Can someone help a blind man understanding the hype about the "new" training module?

I had to assure myself I was indeed playing the FM11 demo and not FM10.

What is the deal with the training? Wasn't it supposed to be overhauled? I can't see any difference but the match preparation module. Is that it?

Players are now also assigned a training category automatically (Defenders on Defender schedule and so on). Just a shame that its ANOTHER 'new feature' that is only half done. Why doesnt this also do it for the Under 18 teams? All they have is a general schedule. If you going to do something at least do it properly SI.

Most of the "new features" in FM 11 are nothing more than the same thing that looks a little different and put in a different spot.

I must say, I was looking forward to the game, until I started reading the reviews pasted in the sticky. They do cover a lot of things that I was deafening myself to in the build up. ie. Lack of real decent features. I did have concerns listening to the podcasts with the feature roulette. It was all I listened to the podcasts for TBH, and it was advertised as having all of the X hundred new features listed. Yet, each one that spun in, was 'a new button has been created' or moved etc.

The best example I have of the reviews is this...

Another misfiring element Sports Interactive appear content to sweep under the carpet is that damn 3-D match engine - which remains as worthless as ever. Some new player animations have been added and it looks marginally better than before. But it's still uglier than Blackburn vs. Stoke on a wet Tuesday night and generally gets switched off mid-way through the second pre-season friendly. It's about time SI devoted some serious time to making Football Manager's 3-D worthwhile.

I watched the graphics on the demo and thought they were a lot better than before. But reading the reviews, I do agree with them, and the graphics are still reallly poor, seeing as jhow long is in between each release and the quality that other games deliver. Not just FIFA or PES, but PC games in general. I'm expecting the usual 'I'd rather have decent match play' that will come this way, but FIFA manages to have both? Time to stop the excuses I think and start delivering a 21st century football manager sim. Out of the box, this could well have been made in 1998. Indeed many online football managemnt sims could rival it.

mintchip: I dare you to show me ONE football manager sim which can deliver only a 1/10 of FM's depth and quality!.. I'm sure there are some "fun" sims out there, but each with a depth equal to the depth of a Lady Gaga lyric!

I understand that some think that the graphics in FM2011 arent living up the "EA" standard of graphics. Fifa 2011 is amazing to watch. But to be honest I wouldnt want the graphics to be like that on FM. For several reasons:

1. The game would require alot more of the graphics card

2. It would steal the focus away from what FM is all about. Tactics! - not eyecandy!

3. Would seem alot more arcade'ish

I firmly believe that SI will strive to improve the feel and look of the 3d engine over time and I'm quite happy with the current progress - but again.. I do understand why others feel otherwise..

Oh and have you seen the sims that came out in late 90's.. I think you should withdraw that sentence

mintchip why don't you buy fifa manager 2011 , i've heard they have added rainbows to go with the 25,000 players they have

when will people realise that FM was never about the graphics (and it will never be)

FM was always about the depth of the game. i have played every management game out there and there is nothing to rival it to date. beats everything hands down. pretty graphics and stadium builds are just a distraction to the actual functionality

imho this year's FM has improved loads. i like the new interaction screens and the fact that they seem like proper conversations with players. Agents was a must as FM is trying to mirror real life and the training module has improved (not perfect but it was a good push to the right direction)

Agree with Herter to be honest. Football Manager is about depth, not sparkly graphics. This is why I prefer Pro Evo to Fifa.

I truthfylly feel they should scrub the 3D all together and focus on the core game and make it better that way since the game has never really felt the same since 3D came in. It was by doing this that CM/FM has distance itself from all the other competition and made it the supirior football management sim that it was back then and still is now.

Agree with Herter to be honest. Football Manager is about depth, not sparkly graphics. This is why I prefer Pro Evo to Fifa.

I truthfylly feel they should scrub the 3D all together and focus on the core game and make it better that way since the game has never really felt the same since 3D came in. It was by doing this that CM/FM has distance itself from all the other competition and made it the supirior football management sim that it was back then and still is now.

they had a poll on 3D or 2D a while ago

majority liked 3D including me, but i'm not saying it should look incredible

mintchip why don't you buy fifa manager 2011 , i've heard they have added rainbows to go with the 25,000 players they have

rainbows, thats me sold.

rainbows, thats me sold.

the fact that you can play golf as a pass time got me

I must say, I was looking forward to the game, until I started reading the reviews pasted in the sticky. They do cover a lot of things that I was deafening myself to in the build up. ie. Lack of real decent features. I did have concerns listening to the podcasts with the feature roulette. It was all I listened to the podcasts for TBH, and it was advertised as having all of the X hundred new features listed. Yet, each one that spun in, was 'a new button has been created' or moved etc.

The best example I have of the reviews is this...

Another misfiring element Sports Interactive appear content to sweep under the carpet is that damn 3-D match engine - which remains as worthless as ever. Some new player animations have been added and it looks marginally better than before. But it's still uglier than Blackburn vs. Stoke on a wet Tuesday night and generally gets switched off mid-way through the second pre-season friendly. It's about time SI devoted some serious time to making Football Manager's 3-D worthwhile.

I watched the graphics on the demo and thought they were a lot better than before. But reading the reviews, I do agree with them, and the graphics are still reallly poor, seeing as jhow long is in between each release and the quality that other games deliver. Not just FIFA or PES, but PC games in general. I'm expecting the usual 'I'd rather have decent match play' that will come this way, but FIFA manages to have both? Time to stop the excuses I think and start delivering a 21st century football manager sim. Out of the box, this could well have been made in 1998. Indeed many online football managemnt sims could rival it.

I agree. While the graphics in FM 11 demo are a bit better in comparison with FM 10, matches in 3D still look ridiculously robotic and unnatural. Players ice skating all over the place, unsynchronized animations, you can't even tell whether a player is going to shoot or pass, basically something you only used to see in football games in the 90's. Hell, I would even say matches in FIFA 97 flow better with less stiff animations and more of them.

Many will say, and have already said FM "is not about graphics". I don't disagree with that but that doesn't mean the 3D shouldn't be better than it is. If SI can't do it, they should hire someone to help them because at this rate, seems we're going to have to wait until FM 2020 until we finally have a 3D engine that resembles a football match. And by that I don't mean fancy, super detailed graphics. I mean the animations and general play that ATM is pretty poor in comparison to anything really.

Agree with Herter to be honest. Football Manager is about depth, not sparkly graphics. This is why I prefer Pro Evo to Fifa.

Umm, Pro Evo has easily better graphics than FIFA.

if you dont like it, dont watch it

Anyway, back to the point. Where's the new training feature?!

There isnt really, from what i can make out, its something thats been done under the hood, so to speak.

Maybe the 3D Match Engine is making people lose focus on the enchancements made to the actual Match Engine? FM has far more things to worry itself about that creating photo realistic players and fans. All they need to do is create the illusion and at the moment it does this fine. There's far more to FM than the 3D Match Engine but the changes to it will make it very immersive.

I like the new option to give each player a specific attribute to work on, I've been wanting that to be added for ages.

Anyway, back to the point. Where's the new training feature?!

split between GK training

Default Defender, Midfielder, attacker training

Few attributes have been moved between categories.

Looks different.

Not impressed. Was expecting a complete overhaul.

I think they took out the Set Piece training and added it as individual training options so that you can create a CK specialist and a FK specialist separately. They've added match preparation as a visible option and it's taking 30% of your training workload, so now you can either focus on gelling the team together, or on individual attribute training, so more options there. I think they've also made it clearer how much of your training output goes to other training options (i.e. match preparation, learning a new position or learning a player preferred move).

I think there has definatly been an improvement. I like seeing a % breakdown so you can work out how much of a players trainign regime is made up of what activities ie. team training, new positions, player moves, specific attributes etc.

It certainly isnt complete overhaul but it is definatly a step foward and I cant wait to get stuck in

Jeez. You copy one statement from a review and WW3 breaks out. Crumbs. Will keep my opinions to myself in future. Oh no, this is a forum, for criticism as well as praise. Accept please children.

Stand by what I say, and no jumping up and down with fingers in your ears will change my personal opinion. Graphics on FM2011 aren't big or clever in this day and age. And I can't understand how the graphical side of the game can't develop faster than it is. Watching a game isn't far away from Sensible Soccer days some 15 or so years ago.

Someone ask for a sim from the late 90's that was class? CM2, CM97-98, CM3. They were quality and were relevant at the time to the type of PC's and games out there. We've progressed so far with tactics etc since those days. But the training module has moved sooo little. And who'd have thought an increase in media relations would generate a few questions with about 20 answers to each. Even with the processing of 15 years ago, that could have beeen achieved. And yet it is fed to us as a ground breaking feature.

Just want the best game out there, and we're moving forward so slowly it's quite sad. As someone above said, we wil be waiting until FM20 for a half decent 3d game at this rate.

if you dont like it, dont watch it

Maybe they should put that on the box?

Jeez. You copy one statement from a review and WW3 breaks out. Crumbs. Will keep my opinions to myself in future. Oh no, this is a forum, for criticism as well as praise. Accept please children.

Stand by what I say, and no jumping up and down with fingers in your ears will change my personal opinion. Graphics on FM2011 aren't big or clever in this day and age. And I can't understand how the graphical side of the game can't develop faster than it is. Watching a game isn't far away from Sensible Soccer days some 15 or so years ago.

Someone ask for a sim from the late 90's that was class? CM2, CM97-98, CM3. They were quality and were relevant at the time to the type of PC's and games out there. We've progressed so far with tactics etc since those days. But the training module has moved sooo little. And who'd have thought an increase in media relations would generate a few questions with about 20 answers to each. Even with the processing of 15 years ago, that could have beeen achieved. And yet it is fed to us as a ground breaking feature.

Just want the best game out there, and we're moving forward so slowly it's quite sad. As someone above said, we wil be waiting until FM20 for a half decent 3d game at this rate.

it's all good saying this and i as a high end machine owner want decent graphics too

sadly alot out there are using macines from when leeds utd last won division 1

I like the new option to give each player a specific attribute to work on, I've been wanting that to be added for ages.

Me too.

I'm also glad that crossing is now in with passing and creativity instead of set pieces.

Is there an easy way to change training schedules for individual players? FM2010 you could create a training schedule off the current schedule the player was on and tweak it slightly IE if the player complained the regiment was to hard etc.

Cannot seem to find an easy way in 2011 aside from jumping screens.

Jon.

You have to also understand this is a Yearly franchise, all they do is say about 30 changes which are basically nothing big but minor changes as they know they have to keep LOADS of options open to keep the franchise open, so next year they have a list of 100 things people want and the next FM 2012 will maybe improve on 2 or 3 its more a franchise option, i still love the FM games but would like more to be changed a year when you see a BIG point for the next release being

* Improved training options

* More complex module for searching new players

* Improved graphics and 3D view of the game

* Introduction of football agents to the game

* Playing games in evenings (so called night effect)

* Differentiated weather conditions

I look at stuff like Weather Conditions and feel that really would what take a few days to make so im more questioning did this really take a year to make? this chart seems more of a monthly update rather than yearly but hey as i said this is a franchise and the only way it will make big progress as if they do a cap from 2011 and only release updates like transfers and other little tweeks and then release it every 2 years!

@Kun

Where the USP?? DLR

screw it, i really dig the 3-d match engine. I'm enjoying that aspect of the game so much. But then again i also love the 2-d engine, just as i loved the flashing bars in the first CM games. Of course it looks graphically impoverished beside fifa 9,10,11, but who the hell cares? We get more than the general gist of what a football game is like. It's still exciting, but here's the thing guys-It requires that you use your IMAGINATION. You know, just like we had to when playing CM back in the day. This is in some ways more rewarding than having ultra realism.

What you generation playstation boomers have got to realise is that comparitivley this is a small operation game. They do not have massive financial backing to create a fifa-esque ME. And even if they did, they would be totally alienating the 90% of FM players who do not have the requisite graphics needed to play the game.

While everyone has a right to complain, i do feel that people moan far too much about the game. We all pay our hard earned cash to play the game, and have a right to a decent product, but with such a complicated game structure we should find some leniency within ourselves and stop being so demanding. I have complaints too, but i don't let them stop my sheer enjoyment of the game. SI are doing a good job, and hopefully in the next few years we will see big improvements(in the AI most importantly) in what we already have, rather than obligatory new features

You have to also understand this is a Yearly franchise, all they do is say about 30 changes which are basically nothing big but minor changes as they know they have to keep LOADS of options open to keep the franchise open, so next year they have a list of 100 things people want and the next FM 2012 will maybe improve on 2 or 3 its more a franchise option, i still love the FM games but would like more to be changed a year when you see a BIG point for the next release being

* Improved training options

* More complex module for searching new players

* Improved graphics and 3D view of the game

* Introduction of football agents to the game

* Playing games in evenings (so called night effect)

* Differentiated weather conditions

I look at stuff like Weather Conditions and feel that really would what take a few days to make so im more questioning did this really take a year to make? this chart seems more of a monthly update rather than yearly but hey as i said this is a franchise and the only way it will make big progress as if they do a cap from 2011 and only release updates like transfers and other little tweeks and then release it every 2 years!

I too think it would be a good idea to release every two years and give us patches in the meantime, even raising the price significantly per release would be acceptable to me. Anyway, very unlikeley to happen.

I think the general structure and detail of the game is fine, i'd rather they just honed the current features rather than add new things, because it's all there already, everything we need, just needs perfecting!

I like the new option to give each player a specific attribute to work on, I've been wanting that to be added for ages.

Yep, this alone is a massive improvement for me. Probably the single thing I most wanted them to add.

So it's all good as far as I'm concerned.

Is there an easy way to change training schedules for individual players? FM2010 you could create a training schedule off the current schedule the player was on and tweak it slightly IE if the player complained the regiment was to hard etc.

Cannot seem to find an easy way in 2011 aside from jumping screens.

Jon.

That has been bugging me as well. Very annoying.

the fact of the situation is there will be years when little or no features are are created as there only finite things they can do. Ive got the feeling they could do more but dont because if they release it all at once there would be no new features in years to come at all apart from data updates and improving the match engine to be more life like (which can never be fully attained anyway)

im not compaining its just the way of the world when you have to release a game based on the same thing year upon year

*shrug* FM2010 was meant to be the "Polish Year" when they'd rein in on new features and try and fine tune everything, which made everyone very happy as it was sorely needed. Now the irony is that with FM2011 which is apparently a return to the norm, in fact the amount of actual 'new' stuff we get is really quite similar to 2010.

It's real easy to bash people for saying FM needs better graphics and so on, but really when you face up to some of the criticisms they are really very valid. I love FM to death for the complex, not-pretty 'serious sim' that it is but seriously, "Weather Conditions" is not a feature, SI. Advertising it as a bullet point is like a new car boasting about a new design for its glove compartment handle.

In the end FM2011 can be defined by its most (only) important improvements: it's FM2010 + Agents + Match Preparation Training + Tweaks & Fixes. Now, as someone said it's a yearly franchise and you can't expect it to come with seventeen shiny features every year, but consider that;

-> The "new transfer system" is actually exactly the same as the old one, except that player negotiations are speeded up & you negotiate with agents. I was really excited when I first dealt with an agent but quickly realised that everything else is the same. I plan to retry the experiment I did with FM2010, and see if the Transfer AI has actually improved - in that one, the AI was so stupid that you could offer Fabregas for free and nobody would make a bid!

-> Match Preparation Training is a nice addition, and of course also includes some nice additions like player specific training. It's a pity that SI half-baked the Set Piece Training, where instead of actually designing Set Pieces you... get to see the same thing as 3 years ago but in pictures. I mean, that's good, but it's a small addon, and more should have been done.

By no means am I discounting how hundreds of small tweaks make a game better and more fun, but SI seems to have their heads in the sand sometimes, to me. From their point of view obviously they're going to be thinking in terms of 300 new features and considering how every button makes the game better, which is right, but that seems to take away from thinking more strategically about, "when we put all this together, is the player going to see it and see a significantly transformed/improved game experience? Or is it in practice just going to be FM2010.5?"

Expecting anything like a super upgrade in 3D graphics would have been unrealistic, but I wish they'd have focused on taking a small number of features and getting them really done fully, instead of... taking a small number of features and half-baking them (obviously, press conferences are still boring half-baked crap after ~3 years. 2011's new feature is that you're now a little less arthritic for it, if you don't skip it, that is.)

That has been bugging me as well. Very annoying.

+1 Individual training w as a big part of Fm10 for me especially youth.

I used to get a 16yo striker and make a training schedule, say, to quicken him up and improve his finishing.

Now, I can focus on finishing quite easily, but to actually make a training schedule for him only is really annoying. One has to remember what it was that needed doing, go to main training screen, make the training schedule and move the player into it.

+1 Individual training w as a big part of Fm10 for me especially youth.

I used to get a 16yo striker and make a training schedule, say, to quicken him up and improve his finishing.

Now, I can focus on finishing quite easily, but to actually make a training schedule for him only is really annoying. One has to remember what it was that needed doing, go to main training screen, make the training schedule and move the player into it.

Agree. And it used to be that you go to a training schedule, and all the players under it are listed. Checking on their progress and happiness over training levels was easier and made more sense. Now it's going to each player > training > training levels.

Clicking on the training section now also takes you to attribute development by default and then you have to click training levels. Training levels should be the default screen under training. If I wanted attributes, I would have gone to the main player screen. Attribute development and training levels should switch places.

And I used to be able to sort players by fitness %, then rest a group for a specific number of days. Now if you select a group and in it was a player assigned to a certain rest period which he has not completed, you can't right-click and send them all to a particular rest period. Such a pain going thru every single player for that.

ah come on guys, training in FM2011 is just amazing; so detailed etc. just class, like announced in the blogs

So we are looking at some options to make this easier in future updates, possibly by re-enabling the editing of the training schedule on the player profile training section.

Thank you for that. We'll have to wait until dec I think?

To recap a few points from another thread relating to the training schedules and users who want to create personal schedules for a lot of single players: The training schedules were originally designed to be "group specific" schedules, to train groups of players and not single invididual players. So naturally the screen layouts etc. were done from this point of view. We understand that this has made it a bit more cumbersome to create personal training schedules if you are into that kind of micromanagement of the training. So we are looking at some options to make this easier in future updates, possibly by re-enabling the editing of the training schedule on the player profile training section.

Possibly re-enabling it? You have made tweaking training schedules a nightmare in one of the most complex, micro-management heavy games around.

Preset schedules like preset tactics will never be good enough for those that delve deeply into your game and you have made it much more difficult to customise schedules. On top of that your preset training schedules are immensely shallow, not even taking into account age.

Reshaping the training categories into groups that have near identical numbers of attributes in each while splitting the giant and cumbersome goalkeeping category into a much more functional set of two groups is a huge step forward for designing schedules easily and accurately, yet you then go and make it much more time consuming and awkward to tweak schedules? Give with one hand and then take away with the other. Do you actually understand the practical behaviour of your own training system?

If you want to take training down the route of using pre-designed group schedules then you need to make vastly greater efforts in designing your own schedules.

....Do you actually understand the practical behaviour of your own training system? ....

Muuuuuuuuaaahhhhhh !!!

Muuuuuuuuaaahhhhhh !!!

Practical behaviour, as in managing the growth and peak and decline of players over 5-10 seasons. Practical behaviour, such as finding the workload "sweetspot" for match condition for all players, and then tweaking the individual categories as attributes change and give feedback over the course of a year.

SI obviously know how it works, but they do know what it is like to give a proper and thorough long term play? That "slight" omission of being able to alter schedules in the players profile has just made detailed training significantly more awkward in terms of screens. Not a good gameplay decision.

I agree. While the graphics in FM 11 demo are a bit better in comparison with FM 10, matches in 3D still look ridiculously robotic and unnatural. Players ice skating all over the place, unsynchronized animations, you can't even tell whether a player is going to shoot or pass, basically something you only used to see in football games in the 90's. Hell, I would even say matches in FIFA 97 flow better with less stiff animations and more of them.

Many will say, and have already said FM "is not about graphics". I don't disagree with that but that doesn't mean the 3D shouldn't be better than it is. If SI can't do it, they should hire someone to help them because at this rate, seems we're going to have to wait until FM 2020 until we finally have a 3D engine that resembles a football match. And by that I don't mean fancy, super detailed graphics. I mean the animations and general play that ATM is pretty poor in comparison to anything really.

Umm, Pro Evo has easily better graphics than FIFA.

Basically I agree about the " skating " effect, I suspect the 3D developer is the same of Hockey Manager

Practical behaviour, as in managing the growth and peak and decline of players over 5-10 seasons. Practical behaviour, such as finding the workload "sweetspot" for match condition for all players, and then tweaking the individual categories as attributes change and give feedback over the course of a year.

SI obviously know how it works, but they do know what it is like to give a proper and thorough long term play? That "slight" omission of being able to alter schedules in the players profile has just made detailed training significantly more awkward in terms of screens. Not a good gameplay decision.

Don't worry, i take my part of cynism when my turn is coming. Obviously we are always anxious to discover a new arcade FIFA in place of our favorite game.

But, honestly, in same time, the training look likes attribut's level factory, more than a football training.

At least the more embarrassment is the indefinite formulations about learning things, all along the "tips". Or things they are supposed to make. The team work deserve more clear explanation. If i read Vaughan precepts, it's only a limitation. The discipline of your consign level are apply.

But who read Vaughan ?

Conclusion, the french forums, but i suppose it's the same thing everywhere, are full of nonsenses. You can read some things like " don't touch nothing to your initial tactic because players need time to learn. Or put all your player in only one training because they learn better to have the same training ... Decision is a position on field... making a pre season training up the condition for all the season.

Actually, the mod rule on the thema : you can't win without preparation match.

In same time, match exercice, rotation because natural fitness, jadness, injury proness are totaly misunderstood, better ignored. And i don't talk about motivation or media discussions.

It's the climax of the drama

I agree with SFraser in his posts above. I am a training mico-manager convert, never really bothered with this category until FM10. After reading and learning from the training/tactics forum I became obsessed with getting the most I could out of every player.

FM11 has taken away the ease of playing this way, re-enable the editing from the individuals training screen is a start, please put this in the first patch.

Keep in mind that training doesnt really have great effect on how player x turns out. Thats the biggest problem.

Keep in mind that training doesnt really have great effect on how player x turns out. Thats the biggest problem.

Who says that?? Training has a huge effect on how a player turns out. Training is completely responsible for CA distribution across attributes.

Who says that?? Training has a huge effect on how a player turns out. Training is completely responsible for CA distribution across attributes.

Only one point here and two there. If you train player through his career with customed schedule and get only one luckily two points difference to what you would get with "leave as it is" approach then I woulnd't say that training has significant effect.

I like the new option to give each player a specific attribute to work on, I've been wanting that to be added for ages.

i wonder if it even works, hopefully someone will make two runs on a holiday for a couple of seasons and compare the growth with and without that option selected

I thought it was a case of, matches increase the available CA you player has, and training just focuses it into the areas/stats you want, with it also giving a few additional points onto CA by itself over time

Only one point here and two there. If you train player through his career with customed schedule and get only one luckily two points difference to what you would get with "leave as it is" approach then I woulnd't say that training has significant effect.

I thought it was a case of, matches increase the available CA you player has, and training just focuses it into the areas/stats you want, with it also giving a few additional points onto CA by itself over time

DeadZone is correct. Otherwise how do the people in GPTG end up with vastly different final attributes for players.