yres 680

21 nov 2005. Version 0.4.8 released. Compilation is much easier now, due to the removal of a dependency. If you were unable to compile, please try again now. See changelog for info.

The slow-motion keys had stopped working in 0.4.5. The bug was fixed in 0.4.7.

20 nov 2005. Version 0.4.6 released. Just a few hours after releasing 0.4.5, I found a major bug in the AI and fixed it. C'est la vie!

Also fixed a minor bug. See changelog for details.

Version 0.4.5 released. Fixed a major bug (on fast computers, the player would not serve and the game would not start!). Thanks to Goran and Gemi for their help.

Also tuned gameplay slightly (see changelog).

19 nov 2005. It seems on some computers the game can't be played at all, because the player won't throw the ball.

The first attempt to fix the bug did not work. Please try again with this file and recompile. If this fixes the problem, please let me know!

18 nov 2005. Version 0.4.4 released. After two days of testing, I made substantial gameplay and AI improvements. See the changelog (latest release) for details.

16 nov 2005.

Version 0.4.3 released. Another bug fixed and slightly improved dropshot gameplay.

Version 0.4.2 released. The bug wasn't really fixed. It is now. Sorry.

Version 0.4.1 released. Just one (but major) bugfix since 0.4. See changelog.

Version 0.4 released. There were major changes related to graphics, A.I. and gameplay, some of which were requested by users.

With this release, I consider control-related gameplay to be almost complete. From now on, I will concentrate almost exclusively on graphics and AI. Updates will probably be less frequent.

The changelog for version 0.4 is already up.

And remember: real men play in -realistic mode, not -newbie!

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About Free Tennis

Welcome to the home page of Free Tennis, a free tennis simulation.

The most notable features of Free Tennis are:

Real tactics are useful in the game. For example, it is best to take the net with a slow, low shot (backspin); it is best to play diagonal when you are decentered horizontally, in order not to give angles; you should get back to center and behind the baseline after the shot, in order not to be caught in No-Man's-Land when the opponent hits;
The A.I. is very advanced and reflects those tactics;
You have total control over the parabola described by the shot;
The graphic gestures are realistic and elegant;
Different players have different skills;
The game is developed by a former tennis player;
Free Tennis is Free Software (which means more than simply "open-source"). It is released under the GPL license. Should you need another license, please ask the author.

Free Tennis is created by Maurizio Colucci.

Free Tennis is dedicated to Charles Darwin.