FM 2009 has an average rating of 2 stars on amazon?

Now i know this shouldn't really be in this forum, but i value the opinion here more.

I decided just now while a bit drunk to buy myself fm 09 game as a christmas present for myself. Amazon are selling it for £17 so seemed like a good deal. However, possibly for the first time ever, a customer rating of 2 stars out of 200 people is given for the game. This immedianly put doubt in my mind. So i ask, is it really that bad? why does it recieve possibly the lowest customer rating out of anything i've ever seen on amazon?

2* rating was due to drm being involved iirc, same happened to spore.

full backs are useless and therefore ruin the game.

There's about 100+ people who gave it 1* because of the DRM. All of their comments rant about it and how its evil,and barely mention the game itself. Personally i think 2-3* is about right though, but nothing to do with DRM.

Cm 01/02 is free now, get that instead!!

got it already on disc tbh

Amazon user comments cant really be taken seriously tho

fm07 ftmfw

Amazon user comments cant really be taken seriously tho

I agree, its just usually ratings are over-inflated, which is why i questioned the rating of said game so much,

fm07 ftmfw

Ha, didn't realise there was anyone else still playing this

ive started playing it again. got back into my boro game. didnt buy 08 or 09 though.

Also still playing fm07 - its miles, miles, miles better than 9.0.2

Beggars belief that they can take a pretty solid ME and turn it into the festering lump that they put into 09.

Just tried to reinstall FM07 and it doesn't seem to work on my new computer.

Just tried to reinstall FM07 and it doesn't seem to work on my new computer.

It should do - runs on Vista64 for me with no problems at all. Make sure you have the .net framework updates from microsoft for the crappy installer that they use though.

Excellent, its working fine now. Just got to update it a bit and I'll have something to do tomorrow.

2* rating was due to drm being involved iirc, same happened to spore.

whs, its for the activation fiasco and now possibly for the 2nd patch which has seemed to cause more problems with the match engine than fixing existing ones-the game itself is sound though

It's a hideous version, bugs excluded. The database is almost identical to FM08 and hence brings nothing new, the major new additions such as 3D and press conferences are either flawed or laughably pointless and in general, it's the least addictive version since I started playing the series from CM3. Even the ones which were heralded as crap like CM4 and FM07 had me addicted but this one is just dull and I haven't touched it since the first week I bought it. In conclusion, 2* is about right.

I'm still playing FM 07. I'm in 2034.

DRM and Activation issues were the main problem.

What annoys me about amazon is that a review which says

"5 stars

It's the best game evaaaaar"

will be found useful by 38 of 40 people, whereas a genuinely insightful review which gives fewer stars, like 2 for example, will be found useful by 4 out of 40 people.

Must be fanboys.

Bet the people who downloaded the cracked version didnt have DRM or activation issues aswell. Stuff like this just doesnt work, and clearly its ****ing off legit users

Another one for FM2007, tried FM2008 but didnt like it so havent bothered with FM2009 yet

I must say I tend to find those who are most critical of the match engine are those who have an over-inflated opinion of their skill as a manager or those who haven't found the killer tactic that lets them win every single game.

People like you and I who've busted a gut testing pre-builds of the game (I remember the first build of CM4, jesus, that was all but unplayable!) are far more "well adjusted" as regards the relative merits of the game.

Some bits of the game annoy the crap out of me but other bits I appreciate the levels of work that've gone into them even if they're not quite flawless yet.

As regards the earlier post about the database being the same... if it's the same, that's a result of not too many transfers over the course of the last year or so, how can that be a fault of SI?

That's the worst post i've seen for a while. Total rubbish.

We're not happy because the ME is in no way, shape or form realistic. Its made worse by the fact that its gone backwards since FM07.

For me FM09 is the best version by a distance. It took a while to get into as all new versions tend to for me, but I don't have any faults with it really. Don't see how people can still play CM01/02, it's just far too simplistic now.

Despite being very critical of 08 I'm actually very much enjoying 09. Press conferences are useless and repetitive but I actually quite like the 3d engine. The data is a bit of a pity though as a lot of areas, e.g. Segunda Liga, haven't changed for years.

For me FM09 is the best version by a distance. It took a while to get into as all new versions tend to for me, but I don't have any faults with it really. Don't see how people can still play CM01/02, it's just far too simplistic now.

There's a certain level where one has to deal with so many trees that one forgets all about the forests.

And I like forests. They let you breathe and stuff.

Speaking of FM07 doesnt anyone know where I can get the patch?

Thanks Kris!

There's a certain level where one has to deal with so many trees that one forgets all about the forests.

And I like forests. They let you breathe and stuff.

I see.....

regardless of the game's merits, an attitude of "i'm a tester so i am right and you are wrong" is never going to make you very popular, especially when you start claiming that people who dislike the match engine are only so negative because they want to win every match but can't

there are massive, massive flaws in this version's match engine, but the most worrying fact in my opinion is that, whilst there was clear progression and improvement in the match engine from cm4 all the way to fm07, this has now seemingly ceased, and each incarnation now comes with its own quirky glitches in addition to the problems that have always been there

I've been testing it for the last few months too and i've found it to be a horribly broken, fundamentally flawed game.

There are flaws in the ME - For example the balls over the top are still an issue. The "fix" for long shots has now resulted in there being an issue with too few long shots occurring in game. Height & Weight still have absolutely no influence on a player's ability. There is nowhere near enough variety or spontaneity compared to real football. I could go on, but as i've got other gripes, i'll leave it there.

The Tactics Module is flawed - I really don't care about winning formations or anything like that - what I do care about is having the ability to be explicit in setting up a tactic where my players know what I want from them. I want to be able to have a winger both cut inside and hug the line, I want to be able to have my fullbacks overlap without leaving glaring gaps when they aren't in possession of the ball. I want to be able to tell my goalkeeper to deliver the ball short and not see him hoof it forward every time when doing so. I want to be able to figure out a solid tactic that'll get me playing decent, if basic football without requiring a degree in mathematics to do so.

The training module is terribly terribly broken when you find out the star rating system is purely there for knowing how many players a particular coach can coach at any one time. When you realise there is absolutely no way to coach your players to be able to actually play the tactics you want to prepare them for the games, so that they don't look like 11 players who've never played together before. It's broken when you realise that the major problem with NewGens largely being rubbish isn't really that the game isn't creating enough players with talent or good attributes in the right areas for the position, but that the AI managers don't actually bother coaching them to a level where they actually develop into good players.

I could talk about the problems with the transfer module, the financial module and the scouting module, but my Christmas dinner is about to be served and I think that's enough to go on with. Suffice to say, that not everybody is impressed with the game who has been testing it for months and not everybody who has criticisms of aspects of the game are not doing it purely because they can't win every single time.

Seeing as this is turning into a bit of an 07 thread. Didn't finish off my Lanús season last night, was speaking to some whore on MSN instead /o\.

Anyone got a good data update? I got one from sortitoutsi, which is decentish, but not great. It has most of the transfers but doesn't have stuff like City's takeover and other things like that.

so has there been two patches then? and bugs still exist? is there going to be a third?

true, i meant major ones

It's a hideous version, bugs excluded. The database is almost identical to FM08 and hence brings nothing new, the major new additions such as 3D and press conferences are either flawed or laughably pointless and in general, it's the least addictive version since I started playing the series from CM3. Even the ones which were heralded as crap like CM4 and FM07 had me addicted but this one is just dull and I haven't touched it since the first week I bought it. In conclusion, 2* is about right.

So played it for a week and can say the data is the same? Data isn't just stats, but ca and pa. How you could figure that out in a week is beyond me. 3d is flawed? I don't think so. Obviously the match engine has it's problems but I think the 3d representation is very good for it's first run. Maybe even more so since 9.2.0. But of course you haven't even tried that but can still comment?

I don't think the match engine has gotten worse since 07 really. I thought 9.1.0 was the best it's been at but has taken a backwards step with the latest patch. It needed small changes and they appear to have gone over the top.

not really sure how people can praise 9.1.0 when it was little more than a long shots competition

havent played fm for years & the comments in here are unlikely to tempt me back.

So played it for a week and can say the data is the same? Data isn't just stats, but ca and pa. How you could figure that out in a week is beyond me. 3d is flawed? I don't think so. Obviously the match engine has it's problems but I think the 3d representation is very good for it's first run. Maybe even more so since 9.2.0. But of course you haven't even tried that but can still comment?

I don't think the match engine has gotten worse since 07 really. I thought 9.1.0 was the best it's been at but has taken a backwards step with the latest patch. It needed small changes and they appear to have gone over the top.

Explain to me how 9.1 was the best when you had goalkeeper assists all over the place and everyone had shots from 40 yards?

Oh, ok. Sorry, I was wrong. The ME's awful and unplayable, you're right. I've been completely overlooking it for the last month or so. I'm going to delete the savegame and smash the disk.

Lets see, season 1 I finished 18th with Yeovil and this season, I'm 12th at the end of January after major rebuilding of my team. Pretty accurate by my reckoning.

Ok, there are a few flaws in the match engine but you're refusing to look beyond them at anything else. You have given me no reasons whatsoever to back up your criticism of the ME and therefore that makes me think you're arguing for no reason other than a desire to be hyper-critical and totally unreasonable towards SI and the programmers.

If you'd like furnish me with your reasons that you think the ME is a big bag of pants, then I honestly want to hear them. And if your points are valid, I am only too happy to accept that I may be wrong on some (or even all) points. I'm not above admitting when I'm wrong.

I'm not going to degenerate into any more petty spitefulness over this, I had my little bit of sarcasm at the start of the post and all I'm now interested in is a reasoned discussion with you over the ME.

Ultimately, I'm happy with the game. I accept that I'm not as good at it as I was at CM 01/02 but I put that down to an ever-increasing latent difficulty that helps to make the game more realistic. After all, if managing a football club was a piece of **** then everyone would be doing it. I'm content to look past bugs that aren't game-breakers and just enjoy trying to drag Yeovil up to the Championship.

Happy Christmas.

Look under the bugs forum in the match engine section. I'm not about to type out my huge list again.

Ok, I'm going to take it as the one entitled "SI Testers..."

1- Goalkeepers getting assists: None of the 4 keepers I've used has a single assist this season.

2- My defenders do this now and then. Look at the anticipation, concentration and positioning stats of the most regular offending defenders (offenders?!). Unless you're managing a top club with World Class centre backs then that may be something to do with it. I personally put it partly down to the dross I've signed at Yeovil.

3- Long shots. Yes. Definitely wholly agree with you there. Can't say whether it's been fixed in the 9.02 patch because I've not played enough matches since the previous patch. They look great on the 3D match engine but they lose some of their sparkle when you're getting them every match.

4- Never had a single random freeze. Except my centre backs Could be that you have some very high CPU time draining software running in the background that makes FM (which is now SERIOUSLY memory intensive) grind to a halt. Or it could be your graphics card/mobo etc.

5- No real problem in my eyes with the injury. A bit of a non-sequitur but as regards strained wrists, even well taped up they can hurt quite a bit if you're running fast and the wrist's moving. I speak from direct experience, I've done my wrists many times in goal so I've gone on pitch instead. Still hurts like a swine.

6- I've seen some screenies of the duplicate player thing but never seen it myself. Agree that it exists but it's not a game breaker, just a minor thing that's not really worrying about in my eyes.

7- Never seen the black pitch texture. Seen some very brown pitches though...

8- Haven't seen the poker chips either. Looking at the amount of graphical and display bugs you have, I'm concerned that there's actually something wrong with your PC, be it a dodgy driver or virus.

9- I get the complete opposite with the WPotY items in press conferences! My players always react favourably! I think it's a bloody pointless question to be offered to anything other than a top division manager though. Nobody in League 1 gives a monkey's!

10- crossbar challenge, bug sponsored by Soccer AM I've seen it but I put it down more to the match engine balancing things up so that the ball can stay in play a bit longer. More long shots that miss wide/high would equal more dead ball time so it counterbalances to keep the active play time more realistic. In the same way that it gives the keeper a better chance in 1-on-1s because you get more of them in FM than reality so it has to have an offset to stop every 1-on-1 going in.

11- Don't pay much attention to background matches but I'll see if I can keep an eye out and comment at a later date if I remember.

12- I'll keep an eye on a few games and see if the shots go over rather than wide. Don't see that as a bug though- where the ball goes out of play behind the goal line makes no difference at all.

13- Keepers with a low decisions attribute could be to blame there. I don't see it happen for me very often.

14- keeper's got a high punching attribute and maybe a low handling one?

So, there's my thoughts on your bugs. I personally don't see many of these as enough to make much of a problem to the game overall.

And, as an aside, I'm with you on the highlights speed slider! I want it back!!!

Absolutely nothing wrong with my PC, all of those issues are coming from the game. You're basically giving very flimsy excuses for everything there, which is why you don't see a problem with the game, you've got your SI blinkers on.

Do you think if the freezing issue was caused by other software we would still be having a problem with it at this stage? Common sense needed there m8.

1) Known problem that happens both for/against AI and Player teams. Just because you can't see oxygen doesn't mean it doesn't exist. has been tweaked in the patch, but still happens far too often. Goalkeepers tend to save more one on one's in 9.0.2 which reduces their number of assists but they still get a ton of key passes.

2) Even the best defenders in the game do this far too often.

4) No, just no. This pc is always kept in tip top condition and i have disabled everything imaginable while playing 09 and it still happens - its a bug in the game. Neither is it only my PC, it happens on a wide variety of setups, including absolutely brand spanking new ones.

5) How does a slightly painful wrist stop you from playing football outfield? It doesn't. This is a nonsensical argument that holds absolutely no weight.

7) ATI issue as far as I can see, even on the latest drivers.

8) no virus, don't be silly - what kind of virus causes only very obscure graphical errors in a single program and nothing else?, again, its a graphical issue between 09 and PCI-E graphics cards - quite common this one.

10) Covering up the ME's inadequacy in one area by making it stupid in another is not a valid fix or counter argument.

12) been fixed in the patch

13 & 14) happen to both the best and worst goalkeepers in the game on a much too frequent basis.

I'm still on '07 too. 2014 and my San Marino team are looking pretty special!

I must say I tend to find those who are most critical of the match engine are those who have an over-inflated opinion of their skill as a manager or those who haven't found the killer tactic that lets them win every single game.

People like you and I who've busted a gut testing pre-builds of the game (I remember the first build of CM4, jesus, that was all but unplayable!) are far more "well adjusted" as regards the relative merits of the game.

Some bits of the game annoy the crap out of me but other bits I appreciate the levels of work that've gone into them even if they're not quite flawless yet.

As regards the earlier post about the database being the same... if it's the same, that's a result of not too many transfers over the course of the last year or so, how can that be a fault of SI?

busted a gut? i get the impression that no-one who works for SI has ever 'busted a gut'.

i'll probably be told i'm wrong and how they all worked a 400hr week or something but its the impression i get.

I agree mainly with what Gregg says although I seem to enjoy the game more. Things like training and transfers aren't perfect but I can put up with them. The ME has major problems, particularly defensively, and the tactics interface is ridiculously complex. Those are my main gripes. I could post in major depth on both, with possible solutions, but I feel like I've posted them already 100 times.