Should SI stop adding new features for a year and sort out current game?

I loved championship manager and it worked really well then Sega took over and it became Football Manager the whole series evolved even more. Football Manager is the best managerial game out there and it is already a very in depth game but I would like SI to just stop adding new features for a year and concentrate on what they have.

I want to see the media improved rather than just answering 4 questions that don't seem too make much difference, champions league or premiership games played on same day as a premiership league fixture this was happening years ago in the series but shouldn't be happening now. Players AI on the pitch also needs improving and the feedback from the fans and chairman.

I think in the past few years Football Manager has tried to add many new features and it's just causing more problems. I would much prefer all the latest transfers etc along with the features already in the game working as it should be than see a lot of new features included in the game that is not working properly to add with the ones already not working properly.

No they shouldnt.

I am with you 100%. I hope SI is reading this. I used to love FM, but cant get into it anymore. Features such as match prep, press conferences, are boring and sadly, effect the match result.

I hope SI focus on just perfecting what they have, aka ME and tactical aspect.

Match prep doesnt really affect anything, i have kept it on team blend for 9 seasons now and never needed to change it, its been a pointless feature for me except to see how far along my team are with my tactics.

I like the extra feature it makes the game more than a click continue game, the more the merrier i say!

I am with you 100%. I hope SI is reading this. I used to love FM, but cant get into it anymore. Features such as match prep, press conferences, are boring and sadly, effect the match result.

I hope SI focus on just perfecting what they have, aka ME and tactical aspect.

They have different people working on different modules, so using your examples... working on press conferences wouldn't effect the quality of the match engine.

SI shouldn't stop adding new features. It what makes the game better. I'm sure I've read somewhere possibly in the blogs, that Miles said they had been working on the agents feature for a few years or another feature and that they don't add a feature in until they are really happy that it works. I could be wrong though.

I would like an update (glorified patch if you will) to be released seperate from FM12 so you have the full game or a transfer update/minor tweeks patch even if they charged you a fiver say i would prefer this and then i would probably buy FM13 but they will lose out on money so this will never happen.

I just hope they put lots of work into making the AI capable of long term team building.

They're always going to have to add new features, otherwise Miles and some other people would out of a job...

3D match engine took them a few years to create to what they have now. Same with agents and DLR. They have to continue to have new ideas and features to add in future versions of FM to keep making progress in the series. And of course, there's competition and they need something to entice the customer to buy the next version of FM, therefore they need new features every single year, just like every other sports game on the market...

I wouldn't spend $40 on a roster update with no new features.

SI shouldn't stop adding new features. It what makes the game better. I'm sure I've read somewhere possibly in the blogs, that Miles said they had been working on the agents feature for a few years or another feature and that they don't add a feature in until they are really happy that it works. I could be wrong though.

They said the same with dynamic league rep. It had been requested for years but they've only introduced it once they're sure it's working properly rather than rush it in a couple of years ago.

if adding new features breaks the game, then those new features shouldn't be added. SI added match-prep and it broke the Tactics engine/editor (that's my take on it at least) so maybe match-prep shouldn't have been added. They added agents and it broke contracts/transfers and they revamped the media aspect and it broke the whole game!

I don't care how long they've been working on it, if adding it breaks what already exists THEN DON'T ADD IT!

Fix what we have, no more fluff thank you very much, not until the game and it's features that exist now works as it should do, looks as it should do and engages us like it should do!

I can't think of any new features that I want to see in FM12. Mainly, my wishlist is a revamped scouting, transfer and AI club logic modules. FM is already suffering enough from feature bloat.

Quite frankly, a lot of these fluff features take away from the game as they are poorly designed or tested. Press conferences are just plain boring and add nothing to the game. The new player interactions in FM11 turned the players into uptight and emotional wrecks who turn in transfer requests after every little disagreement.

if adding new features breaks the game, then those new features shouldn't be added. SI added match-prep and it broke the Tactics engine/editor (that's my take on it at least) so maybe match-prep shouldn't have been added. They added agents and it broke contracts/transfers and they revamped the media aspect and it broke the whole game!

I don't care how long they've been working on it, if adding it breaks what already exists THEN DON'T ADD IT!

Fix what we have, no more fluff thank you very much, not until the game and it's features that exist now works as it should do, looks as it should do and engages us like it should do!

so you dont know that it affected anything but you have decided it has, and because of this it should not have been added??

so you dont know that it affected anything but you have decided it has, and because of this it should not have been added??

Of course, he wouldn't know the root cause since he doesn't have the source code. However, SI has admitted that a lot of these bugs were seen during testing, but couldn't be fixed by release date. That process has to be improved so obvious bugs can be caught earlier in the cycle.

so you dont know that it affected anything but you have decided it has, and because of this it should not have been added??

simple logic

what you would expect a new feature to affect worked before the new feature was added, it didn't work after the new feature was added, therefore new feature broke it...

that's kind of not hard to figure out milner, even for you

Well I don't feel that the Agents, Transfers etc. were thoroughly tested. Normal game play of a career game would actually show that these features don't work correctly.

Things like the AI never bidding on your players after they reach a certain CA. And the AI buying players for 40m and playing them 5 times in 3 years. Offering players to other clubs and the AI never ever overspends with you as it does with itself within the game. The AI never accepting anything except the exact player value which is a hidden stat (for example I wanted to Chiellini I offered 30m, then 34m, then 40m then 45m then 49m (and 49m was the exact hidden player sale value according to FMRTE) where in the real world the Board may have stepped in and said at the 34m or 40m mark that they would accept that bid - there's no leeway) But then you the AI going out and buying 4m rated players for 36m. Another instance was in trying to sign Maicon. Bayern Munich had a bid of 20.15m accepted (no mention of other things). Then I bid 25m, 30m, 35m and each bid was rejected. Maicon signed for BM before I could bid again.

I don't mind new things being added but I would prefer a much more thorough way of making sure they worked absolutely.

I bough FM 11 when it came out. And I've effectively being playing a broken game until now. It doesn't really work the way it should. It's nearly March now - and I'm waiting for the 10.3 patch. 5 months after buying the game and it's still broken.

I could really go for a FM12 game that just had a database update, bugs of FM11 totally worked out. Whatever they have planned for FM12 should hold off on until FM13 and let them test the crap out of it until it works properly.

The whole press conferences thing is absolute rubbish.... Biggest waste of time, was a novelty for the first couple of times it happened but after that I just got annoyed by it, now every time I start a game I just leave it to my assistant to do it. Forget not adding new features to the game, how about getting rid of ones that are crap??

No and the reason is simple. This forum would be full of absolute carnage if they did that; all we would see is people raging that's its a rip-off, a re-packed FM11, FM11.4 or w/e. They are not stupid, the big whiners are free to play a previous version if that's what they want and not deal with all the 'unplayable bugs' lol and newer features they don't like. Also as a business, they realise that they will need to offfer something substantially new to try and get new customers to buy the product as well as maintain the fanbase they already have. Society always wants something new, every big game aims to step it up with each incarnation for a reason.

simple logic

what you would expect a new feature to affect worked before the new feature was added, it didn't work after the new feature was added, therefore new feature broke it...

that's kind of not hard to figure out milner, even for you

The point is there is no way to tell for certain is there? I would imagine they re-write various parts of the game each year, not just add on's which means this could have been a bug cause by an almost unlimited number of things perhaps not related to the MP at all.

Because it worked on FM10 has very little to do with FM11.

Of course, he wouldn't know the root cause since he doesn't have the source code. However, SI has admitted that a lot of these bugs were seen during testing, but couldn't be fixed by release date. That process has to be improved so obvious bugs can be caught earlier in the cycle.

the tactics bug is not an obvious one to begin with tho, and as the theads about it have proved does not affect everyone playing the game, it would be difficult to track down a bug that doesnt affect every single copy of the game played, hence why it was probably missed during testing or why it still exists now, i would imagine that one will be very close to the top of the list and has been since day one, the fact it has not been sorted in two patches says to me that it must be hard for them to sort out once and for all.

I think they need to cut down on new features and improve what they've already got and especially improve the core of the game.

They're always going to have to add new features, otherwise Miles and some other people would out of a job...

3D match engine took them a few years to create to what they have now. Same with agents and DLR. They have to continue to have new ideas and features to add in future versions of FM to keep making progress in the series. And of course, there's competition and they need something to entice the customer to buy the next version of FM, therefore they need new features every single year, just like every other sports game on the market...

I wouldn't spend $40 on a roster update with no new features.

Would you spend $40 on a transfer update with no new features instead?

Screen Flow is absolutely cack the way they have it setup.

They have tick boxes for selecting leagues at the start of the game.

Then you go to screen flow and you have 4 or 5 drop down boxes relating to competitions and what you want to subscribe to.

And some of the options Don't Stick.

Then if you accidentally leave the screen and go back to it the options you choose are wiped because you didn't hit confirm.

Plus if you make an error on one of your selections and "Add it" you can't change anything on it without removing it and doing it all again.

There's very little consistency to the UI and it bugs the hell out of me.

Other parts of the game are so bloody bad. Like when contracts expire, or coaches get pinched (which has been a problem for a long time).

I'd much prefer they fixed these and all the other things before they added more features.

yes they should. The training screen in particular is set up in a properly cack handed way which discourages you from using it. I used to set up a schedual for every player, now its just too much because of the changes made in 2011

Of course all this could be solved with the addition of "classic" and "advanced" game modes. They can do what they like with advanced so long as we can also keep things how they ought to be via classic

Yes they should and ought to, but it's pretty obvious they won't...

There are so many key areas that have been in dire of tweaking/revamping/fixing FOR YEARS, yet all we've been getting are patches and quick fixes... kinda like putting a band-aid around a severed finger...

Unsurprisingly more often than not such fixes have "overfixed" the issue, basically creating a new and opposite issue in the process... as shown by the transfer market going from Man City-crazy in FM10 to Scrooge-stingy in FM11...

Not to mention the amount of talents who'll end up sitting at home with no contract and no contract proposals for months, while AI clubs keep on bringing in mediocre players.

Or the horribly unbalanced newgens... now even more expensive!

And then we still get a somewhat random/obscure ME, a cumbersome yet apparently ineffective tactical system, an equally random training system, the "it's all about luck" development patterns, a non-exisiting managerial turnover that, along with the flawed Reputation system, makes the idea of a journeyman career almost impossible...

How can I build a project if the only chance I have to change club is when (every 10 years) an AI manager gets the boot?

So, no thank you, I'll pass on "improved agents", "improved press conferences" and various brand new fluff if it means I can finally get a game where I feel I understand what I'm doing with my club and players.

And a game where the transfer market for players and managers is realistic and won't render any career game a piece of cake because of the many inherent flaws of the AI.

As much as I still enjoy FM, it's more a matter of habit/addiction than actual enjoyment... There's nothing fun in winning everything after a couple of years solely because of the AI's inability to keep their teams competitive.

As much as I still enjoy FM, it's more a matter of habit/addiction than actual enjoyment... There's nothing fun in winning everything after a couple of years solely because of the AI's inability to keep their teams competitive.

Encourages you to buy the next one tho doesnt it ? Anyway i reckon this is segas fault a few of the names they bought up turned to cack very swiftly under their business demands.

Oddly, they did this with FM10. It was about "polishing", not adding new features. The game is much better for that year, and IMO it doesn't need another year of polishing as such. Maybe a bit of trimming, but that can go on as new features are added.

in reply to OP, yes they should

Simple amswer; No they should not.

Id rather new features with a few minor bugs which get fixed when patched than a game that doesnt improve.

Just getting rid of press conferences would make me happier, they are terribly boring.

Yes absolutely.

Back to basics.

Stop making the game too fancy, and just make the thing work.

The same question pops up every year...

I'd be happy for them to not realease an FM12 if it meant they'd have an extra year to develop and fine tune FM13. As long as we get transfer updates though in the meantime.

I'd be happy for them to not realease an FM12 if it meant they'd have an extra year to develop and fine tune FM13. As long as we get transfer updates though in the meantime.

I agree with that, but they will not forsake the £25 purchase price we will all pay.

It will be released, bugged up or not.

whilst i agree in principle its never going to happen.

new features sell games, Ive spoken to several players who owned fm10 and didn't even know the patches or these forums existed, never mind the bugs, I suspect a great number of players are the same and wouldn't buy the next version on the basis of a tune up.

would you be happy not getting paid for a year? Then after you second year, only getting paid for one?

They wont suddenly sell twice as many copies because they only release the game every two years, so basically they would be cutting off one year of sales which in turn would leave less money for FM, then less testing, then more bugs and then people would say, "well why not just release one every three year" and so on and so on.

SI dont make any other games because they are not a huge company and i would imagine due to the complex nature of FM so i dont think they could afford to make one every two years, also keeping in mind to keep up their licenses they would probably have to be renewed every year so they can keep them, would FM sell as many copies without these licenses? Its easy to say just make it every two years but in reality its not a possibility for a company to not get some kind of income ever year.

Yes absolutely.

Back to basics.

Stop making the game too fancy, and just make the thing work.

hear hear!

would you be happy not getting paid for a year? Then after you second year, only getting paid for one?

They wont suddenly sell twice as many copies because they only release the game every two years, so basically they would be cutting off one year of sales which in turn would leave less money for FM, then less testing, then more bugs and then people would say, "well why not just release one every three year" and so on and so on.

SI dont make any other games because they are not a huge company and i would imagine due to the complex nature of FM so i dont think they could afford to make one every two years, also keeping in mind to keep up their licenses they would probably have to be renewed every year so they can keep them, would FM sell as many copies without these licenses? Its easy to say just make it every two years but in reality its not a possibility for a company to not get some kind of income ever year.

At this rate I won't be buying the new one until April the year after it's released. They can keep releasing buggy version after buggy version, truth is people will get fed up with it.

No, I'm eagerly anticipating 2012's new features that will probably include more press conference questions, more 3D animations, more player interaction options and increased length of conversations with the groundsman about what pattern you'd like the grass cut in to.

All of which are infinitely more important than a transfer system that works, a match engine that makes sense and realistic regens for career games!

Should SI stop adding new features for a year and sort out current game?

uhhhh, they usually only add new features once a year

100% agree with OP, infact they should remove some of the uneccessary features and concentrate on the core features such as match engine, transfer system and newgen system

No, I'm eagerly anticipating 2012's new features that will probably include more press conference questions, more 3D animations, more player interaction options and increased length of conversations with the groundsman about what pattern you'd like the grass cut in to.

All of which are infinitely more important than a transfer system that works, a match engine that makes sense and realistic regens for career games!

Me too!

SI shouldn't stop adding new features. It what makes the game better. I'm sure I've read somewhere possibly in the blogs, that Miles said they had been working on the agents feature for a few years or another feature and that they don't add a feature in until they are really happy that it works. I could be wrong though.

So they were 100% happy with the agents feature and the "3 tactics" feature?

Ahah great...

I think football manager is the benchmark but for the past few years at least it has been same game same issues but new features creating more issues. AI is one thing that needs working on as do transfers. and the media. I rather not have media press interviews and team talk as they don't seem to do much and team talk feature is one thing that creates problems because it doesn't work properly.

I know Football Manager is the best on the market (although it doesn't have too much competition) but it has been the best since it was released 1990 I think under Domark but without the users inputs it wouldn't be the game it is (except for people who say game is rubbish because they can't win or players attributes but some people wont give any criticism and if people do make some reasonable points they quickly get shot down by some of the users on here.

No and the reason is simple. This forum would be full of absolute carnage if they did that; all we would see is people raging that's its a rip-off, a re-packed FM11, FM11.4 or w/e. They are not stupid, the big whiners are free to play a previous version if that's what they want and not deal with all the 'unplayable bugs' lol and newer features they don't like. Also as a business, they realise that they will need to offfer something substantially new to try and get new customers to buy the product as well as maintain the fanbase they already have. Society always wants something new, every big game aims to step it up with each incarnation for a reason.

This, a million times over. If they didn't put in anything new, people would complain.

I'm against. SI, goes on adding news features and improving what you already have.

Take out the stupid agent fees, i bet a manager does not get too tied up with all the details and the match preparation is a joke and seems it was added in the last minute.

i hope they revamp the press conference. its garbage now as i just leave it to assistant. the whole thing is so repetitive and boring.

I'd be happy for them to not realease an FM12 if it meant they'd have an extra year to develop and fine tune FM13. As long as we get transfer updates though in the meantime.

this is not going to happen. to all those who understands concurrent engineering in companies, will know what i'm talking about.

they will release the game year after year as it rakes in a hell lot of income for SEGA. there's nothing you can do about it. it's all about money.