SI can we have a realistic 3D match engine please!!!

[grade]

Lets be honest here, you are simply afraid that if SI focus in having the graphics like Fifa does the Match Engine would suck. Gentlemen and any lady that is part of these forums, it is possible to have great 3D motion graphics and great match engine, it just the guys at Fifa Manager simply made it wrong.

[dfa120374]

Never played the Fifa games but do you not actually PLAY the football in those games? If so then they are two different types of games needing two different types of match engine. The one you PLAY the football in (Fifa) will need a really good engine so it looks good while you're playing it. The FM series is a MANAGER game and focuses more on the management side so it doesn't need a graphics engine nearly as powerful as what Fifa would need.

I think that the 3D match engine in FM11 is pretty decent as it is and I'm running the game on a computer that's only two years old and doesn't have a graphics card - just an inbuilt graphics card into the mainboard. I enjoy watching the 3D matches and while there can - and no doubt will - be tweaks & improvements to the visuals as the series goes on, I still think it's decent as it is and it doesn't ruin the playing experience for me at all.

Plus I don't think SI will go all out for a superb looking 3D engine purely because there are still a lot of people out there who play the game in just commentary mode or 2D match mode as well as, so for a game that focuses heavily towards the actual management side of football rather than the actual playing of football it would be a waste of time and money for SI to completely overhaul the 3D engine.

Also, I think that if they started to focus more on the visuals of the match then it could potentially take away the focus of the actual management side, which after all, is the reason we buy the game in the first place is it not? To MANAGE the game & team - not to play AS the team.

[x42bn6]

Am I the only one who thinks that a full engine like FIFA/Pro Evo just wouldnt work? I personally think it would slow the game up in terms of flow (not in a hardware sense). I, as i imagine alot of players do, play with a quick highlights speed. Which works fine for a zoomed out / overview feel of the game. But If it was to run at say a FIFA/PES speed it would take forever.

My view is that the graphics requirements are too high to begin with - the graphics engine needs some serious optimisation. I think the old Pentium 4 onboard video can play Counter-Strike: Source on medium without too many issues - and I'd argue that this is more detailed than FM11 3D. And I've mentioned that the Radeon 9800 is just short of the Crysis demo, and Crysis low is still a pretty good-looking game. Also, the old Battlefield 1942 game can be played on high with a GeForce 3 Ti 500 video card, which is weaker than the 9800 and Battlefield 1942 on high is a really detailed game.

[x42bn6]

Lets be honest here, you are simply afraid that if SI focus in having the graphics like Fifa does the Match Engine would suck. Gentlemen and any lady that is part of these forums, it is possible to have great 3D motion graphics and great match engine, it just the guys at Fifa Manager simply made it wrong.

Agreed - I don't know why some users are trying to prioritise SI's work for them. SI will know what to prioritise. Customers get to be very demanding. Aim high!

[tom_numbers]

dfa120374, great post

[x42bn6]

Never played the Fifa games but do you not actually PLAY the football in those games? If so then they are two different types of games needing two different types of match engine. The one you PLAY the football in (Fifa) will need a really good engine so it looks good while you're playing it. The FM series is a MANAGER game and focuses more on the management side so it doesn't need a graphics engine nearly as powerful as what Fifa would need.

DID YOU KNOW: FIFA 11 requires an GeForce 66xx series (or above) video card to run (http://www.systemrequirements.in/system-requirements-for-pc-game-fifa-soccer-11.html), while Football Manager 2011 requires a Radeon 9800 or above. And did you know that these video cards are actually roughly equivalent?

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/video_lookup.php?gpu=GeForce+6600+GT

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/video_lookup.php?gpu=RADEON+9800

So, to me, it would not be unreasonable to expect FIFA 11 and Football Manager 2011 to have roughly-equivalent graphics.

[dfa120374]

DID YOU KNOW: FIFA 11 requires an GeForce 66xx series (or above) video card to run (http://www.systemrequirements.in/system-requirements-for-pc-game-fifa-soccer-11.html), while Football Manager 2011 requires a Radeon 9800 or above. And did you know that these video cards are actually roughly equivalent?

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/video_lookup.php?gpu=GeForce+6600+GT

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/video_lookup.php?gpu=RADEON+9800

So, to me, it would not be unreasonable to expect FIFA 11 and Football Manager 2011 to have roughly-equivalent graphics.

Fifa 11 requires a card like that to run (which usually means for basic graphics - not everything set to full) but would you get the quality of graphics that are being touted in Fifa 12 on full settings? The two engines require different things - the Fifa games require more detail, more depth and more quality because that is the type of game that calls for an engine like that because you are playing IN the match. No one who wants to play a football game like Fifa 11 will want mediocre graphics - they will want something that looks awesome.

The FM series don't need as much quality, depth or as much detail in the match engine because it's priority focus is the management side rather than playing the match itself. Someone who's wanting to play the management side of the football game may want the match side to look decent BUT that's not their main focus for playing the game.

Two different types of football games here call for two different types of graphical engines - one is required (demanded) to be great and the other is not required (nor demanded) to be great.

dfa120374, great post

Thank you, my man

[grade]

Fifa 11 requires a card like that to run (which usually means for basic graphics - not everything set to full) but would you get the quality of graphics that are being touted in Fifa 12 on full settings? The two engines require different things - the Fifa games require more detail, more depth and more quality because that is the type of game that calls for an engine like that because you are playing IN the match. No one who wants to play a football game like Fifa 11 will want mediocre graphics - they will want something that looks awesome.

The FM series don't need as much quality, depth or as much detail in the match engine because it's priority focus is the management side rather than playing the match itself. Someone who's wanting to play the management side of the football game may want the match side to look decent BUT that's not their main focus for playing the game.

Two different types of football games here call for two different types of graphical engines - one is required (demanded) to be great and the other is not required (nor demanded) to be great.

We all know that Fifa and FM are two different games, about the same thing. But what makes me confused is why can we as costumers request from SI to have better graphics for the 3D? Why do we have to content with the graphics as they are now? What is the problem of having great graphics like or better then Fifa, representing a great match engine?

If SI released the 3d graphics because they thought it is equally important to show how the match is proceeding to help us as costumers to see if our options and tactics are working fine or not. Personally I think we can have the best of everything in FM, including graphics.

All of you people need to learn that, FM is not Fifa Manager and SI is not whoever does Fifa Manager.

[x42bn6]

Fifa 11 requires a card like that to run (which usually means for basic graphics - not everything set to full) but would you get the quality of graphics that are being touted in Fifa 12 on full settings?

That is not the point. The point is that FIFA 11's low settings are miles more detailed and look better than FM11 3D, with similar graphics requirements. That is why I listed minimum system requirements - maximum quality doesn't come into it.

The two engines require different things - the Fifa games require more detail, more depth and more quality because that is the type of game that calls for an engine like that because you are playing IN the match. No one who wants to play a football game like Fifa 11 will want mediocre graphics - they will want something that looks awesome.

The FM series don't need as much quality, depth or as much detail in the match engine because it's priority focus is the management side rather than playing the match itself. Someone who's wanting to play the management side of the football game may want the match side to look decent BUT that's not their main focus for playing the game.

It doesn't mean that FM11 should have rubbish graphics. I've said FM11's engine is not getting the best out of its processing power at all.

Two different types of football games here call for two different types of graphical engines - one is required (demanded) to be great and the other is not required (nor demanded) to be great.

Why can we not have great graphics on Football Manager? FIFA 11 has shown it is possible.

Just look at this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzvQJMR120o

The first bit is FIFA 11 at 1920x1080, very low quality. That is the sort of quality of graphics the minimum graphics card offers in FIFA 11.

The ultimate football management game would be a top-notch game with no bugs, and gorgeous graphics. There is nothing wrong with wanting the latter.

[dfa120374]

That is not the point. The point is that FIFA 11's low settings are miles more detailed and look better than FM11 3D, with similar graphics requirements. That is why I listed minimum system requirements - maximum quality doesn't come into it.

Fifa's graphics may still be more detailed in low settings than FM's BUT like I have said before, Fifa is concentrated more towards playing the game of football and not the management side of the game and vice versa for FM so really the graphics don't have to be excellent for FM because that is not why people buy the game.

As I have said before as well, I'm sure in time the graphics side of it will get better and unless I'm mistaken I think the 3D match engine has only been around for a couple of years for the FM series so really it's not a bad start for a football manager sim.

It doesn't mean that FM11 should have rubbish graphics. I've said FM11's engine is not getting the best out of its processing power at all.

I don't believe, that for a game that is focused towards being a manager sim, the graphics for the 3D view are too bad at all. Especially seeing as the game is not geared towards the graphical side. I enjoy watching the match and the computer I use the game on only has an inbuilt graphics card.

Would you rather that SI plow the majority of their time into making superb 3D graphics or concentrate mainly on how the game plays as a manager sim? It would be good to have both worlds but to me if they focused more on the match graphics it would take away the focus on making the manager side of the game more realistic and to put all that attention into an excellent 3D graphics engine when there's still a huge base of players that view the match in Commentary or 2D modes would be a waste of time. Plus the time it would need to actually put attention into making the management side as realistic as possible AND making the graphics look superb I imagine would be extremely great.

I'm sure that if they did make the graphics look good like in Fifa then more people might watch the games in 3D but until that happens, who knows.

Why can we not have great graphics on Football Manager? FIFA 11 has shown it is possible.

Just look at this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzvQJMR120o

The first bit is FIFA 11 at 1920x1080, very low quality. That is the sort of quality of graphics the minimum graphics card offers in FIFA 11.

The ultimate football management game would be a top-notch game with no bugs, and gorgeous graphics. There is nothing wrong with wanting the latter.

No there's nothing wrong with wanting gorgeous graphics in the game (and the Fifa ones do look good) but to have all three (a top-notch game, no bugs & gorgeous graphics) is asking a lot.

For a football manager game the most important thing for me is that the game works properly, has depth, is detailed and as close & as realistic to the management side of the game as possible.

I'm not arguing that great graphics wouldn't look good in the game - I'm just commenting that the game is not concentrated towards that side of football as much as it is the management side but I think that for the first couple of efforts for the 3D side in FM it has been a decent start, especially seeing as it's a manager sim.

And who knows - they may surprise us by bringing out better match graphics from the next FM.

[dfa120374]

We all know that Fifa and FM are two different games, about the same thing. But what makes me confused is why can we as costumers request from SI to have better graphics for the 3D? Why do we have to content with the graphics as they are now? What is the problem of having great graphics like or better then Fifa, representing a great match engine?

If SI released the 3d graphics because they thought it is equally important to show how the match is proceeding to help us as costumers to see if our options and tactics are working fine or not. Personally I think we can have the best of everything in FM, including graphics.

All of you people need to learn that, FM is not Fifa Manager and SI is not whoever does Fifa Manager.

My point exactly.

And as I mentioned earlier, I don't think FM has done too bad a job with the match graphics side seeing as the 3D side was only introduced in FM09 and I'm sure that it will get better as games generally do get better over time.

[grade]

I agree with you, but I don't agree with the point of many people here that they rather have poor graphics and improve the rest of FM, when we can have improvement of both.

What I think is that movement of the 3D graphics is far poorer then it should be.

[Svenc]

DID YOU KNOW: FIFA 11 requires an GeForce 66xx series (or above) video card to run (http://www.systemrequirements.in/system-requirements-for-pc-game-fifa-soccer-11.html), while Football Manager 2011 requires a Radeon 9800 or above. And did you know that these video cards are actually roughly equivalent?

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/video_lookup.php?gpu=GeForce+6600+GT

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/video_lookup.php?gpu=RADEON+9800

In synthetic benchmarks - yes. In actual gaming benchmarks, the 6600GT comes out on top, as you'd expect it to, as it is a budget gaming card released a generation later. Talking about the actual models required to run FM 3D at all you've got to remember that we may be talking a card that equals Crysis requirements at their bare minimum. But we're also talking a card that was released more than eight (!) years ago. Even in FM's 3D there are features being used that older cards cannot cope with, has nothing to do with raw rendering power, but per pixel effects that aren't do-able on cards even older than that. You've got to draw the lines somewhere. It is also worth noting that there's a reason that licensing highly optimized engines like Crytek's costs quite a bit of money. This isn't defending FM's relative lack of polish. This is trying to keep things into perspective: "If FIFA can run on this, I'd expect to look FM equal at the very least."

What would keep many FMers out of trouble would be if hardware salesmen told their customers that going onboard video chips is for most models an absulte no-go if he wanted to do any 3d gaming at all. Not going to happen, naturally. Even the smallest of dedicated video cards offer multiple times the performance for little more than what you pay for each iteration of FM - and fat chance it can run FIFA/PES XX too.

[cynet]

We have the game play but we haven't got the graphics to illustrate this, i don't change my point of view that the game needs a great entertainment show piece on the pitch, right now we have wooden looking card board cut out's trying to look like footballers and the GK looks like a man with piles looking to scared to move just in case one bursts.

[x42bn6]

Fifa's graphics may still be more detailed in low settings than FM's BUT like I have said before, Fifa is concentrated more towards playing the game of football and not the management side of the game and vice versa for FM so really the graphics don't have to be excellent for FM because that is not why people buy the game.

As I have said before as well, I'm sure in time the graphics side of it will get better and unless I'm mistaken I think the 3D match engine has only been around for a couple of years for the FM series so really it's not a bad start for a football manager sim.

There are other benefits to better graphics, such as using the GPU more to release CPU cycles for processing, making the game quicker overall.

It is just that nobody should be having graphical issues with 3D with any PC that is 4 years old - that's the level of graphics power we had back then.

I don't believe, that for a game that is focused towards being a manager sim, the graphics for the 3D view are too bad at all. Especially seeing as the game is not geared towards the graphical side. I enjoy watching the match and the computer I use the game on only has an inbuilt graphics card.

Would you rather that SI plow the majority of their time into making superb 3D graphics or concentrate mainly on how the game plays as a manager sim? It would be good to have both worlds but to me if they focused more on the match graphics it would take away the focus on making the manager side of the game more realistic and to put all that attention into an excellent 3D graphics engine when there's still a huge base of players that view the match in Commentary or 2D modes would be a waste of time. Plus the time it would need to actually put attention into making the management side as realistic as possible AND making the graphics look superb I imagine would be extremely great.

I quite frankly don't care how SI distribute their time. They know best. What I want is improvements in areas X, Y and Z. I don't believe consumers need to worry about prioritising features.

What I do care about is that they should have "improve graphics efficiency" somewhere on their todo list. Where it is on that last is not important - but it should be on there.

I'm sure that if they did make the graphics look good like in Fifa then more people might watch the games in 3D but until that happens, who knows.

No there's nothing wrong with wanting gorgeous graphics in the game (and the Fifa ones do look good) but to have all three (a top-notch game, no bugs & gorgeous graphics) is asking a lot.

No it's not. You are a customer. Customers are never wrong. Customers get to be fussy. Customers get to be demanding. It is the poor software developers that need to worry about expectations.

If customers aren't demanding, then the game never improves. Remember that if you run a company, you always under-promise and over-deliver. But the more ideas you throw at that company, the more likely something is to stick.

In synthetic benchmarks - yes. In actual gaming benchmarks, the 6600GT comes out on top, as you'd expect it to, as it is a budget gaming card released a generation later. Talking about the actual models required to run FM 3D at all you've got to remember that we may be talking a card that equals Crysis requirements at their bare minimum. But we're also talking a card that was released more than eight (!) years ago. Even in FM's 3D there are features being used that older cards cannot cope with, has nothing to do with raw rendering power, but per pixel effects that aren't do-able on cards even older than that. You've got to draw the lines somewhere. It is also worth noting that there's a reason that licensing highly optimized engines like Crytek's costs quite a bit of money. This isn't defending FM's relative lack of polish. This is trying to keep things into perspective: "If FIFA can run on this, I'd expect to look FM equal at the very least."

Pixel shading? Like bump textures and advanced ambient/specular lighting? Sounds exactly what we need for stick-men with the inability to zoom right in.

Both the 6600 GT and 9800 support Pixel Shader 3.0.

What would keep many FMers out of trouble would be if hardware salesmen told their customers that going onboard video chips is for most models an absulte no-go if he wanted to do any 3d gaming at all. Not going to happen, naturally. Even the smallest of dedicated video cards offer multiple times the performance for little more than what you pay for each iteration of FM - and fat chance it can run FIFA/PES XX too.

Actually, you can get a decent frame rate on FIFA 11 with a fairly-recent integrated graphics card. Integrated graphics are now starting to push low-end discrete video cards; and in addition to that, at little extra power consumption and temperature increase. Here's FIFA 11 on a 3-year-old integrated graphics chipset:

. And here's the FIFA 11 demo on a 5-year-old integrated graphics card:

[Svenc]

I know that the stuttering in those videos is coming from FRAPS, but it is also stated that the frame rate would be between 15 and 30 frames on average, so it may be playable, but stuttering is even noticeable without FRAPS eating up resources.

There are integrated solutions that manage to halfway keep up with the absolute cheapest of dedicated cards of their generation in low details and low resolutions, and Intel's new HD series is quite decent. But a lot of popular integrated graphics solutions of the last couple of years, such as the Intel GMA x3500 or the x4500 series, are barely pushing the lower end of the GeForce 8 series, if at all. And they're eating up system memory on tops whilst doing so. Unfortunately this isn't properly communicated to customers, and for a lot of users running integrated graphics whilst trying to play Football Manager in 3D it shows it never has been.

Both the 6600 GT and 9800 support Pixel Shader 3.0.

6600 GT yes, Radeon 9800 no. The Radeon 9800 was released when Arsenal were champions of England. Go back further, and likely you wouldn't have the players casting quite accurate shadows on a sunny day, for instance. Of course it's not Crysis - but just because it hasn't opted for tech even more ancient doesn't mean the tech is not being utilized at all. I'm not arguing against your point that Football Manager should be more polished to run better on lesser hardware. I'm just trying to put that point in perspective: the point that if EA Sports and Crytek can make real-time 3D islands and footie grounds spring to life on similar hardware just fine - at least in vastly lowered details, and on highly optimized 3D engines developers are willing to pay some real money to get their hands on - Sports Interactive should be able to pull off the exact same. And this right off the bat, two years after they have started going 3D at all, and ignoring that the 3D in Football Manager has become better with each version as it is.

[x42bn6]

6600 GT yes, Radeon 9800 no. The Radeon 9800 was released when Arsenal were champions of England. Go back further, and likely you wouldn't have the players casting quite accurate shadows on a sunny day, for instance. Of course it's not Crysis - but just because it hasn't opted for tech even more ancient doesn't mean the tech is not being utilized at all. I'm not arguing against your point that Football Manager should be more polished to run better on lesser hardware. I'm just trying to put that point in perspective: the point that if EA Sports and Crytek can make real-time 3D islands and footie grounds spring to life on similar hardware just fine - at least in vastly lowered details, and on highly optimized 3D engines developers are willing to pay some real money to get their hands on - Sports Interactive should be able to pull off the exact same. And this right off the bat, two years after they have started going 3D at all, and ignoring that the 3D in Football Manager has become better with each version as it is.

Pixel Shader 2.0, sorry.

Pixel Shader 3.0 is not really that much of a boost over 2.0 anyway - it was mostly nVidia and ATI merging their changes together, adding some registers for textures (not really important for FM, where the only texture is really the grass - and you don't need Pixel Shader 2.0 for that), and support for larger textures (same thing). Pixel Shader 4.0 will be the big one, if it hasn't come out already.

In fact, I don't think you need Pixel Shader 2.0 to generate the graphics FM11 has - it's not like shadows were ground-breaking in 2005 or whatever, or IK/FK for stickman models. I'm fairly sure the likes of Unreal Tournament and Warcraft III had good shadows, and those could run on GeForce 2s.

I'm not disagreeing either - just that I don't understand why some people are saying "we don't need better graphics". Well, trust me, better graphics is always a plus, and since graphics chips can do miles better alone, it frees up CPU cycles and makes the game faster...