"Use Fake Players"

Is this option what we have all been waiting for (we actually get semi-randomly generated players, not the real players with fake names)?

Nobody knows?

Sounds like a renamed "Use real players" checkbox.

I tried it out and it's the same as before, the real players with fake names. I'd love to play in a completely fictional universe

I tried it out and it's the same as before, the real players with fake names. I'd love to play in a completely fictional universe

This:thup:.

Doesn't anybody in the Editor's Forum do this kind of thing?

It's no easy task for existing teams- you would have to manually edit every single player in the database to get that effect- and then, obviously, every new game would still have the same (albeit fictional) database. That or holiday forwards until all of the squads are regens- by which point, the league tables could look like anything, and you've still got ex-players as coaches etc.

The alternative is to play an Editor-created league system (or one with fictional teams) which doesn't have any players in the DB, so the game has to create them at the start- but these are usually in countries that are not already included in the game, and doesn't change anything for the active leagues that are.

Why the game couldn't populate the English League, for example, with genuinely generated players at the start of a game (rather than renaming and very slightly randomising the existing DB) has always been a mysterious omission.

Edit: Thinking about it, a question- what if someone just deleted all of the player data from the existing database? Hmm... someone must have tried that somewhere.

I tried deleting all the players from the game, and then use 'Add players to playable teams', but it just creates a load of young, largely useless players on low wages on every team.

You could just remove all People from the game in the editor and see what happens. But that would require a massive database edit that probably takes forever to load, rather than just a few lines of code that skips loading People from the database if a box is checked.

I tried deleting all the players from the game, and then use 'Add players to playable teams', but it just creates a load of young, largely useless players on low wages on every team.

OK, so I guess the real problem is why player generation has to be based on existing players, rather than club reputation.

I know Graeme Kelly can create a fictitious DB easily because we used to talk about it in FML, maybe SI should create a few as minimally priced DLC?

I think it's still fake names but real players

I know Graeme Kelly can create a fictitious DB easily because we used to talk about it in FML, maybe SI should create a few as minimally priced DLC?

That'd be a useful option, I could certainly be tempted with that as DLC. Essentially, it's trying to create a post-reset FML world, albeit with real teams. I can't speak for how capable it is in FM13 (or the FM14 beta), but a quick test in FM12 shows the issue niksherman was talking about.

Using the editor, I removed all of Man Utd's players and saved as a custom database. Set up a new game, PL active only, with players generated to fill squad spaces, but otherwise real teams and players.

For comparison:

United's generated team

Norwich's real team

United's generated star player

I'm almost tempted to run a season in holiday mode, to see just how badly they fare.

If the generated team is based on player ability, why not just delete all but one player and then generate the team?

I'd love to see this incorporated well. The 'unticking' of "use real players" was a feature added many versions ago that I thought was great at the time but never worked (same players given different identities) and never has since.

I can't imagine it's easy to have a completely realistic world of fresh newgens from day one in programming terms (or it might be? Switching a computer on and copy and paste are my limits on computer-ese) but I wish they had tried in the many versions since the feature was introduced.

I dislike using real players/staff, you just seem to end up looking at the same players/staff to get in for whatever level you start at.

The only way round it I've found is to holiday the game 10-15 years in to the future, which is obviously not ideal especially for those with low spec computers, but hey. We make do with what we have....

It really shouldnt be that difficult to do. The problem would be in knowing how FM uses rankings. For instance, we know that CA/PA are weighted based on league, so a german 3rd 5 star player, might only be a german top flight 2 or 3 star maybe. But does that mean that a player with all 20's in the third division isn't as good as the same stats in top flight? Does CA/PA cap the maximum value for a rating? Things like that would need to be known before you could write a randomizer.

I still fail to believe SI have yet to look at this issue (because it's one for me). What's the point of having the same old players just with fake names? We want randomly generated players. It's about time they fix that option.

Well, this is it- it's hard to see how or why the generation at the start of the game fails so miserably. I don't look behind the curtain much, so I'm not sure exactly what controls the quality of regens, but it's clear that in the example given, those players are not of a standard you'd expect from a team with Man Utd's facilities, reputation and division. Not only that, but clearly the spread of nationalities is also severely lacking- it simply hasn't succeeded in producing a team equivalent to the real Utd team.

What's also odd is that, on a normal game, if there's cause to generate greyed-out players, they too seem to generate better than these real players generated at the game start.

I tried it out and it's the same as before, the real players with fake names. I'd love to play in a completely fictional universe

Load someone else's long-term save or just holiday. Problem solved.

The very first CM game from SI (with Domark I think) did this very thing. You could pick any team from the top four English leagues and start them in any league, because the game generated brand new fictional players from the very start. There were no real players featured until CM93, which was the second incarnation of the game, if my memory serves me correctly.

You lot might know - can you use generated players in classic mode?

That's an interesting question actually. I don't know the answer, but I can't see any reason why it'd be different to the main game in that respect- can anyone confirm?

I was reading the manual today and it said choose nations and then click start game in FMC, whereas the full version gives the other options to not use real players, I don't know if it's just that a full game has to have the other settings defined though, whereas on FMC it's optional?

:|

I tried it out and it's the same as before, the real players with fake names. I'd love to play in a completely fictional universe

It's not what you want, but I just want to add a +1 to the suggestion of downloading a future save. If you can be bothered to holiday a game for yourself then I would highly, highly recommend it. I usually play one short tester save, then a massive journeyman "in the future save." On one, Beckham managed Man United to a treble, it was so cool! You get to explore the world and see who the best teams are and what the shifts in power have been, plus you can manage against current players. It's amazing. I'd also highly, highly recommend editing yourself into the database as a youngster with the intention of becoming a manager, give yourself a high PA and then holiday to the end of your career. Then you can use yourself as an anchor around which to discover about the game world, seeing which teams you played for, where you are favoured personnel, which other players you like or like you, and taking yourself on a tour of the game. The best bit is at some point in your managerial career you may end up managing against yourself!

To keep the space-time continuum intact I usually manage as an ater-ego.

You lot might know - can you use generated players in classic mode?

I really, really hope that this can be implemented for FM15. It is possible, the folks at Out of the Park Developments have done it nearly flawlessly.

I so wish we could start a save game with totally fake players or have an option to start at a date where the players in the game have mostly retired, like quickly go from July 2013 to July 2033. It takes ages ages to holiday 20 seasons

I so wish we could start a save game with totally fake players or have an option to start at a date where the players in the game have mostly retired, like quickly go from July 2013 to July 2033. It takes ages ages to holiday 20 seasons

Amen, I very much agree! Let's all keep voicing our opinions and this will surely make FM15! It cannot be that difficult of an addition, can it?

i think the best way is to tick fake players and then just holiday for 30 or more years, this way all teams will be different and the semi fake players will probably be all retired, i play like this and its really fun when every player is unknown and you don't know who the best young players are

I'd like this feature to work too. The only remedy right now is to get on someone else's save file or holiday yourself. It's not too bad, but would certainly be better to just be able to start off with random players right away.

I wonder if OP can edit and make this thread a poll thread?

Random unknown players makes the game a lot more exciting!

Part of the problem is people will always try to draw comparisions between the fake players and real ones.

Combined with the fact that a top class player in any position will always have similar attributes whether they are real or fake means there will always be comparisons to draw.

That said I've created a new save to have a look and its clear that ages & nationalities of several players haven't been altered but these are mixed in with other random players.

Man Utd

Similar: I can pick out De Gea, Lindegaard, Ferdinand, Vidic, Evra, Rafael, Mata, Giggs, Valencia, Rooney & van Persie.

Different: A 20yo Mexican DC (£17m), A 25yo French DC (£10m), A 26yo Northern Irish winger (£20m) & a 22yo North Korean ST (£16m)

Missing: No sign of anyone like Fletcher, Evans, Nani, Kagawa, Welbeck or Hernandez.

Chelsea

Similar: Cech, Courtais, Ivanovic, Luiz, Terry, Mikel, Ramires, Moses, Oscar, Hazard, Schurrle, Eto & Torres

Different: A 27yo French DC (£8m), a 24yo English DR (£13m), a 20yo Moroccan winger (£9m) and a 28yo English ST (£28m)

Missing: Cahill, Matic, Willian, Lukaku & Azpilicueta

Man City

Similar: Hart, Zabaleta, Kompany, Kolarov, Rodwell, Yaya Toure, Navas, Silva, Milner, Jovetic, Aguero

Different: A 28yo Argentine MC (£22m), a 25yo Portugese AMC (£20m), a 27yo Albanian ST (£33m) & a 28yo Belgium ST (£19m)

Missing: Nasri, Negredo, Dzeko, Clichy, Fernandinho & Nastasic

Arsenal

Similar: Szczesny, Fabianski, Sagna, Vermaelen, Mertesacker, Ramsey, Wilshere, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Ozil, Walcott, Podolski & Cazorla

Different: A 27yo English DC (£9m), a 27yo English ST (£19m) & a 27yo UAE ST (£11m)

Missing: Koscielny, Arteta, Rosicky, Flamini & Giroud

Liverpool

Similar: Jones, Reina, Johnson, Toure, Skrtel, Enrique, Gerrard, Allen, Sterling, Assaidi, Sturridge, Coutinho, Suarez

Different: A 24yo English GK (£13m), a 27yo English DC (£9m), a 26yo Scottish DM (£12m) & a 23yo Latvian MC (£16m)

Missing: Mignolet, Agger, Henderson, Lucas & Borini

I've only really looked at the main players and not those valued at less than around £8m.

Is it possible to delete the game's historical database? Meaning, there would be no world records or championship lists, it would be essentially starting an original and unique game universe? Of course, this would only work well if fictional players could be implemented properly from the get-go.

That said I've created a new save to have a look and its clear that ages & nationalities of several players haven't been altered but these are mixed in with other random players.

Exactly. The simplest way to demonstrate this is to start a new game with "fake" players, sim forwards ten years and look at who's won the World Player/Golden Boot awards. They'll inevitably be Messi-with-another-name and CR7-with-another-name.

Exactly. The simplest way to demonstrate this is to start a new game with "fake" players, sim forwards ten years and look at who's won the World Player/Golden Boot awards. They'll inevitably be Messi-with-another-name and CR7-with-another-name.

But that doesn't explain why some random players are also created and why some obvious RL players are missing.

You would have thought that the squads would be either:

A) The same with change of names or

B) All randomised

Why does it seem to be a mix of both as it stands?

But that doesn't explain why some random players are also created and why some obvious RL players are missing.

You would have thought that the squads would be either:

A) The same with change of names or

B) All randomised

Why does it seem to be a mix of both as it stands?

Indeed- what you say is right. I don't have an answer for that, as it seems to be more work to have it the current way, with some and some, than if it were completely either of the two ways you suggest.

I assume because the bigger names are obviously recreated, which kind of defeats the purpose of fake players if you take over a high rep club.

I have a slightly different take on this.

As I usually start with a much smaller team, it's often not easy to see who was who, (even if you know the club in detail). I have done this in the past with previous versions, (not since FM09), and what I found was that although I could identify "stars", the same simply could not be said of lower league players. From my point of view this was a good thing, as this was the whole point of me doing it. There was a related problem though.

The way that the attributes were allocated didn't seem to be right. The balance was wrong.

What I mean was that if you had a winger for example and he was the best player in your lower league squad, then while he might have great dribbling skills, and excellent crossing, his pace would be something like 5. All too often it seemed as if the stat/attribute balance was wrong. It just ruined the game.

I honestly don't know if that's still the case, (haven't tried it since because I was so put off), but as this isn't, (and wasn't back then), a problem I encountered with newgens, I came to the conclusion that indeed players were being "replicated" and just changed slightly so as to try and make them look different.

This "replication" and tyhen change was what I assumed had caused the attribute balance problem that so frustrated me.

I have a slightly different take on this.

As I usually start with a much smaller team, it's often not easy to see who was who, (even if you know the club in detail). I have done this in the past with previous versions, (not since FM09), and what I found was that although I could identify "stars", the same simply could not be said of lower league players. From my point of view this was a good thing, as this was the whole point of me doing it. There was a related problem though.

The way that the attributes were allocated didn't seem to be right. The balance was wrong.

What I mean was that if you had a winger for example and he was the best player in your lower league squad, then while he might have great dribbling skills, and excellent crossing, his pace would be something like 5. All too often it seemed as if the stat/attribute balance was wrong. It just ruined the game.

I honestly don't know if that's still the case, (haven't tried it since because I was so put off), but as this isn't, (and wasn't back then), a problem I encountered with newgens, I came to the conclusion that indeed players were being "replicated" and just changed slightly so as to try and make them look different.

This "replication" and tyhen change was what I assumed had caused the attribute balance problem that so frustrated me.

So the creation ratings and modifiers need improved algorithms as well? Hmmm...

I assume because the bigger names are obviously recreated, which kind of defeats the purpose of fake players if you take over a high rep club.

Yes, it looks like it retains the highest rep/ability players at each club and "anonymizes" them (new name, nationality) and generates the rest of the players using whatever parameters are appropriate. I guess it does this to try and preserve the pecking order of clubs within the division - i.e. the strongest teams stay the strongest teams and likewise the weakest teams - rather than completely levelling the playing field.

Maybe?

Bump......

I have only used the button in its current from once properly and a few times to see what spawned, got a YOUNGER Pique, which meant he could improve.

I know Graeme Kelly can create a fictitious DB easily because we used to talk about it in FML, maybe SI should create a few as minimally priced DLC?

What I really want (as a former FML fanatic) is to have a "make new club" option where it lets me create a new club and insert it into the league of my choice with completely generated players.

without using the editor, I mean.

Desperately want a genuine "fake universe" option as well. It's crazy that it still doesn't exist.

About the some players copied and some omitted query: I think odd parts of that player can be randomly altered as I just loaded up a game and Cristiano Ronaldo was a 19year old English player (it was clearly him with his PPMs and favoured personnel, as well as being worth 62m at R.madrid) so I get the impression if you look a little closer all the players will be copied simply with certain things altered.

E.g. in Cougar2010's post earlier I presume Nasri is actually that Portuguese AMC, Dzeko is the Albanian and Hernandez is actually that Mexican CB.

I want to play in a fictional universo too! Please SI, make that option viable.

I did the follow: Erased all players with the Editor, then created a new game and holiday for 15 Years. Some of those poor-young players were gone (some retired, others banished into obscurity) and some grew into international-level players. It's the only way to play in a total randomized game.

If you erase all Players with the Editor and create a new game, you will see a lot of young-poor-attributed players, but some (with time) will be very good in the future. Hell, i even saw a total African dominance for five years in the Club World Cup, or Malmo winning three times the Champion League, or an Uzbekistani Super-star playing and leading Napoli into be the best team in the world and getting his National Team into the World Cup Semifinals.

I would love this, completely fictional. This idea has legs!

Has this changed at all in the new version?

Has this changed at all in the new version?

No. To give an example, the Arsenal manager in my FM15 "Use Fake Players" game is a 65-year-old Frenchman (named Charles Delonglee) who has been at his longest club for 6,500+ days, whose favourite clubs include Strasbourg & Nagoya, and who also has an excellent knowledge of Japan.

Sound familiar at all?

No. To give an example, the Arsenal manager in my FM15 "Use Fake Players" game is a 65-year-old Frenchman (named Charles Delonglee) who has been at his longest club for 6,500+ days, whose favourite clubs include Strasbourg & Nagoya, and who also has an excellent knowledge of Japan.

Sound familiar at all?

Unfortunately yes... I truly fail to understand why SI have failed to implement this "feature" (if it can currently be called that) correctly after all this time. Simply put, I won't be buying an upgrade to my FM13 until this is fixed.

Well, if nothing else, the lack of a change to this in FM15 inspired me to get on and make a start with an ambitious fictional edit I'd been putting off for a long time:

http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/409603-FM15-WIP-The-Three-Nations-Project-A-Fictional-Database

I also deleted all existing players from the database and started a new career like that. Unfortunately, the option to add players to playable teams does exactly what it says. Adds players ONLY to the playable teams. Every club outside of the selected leagues will get no player. Even after holidaying 2 seasons (enough for 2 youth intakes), the clubs outside the selected leagues just had one or two players in their squad. Often none at all.

I tried increasing my database size and selected all players from all clubs in all continents. It didnt seem to have any effect. The result after 2 holiday seasons was the same.

Does anyone know if there is a way to force the game to create players for unselected leagues?