Kind of surprised at the number of bugs still in the game after Beta....

[teknotel]

First of all I love the game itself. I think the new additions are well thought out and add to the game and simulation.

In beta I was incredibly pleased and felt many of the complaints, UI, Injuries, game engine etc. were just a matter of opinion rather then actual issues as I felt all worked well and were an improvement on last year.

I noticed some bugs which I did raise in the bug part of these forums.

After release literally none of these have been addressed... Here are the most annoying which are really frustrating me at the moment:

Tactics screen, window fades when hovering i on playing select. Basically you click on a position and it brings up a list of players who can play that role. Surely being able to hover each players (i) button and then select the best fit is an integral part? This has never worked nor does it coming up to a month since beta.

I appreciate this is under review still but this really seems like something quite simple surely? I find it worrying that something as basic as this which is quite obvious is still unfixed.

Also I am noticing now that sometimes if I leave my game for a while when I come back you can't actually click anything... usually in tactics screen. Literally nothing happens when you click anything only solution is to press the red x at the top if you are in windows mode.

Also I noticed that sometimes in games when I finish a game I give my team talk at the end, then next thing I know the team talk has been reset and I am on a screen with the pre game team talk selection! I usually ignore it and press the continue button which is fine, however it just makes the game feel kind of broken to me and does ruin my enjoyment a bit.

There are many other smaller bugs I have noticed as well but cannot recall.

How long until all of these obvious and very noticeable bugs will actually be fixed? Personally I would like to wait and come back to a sharp and mostly bug free game that functions as intended. I get put off every time I play and notice all of these little things. I give a lot of them the benefit of the doubt but they are just so frequent I kind of feel a little disappointed for the first time ever.

That said I think the ideas and game play is great as usual.

[Rooneye]

Yeah the hovering over the (i) thing on players when you use that drop down menu and it disappears is so annoying. Please fix this SI.

[MrPompey]

If you want bugs fixed then you need to log them in the bugs forum

[matisptfan]

1 hour ago, MrPompey said:

If you want bugs fixed then you need to log them in the bugs forum

I am very sorry, but while I'm not the most active user, I had to login to comment on this one.

This is not a particular comment about you, but rather a general one over a certain sense of "leave it to the user" that is shared across these boards.

Even if that idea is valid as a baseline for a better workflow for bug fixing, you totally missed that the OP did create at least one thread to report a bug.

Others like him spend countless hours playing - therefore reporting real-life data that can be applied for game development - and also actively participating in part of the QA process that any established game must go though.

I think it's time to once and for all not only advertise and boast about FM being a massive game played by millions selling millions of copy, but also correspond with more maturity on the processes that lead to the general quality of the game.

Since the public beta was launched, I believe the game had 5 updates. Nonetheless, the game is still in a very unpolished state. I'm talking about visual glitches, UI and graphics bugs (I'm certainly not the only one having role suitability options go dark every other tactical change), sluggish menus and scout reports not matching defined criteria, just to name a few.

I'm not even complaining about changes implemented by design that dramatically reduced QOL while playing, like having an "intermediate" tactical screen that is just a gateway for the complete option, but unfinished changes to the game that were advertised as new full-fledged options and will probably be only showing their true potential in like 2 or 3 iterations.

I hope I don't sound overly critic, but please understand my points before reacting.

We provide feedback out of good will, QA shouldn't rely on users - especially after the beta testing phase;

We are vigilant and most of us are long-term users, therefore already developed a conscience over other years examples;

The game was released to the public in an unpolished state, with annoying bugs and unfinished features. Despite that fact, the coverage of the same features for the next year's version will use this fact as a victory, not as a sign of an half-assed job.

[MrPompey]

Hi @matisptfan

No offence taken and I was probably too quick to reply.

Beta version - thats exactly what it is, a beta version so you get an early look at the game and chance to find bugs etc before the formal release on 10th Nov so it will have had plenty of bugs I'm sure

Software in general - Its a feature of today with complex applications etc that there will always be bugs in software. Microsoft have them in their products and so do Apple and so on. All software including games will have bugs and have ones that require fixes. Some will get fixed and some wont. Look on steam at the most popular game forums and they will all have issues of some type on game launch. Its an unfortunate fact that its simply part of modern life and software will be released that is not 100% error free. That will NEVER change I'm afraid. Due to the costs of testing, market pressures. etc...see my example below

Bugs -I certainly did NOT miss the fact he had raised a bug, but hoped to encourage him to raise another. this is a complex game and everyone plays the game differently and will notice different things. What I think makes SI differ from many software houses is that they will likely react to issues much quicker. We could discuss the ethics of why should consumers help the product sellor improve their software but its the only way things get better and lets face it we play the game for enjoyment. In terms of the number of issues and types of issues I hope that SI will have been listening to people's views including your own that perhaps comment that it was issued with too many bugs may well be valid

I have personally not seen this issue, if I had i would have raised a bug

Product Users - I understand exactly what you are saying but this is my simplistic view. If you find a problem you can ignore it and hope someone else logs it. Alternatively log the issue and ideally SI will fix and release it. Anther way to think about it is that if you saw litter on a footpath and a nearby bin would you walk past it or pick it up and put it in the bin benefiting everyone?

Goodwill - You are 100% right, SI do rely on our good will to do testing for them. It only gets better if we can help them achieve it. Agreed we dont get paid but I expect if you measure how many hours you invest playing the game then it will also benefit you in the long rin as it benefits me and everyone else

My Example

NASA launched the Mars Climate Orbiter and in  September 1999 it fired up its engines ready to manouever ready to obtain an orbit around Mars. Unfortunately it shot right by and was lost. Imagine all the cost of such an endeavor and all the amount of testing that would have been done. You know what the eventual problem was when they reviewed the project? They had 2 development teams, one worked in imperial and one worked in metric....no-one thought to check or ensure thay were using the same units of measure and that is NASA  and so highlights errors / bugs etc always exist and also at the highest level. 

Anyway I hope that explains my view

 

[Jam_Man]

This does seem to be the most sloppy release for a few years.

Never had any issues with the last two but there are just basic sloppy bugs in this one (which I've reported).

Things like tactics screens not retaining settings and needing auto resizing every match really shouldnt be in the game at this stage.

 

 

 

[teknotel]

5 hours ago, MrPompey said:

If you want bugs fixed then you need to log them in the bugs forum

Kind of a strange thing to say considering I linked to the exact bug report I made regarding the main one quite clearly in the OP.... I did report all issues I found. There are just so many glaring ones in all honesty.

As said I have no problem with the gameplay, it is just the bugs like I described which really are spoiling my experience. As you can see if you read the OP I linked to report where it was noted as being under review. 

The thing that gets me is that I didn't notice any changes whatsoever from Beta to release.... nothing. So I can understand them not fixing the hover issue in tactics, if like they did tons of other obvious bug fixing, but I noticed nothing....

If glaringly obvious bugs like that are not a priority for a full released game then what exactly is? Does it seem like something that would take that long to rectify? I don't know, just feel a bit let down as I buy every years copy since Championship manager 92-93 and am always supporting SI and discussing issues with critics. I am very surprised with this release actually as a lifelong fan.

I have total faith that SI will release patches to make the game excellent, just personally I would rather wait and play a game where at least bugs are not this obvious and frequent.

Also whilst I understand the simplistic terms you are trying to convey with your example, I think that comparing a mission to orbit Mars with a fairly simple and obvious UI bug in a computer game (which has had the same systems and interfaces for  years), does not really help this situation.

What I am saying is that this particular bug was on their radar for a long time already. Pretty sure when the NASA engineers realised their mistake it was rectified as soon as possible. Doe my problem really seem like a major issue that would take over a month to fix? An issue which is incredibly noticeable? 

[teknotel]

Also right now I have 280 hours in FM2018:

I have made suggestions:

http://steamcommunity.com/app/624090/discussions/0/1483235412194569718/

 

I am no professional tester and I haven't covered everything and a lot of what I am saying is not valid in these I know. But I buy the game every year, pump 1000s of hours into it and this year I even had a notepad file open with me while I played so I could note things down as i went and report them. I just want you to realise that this questioning of the bugs and asking what they have done instead of fixing these is coming from someone who has tried his best to test the game and give feedback.

I have played games for 25 years so I do understand basic workings in software and I am aware that we are the testers these days. I just think for my 1000s upon 1000s of hours I have put into SI games over most of life that they would release a game with the glaringly obvious UI bugs sorted out as I cannot see how it would take that much to fix some of this stuff.

[alian62]

5 hours ago, MrPompey said:

Hi @matisptfan

No offence taken and I was probably too quick to reply.

Beta version - thats exactly what it is, a beta version so you get an early look at the game and chance to find bugs etc before the formal release on 10th Nov so it will have had plenty of bugs I'm sure

Software in general - Its a feature of today with complex applications etc that there will always be bugs in software. Microsoft have them in their products and so do Apple and so on. All software including games will have bugs and have ones that require fixes. Some will get fixed and some wont. Look on steam at the most popular game forums and they will all have issues of some type on game launch. Its an unfortunate fact that its simply part of modern life and software will be released that is not 100% error free. That will NEVER change I'm afraid. Due to the costs of testing, market pressures. etc...see my example below

Bugs -I certainly did NOT miss the fact he had raised a bug, but hoped to encourage him to raise another. this is a complex game and everyone plays the game differently and will notice different things. What I think makes SI differ from many software houses is that they will likely react to issues much quicker. We could discuss the ethics of why should consumers help the product sellor improve their software but its the only way things get better and lets face it we play the game for enjoyment. In terms of the number of issues and types of issues I hope that SI will have been listening to people's views including your own that perhaps comment that it was issued with too many bugs may well be valid

I have personally not seen this issue, if I had i would have raised a bug

Product Users - I understand exactly what you are saying but this is my simplistic view. If you find a problem you can ignore it and hope someone else logs it. Alternatively log the issue and ideally SI will fix and release it. Anther way to think about it is that if you saw litter on a footpath and a nearby bin would you walk past it or pick it up and put it in the bin benefiting everyone?

Goodwill - You are 100% right, SI do rely on our good will to do testing for them. It only gets better if we can help them achieve it. Agreed we dont get paid but I expect if you measure how many hours you invest playing the game then it will also benefit you in the long rin as it benefits me and everyone else

My Example

NASA launched the Mars Climate Orbiter and in  September 1999 it fired up its engines ready to manouever ready to obtain an orbit around Mars. Unfortunately it shot right by and was lost. Imagine all the cost of such an endeavor and all the amount of testing that would have been done. You know what the eventual problem was when they reviewed the project? They had 2 development teams, one worked in imperial and one worked in metric....no-one thought to check or ensure thay were using the same units of measure and that is NASA  and so highlights errors / bugs etc always exist and also at the highest level. 

Anyway I hope that explains my view

 

So we are paying top dollar for something that is not 100% . If you can't live up to what you promote then there should be a law for false advertising.  It's either a fantastic realistic game or it isn't? You can't talk the talk then don't walk it . I laugh at all the reviews from gaming sites giving it 8 /10 or 9/10 . Do they not actually play the game or are these payed for reviews.  The latter i think . The game as it stands is a 5 or 6/10 . When the next update comes , and it will be a big one , then maybe it will improve .

[Bry]

4 hours ago, prot651 said:

So we are paying top dollar for something that is not 100% . If you can't live up to what you promote then there should be a law for false advertising.  It's either a fantastic realistic game or it isn't? You can't talk the talk then don't walk it . I laugh at all the reviews from gaming sites giving it 8 /10 or 9/10 . Do they not actually play the game or are these payed for reviews.  The latter i think . The game as it stands is a 5 or 6/10 . When the next update comes , and it will be a big one , then maybe it will improve .

I'm glad it's not just me that's suspicious of the high-profile reviews. Let's not forget that they could only have had a late beta version, as many of the reviews came out on, or just prior, to the official release day. How can any discerning reviewer have failed to have noted the countless glitches in versions even now, let alone late beta. Definitely raises a few questions.

[RorysRocketThrow]

It has the potential to be the very best in the series to date, but it is very buggy and the gameplay speed feels so slow.

The delays in the search facility are particularly frustrating.

[rcirani7]

27 minutes ago, Bry said:

I'm glad it's not just me that's suspicious of the high-profile reviews. Let's not forget that they could only have had a late beta version, as many of the reviews came out on, or just prior, to the official release day. How can any discerning reviewer have failed to have noted the countless glitches in versions even now, let alone late beta. Definitely raises a few questions.

Or it's that other people have different opinions? The game's fantastic, and any "glitch" I've encountered hasn't affected the gameplay in any way.

[CFuller]

15 minutes ago, Bry said:

I'm glad it's not just me that's suspicious of the high-profile reviews. Let's not forget that they could only have had a late beta version, as many of the reviews came out on, or just prior, to the official release day. How can any discerning reviewer have failed to have noted the countless glitches in versions even now, let alone late beta. Definitely raises a few questions.

There are some more critical professional reviews that refer to these issues if you look hard enough. Games Radar gave it 3/5, criticising a "cluttered UI". PC Invasion referred to performance issues in its 7/10 review.

As for another comment above, it's ridiculous - and potentially even libellous - to even suggest that some reviewers were paid to give FM18 a higher score. These are professional game reviewers whose job is to be objective; most will not score a game 9/10 or 4/5 if they didn't honestly think it was that good.

That being said, I do agree that this game does look rather buggy compared to recent versions. For a game as complicated as FM, though, bugs unfortunately cannot be completely avoided. The best thing we as users can do to help iron out most of these issues is report them to SI.

[Bry]

10 minutes ago, rcirani7 said:

Or it's that other people have different opinions? The game's fantastic, and any "glitch" I've encountered hasn't affected the gameplay in any way.

That's great for you, but the glitches have clearly impeded many people's enjoyment of the game (not entirely, but to an extent) and should be rather blatant to a seasoned game reviewer. Precisely as you say, people have different opinions. Those don't seem to have been represented.

I see many positives in FM18, but if I were to review it fairly, would not hesitate to point out the many flaws.

[Bry]

13 minutes ago, CFuller said:

There are some more critical professional reviews that refer to these issues if you look hard enough. Games Radar gave it 3/5, criticising a "cluttered UI". PC Invasion referred to performance issues in its 7/10 review.

As for another comment above, it's ridiculous - and potentially even libellous - to even suggest that some reviewers were paid to give FM18 a higher score. These are professional game reviewers whose job is to be objective; most will not score a game 9/10 or 4/5 if they didn't honestly think it was that good.

That being said, I do agree that this game does look rather buggy compared to recent versions. For a game as complicated as FM, though, bugs unfortunately cannot be completely avoided. The best thing we as users can do to help iron out most of these issues is report them to SI.

Thanks for highlighting those examples. I'd be interested to see if there are even more critical mainstream reviews. I've not seen any.

I agree that objecivity is paramount for reviewers, but can any veteran FM player seriously fathom how a professional reviewer could overlook the various bugs in its state at the end of Beta, and so warrant a 8 or 9/10? 

[Lucas]

3 minutes ago, Bry said:

can any veteran FM player seriously fathom how a professional reviewer could overlook the various bugs in its state at the end of Beta, and so warrant a 8 or 9/10

With every professional review you will find somebody that disagrees in some aspect, perhaps struggling to understand the score system because it doesn't tally with their own experiences. We do provide a demo though for people to try so that they can judge for themselves. 

[themadsheep2001]

4 minutes ago, Bry said:

Thanks for highlighting those examples. I'd be interested to see if there are even more critical mainstream reviews. I've not seen any.

I agree that objecivity is paramount for reviewers, but can any veteran FM player seriously fathom how a professional reviewer could overlook the various bugs in its state at the end of Beta, and so warrant a 8 or 9/10? 

Because people like different things? 

People have different views and reviews are subjective 

[Guest]

TBH mainstream reviewers seem to be more generous with their scoring these days, maybe due to the the abuse they receive when they dare to score a game below 8 rather than being beholden to publishers/dev’s

Anything 8 or above should be reserved for games that exhibit absolute finished article levels of polish & the difference from 8-10 down to personal opinion but more often I see reviews that seem to factor in the assumption that dev teams will iron out glitches.

[Lucas]

Just now, Lucas Weatherby said:

With every professional review you will find somebody that disagrees in some aspect, perhaps struggling to understand the score system because it doesn't tally with their own experiences. We do provide a demo though for people to try so that they can judge for themselves. 

I should add, that with each major release we update our demo so people can try the demo out, and it comes with a vast array of leagues available to play and download - around 50 quickstarts in total are made available for FM and FM Touch demos, and these are updated as well when the new database is released, too. So there's plenty of ways you can get judgements on our game whether that is through reviews or trying yourself before buying.

[MrPompey]

6 hours ago, prot651 said:

So we are paying top dollar for something that is not 100% . If you can't live up to what you promote then there should be a law for false advertising.  It's either a fantastic realistic game or it isn't? You can't talk the talk then don't walk it . I laugh at all the reviews from gaming sites giving it 8 /10 or 9/10 . Do they not actually play the game or are these payed for reviews.  The latter i think . The game as it stands is a 5 or 6/10 . When the next update comes , and it will be a big one , then maybe it will improve .

In what respect is it false advertising? I've just mentioned that NO software product can ever be or will ever be 100% bug free its impossible.FM is no exception. Take a look at other software products including games, its the same across the whole genre. This is where Steam comes into its own because it automatically downloads updates for you rather than you having to find the update and download it manually

Every year a demo is available for you to try before buy. The forums are available for you to peruse ahead of purchase to get the view of others playing the game. Ultimately its you choice to press the "pay" button. Looking at GD / Bugs Forum whilst there are some issues there is no riot in the forums so most people appear to be happy.

In terms of FM in general if you are a long time user then you will know that fixes get released after launch every year, we all know this and we all chose to buy or not, wait or not....its individual choice. Appreciate your views and only you can act accordingly. All I would say is that if you are finding bugs then log them as thats the best way to get them resolved

[Bry]

1 hour ago, themadsheep2001 said:

Because people like different things? 

People have different views and reviews are subjective 

That's a really patronizing answer.

[Bry]

1 hour ago, Lucas Weatherby said:

I should add, that with each major release we update our demo so people can try the demo out, and it comes with a vast array of leagues available to play and download - around 50 quickstarts in total are made available for FM and FM Touch demos, and these are updated as well when the new database is released, too. So there's plenty of ways you can get judgements on our game whether that is through reviews or trying yourself before buying.

Thanks. I certainly can't disagree with you. Many of the bugs have certainly been dealt with now, but my angle was solely that with the review copy that they must've had, it's unimaginable to me that things like lag, the color glitches, the hard to see ball, the erratic sound etc, etc, would've passed the smell test.

Anyway, I'll leave it. Really appreciate the response. 

[Svenc]

2 hours ago, Barside said:

TBH mainstream reviewers seem to be more generous with their scoring these days, maybe due to the the abuse they receive when they dare to score a game below 8 rather than being beholden to publishers/dev’s

Mainstream reviews typically aren't that in-depth, in particular as to FM. It depends what you want out of the game, but it is logical that in a game as open-ended as this, you'll only really get to filter a huge amount of stuff after spending significantly time on it. Plus, this being a simulation game, there is naturally a lot of subjectivity, but also myth involved as well. Wasn't it Gamespot this year that argued the injuries would be too frequent -- all the while an indepth rundown of AI transfer dealings etc. rarely ever transpires. The most classic cases were the perennial German reviews of Fifa Manager by the way. Nothing against the game, but they universally argued they would represent "football just like on Television" (Fifa visuals), plus let you feel just like a manager with their options (when it was plain that even the more basic instructions were totally ignored, as both teams in a match would always play the same Watford 1980s kind of direct football up and under stuff, always looking to score the next goal -- FIFA AI style).

I dunno if I agree with that sentiment, but there's also games that, if you're a bit cynical, are marked down as they don't fit the "mainstream perception of a video game" too. That legendary IGN US review of FM 2009ish -- or Alien:Isolation comparably recent, which for me outed every reviewer (too) easily frustrated/lacking patience. Also a game where Sega would have much better released a playable demo, no least because it was quite daring in concept already. In the end it's all viable opinion pieces, though, naturally.

[XaW]

5 hours ago, Bry said:

Thanks. I certainly can't disagree with you. Many of the bugs have certainly been dealt with now, but my angle was solely that with the review copy that they must've had, it's unimaginable to me that things like lag, the color glitches, the hard to see ball, the erratic sound etc, etc, would've passed the smell test.

Anyway, I'll leave it. Really appreciate the response. 

The thing is, not everyone experience all those issues. I had a bit of a lag and I don't use sounds. I had no problems with colors or problems spotting the ball. I didn't even know these issues existed before someone noted them in the feedback thread. The lag I noticed was only limited to a single button/page, nothing more than that. So I didn't really notice any of the issues you stated that you found so obvious. I did however have a couple of other bugs that I reported as soon as I had them.

However, since I work in testing I might go a bit easy here, since I have experienced how hard it is to weed out all bugs before releasing a product! Several times I could have sworn we had fixed all major issues (only a few non critical issues unresolved), only to find that it crashed for a majority of the users in less than an hour after we released. Especially with so many different configurations that PC might have. You need to be able to have people with all kinds of graphics cards, processors, etc, and not to mention all kinds of drivers, some beta drivers, or 7 year old ones. Not that this absolves the developer of any wrongdoing, as the product should still work, but it's sometimes harder than one would imagine... A beta really helps out in that regard as one get's to test the application against all kinds of setups and hopefully fix issues before release.

[Schotsmannetje]

21 hours ago, Jam_Man said:

Things like tactics screens not retaining settings and needing auto resizing every match really shouldnt be in the game at this stage.

This was in the game after release two years ago as well I think. Sloppy.

[Schotsmannetje]

11 hours ago, Barside said:

TBH mainstream reviewers seem to be more generous with their scoring these days, maybe due to the the abuse they receive when they dare to score a game below 8 rather than being beholden to publishers/dev’s

Anything 8 or above should be reserved for games that exhibit absolute finished article levels of polish & the difference from 8-10 down to personal opinion but more often I see reviews that seem to factor in the assumption that dev teams will iron out glitches.

I know people that review professional audio products (like microphones, speakers, headphones, amps, etc.), as I have a history with audio engineering myself. They always tell me that when they write a negative review about a product, the manufacturer will just stop sending them products and goodies, making it more difficult for them to review products (at an early stage at least). When you don't want to be positive about a product, they just find reviewers who do.

Since knowing that, I never take professional reviews too seriously. Having said that: I also know that customer reviews are often very unreliable as well. Especially when it comes to more complex products. Often, people that are negative about products are just too lazy to read manuals and don't even try to understand how the product works.

[MHovel]

Some of you on this thread are either naive, or just pretending like...

"Reviews" ha, what a joke

17 hours ago, themadsheep2001 said:

Because people like different things? 

People have different views and reviews are subjective 

What i dont like the most is people who cant be honest.

If you added one reason which is valid one, why not adding other possible reasons?  (Im sure you were able to think about this one, from what i witnessed, you are intelligent enough).

Why not adding that they also getting paid to give higher scores?

Yes, the scores can be subjective, but if they were honest, the current state of the game doesnt worth such higher rating as 8/10.

But hey, money talks.

[Svenc]

4 hours ago, MHovel said:

Why not adding that they also getting paid to give higher scores?

 

It's one viable thing to dislike a game, it's another to imply that everyone who likes it must be either a moron, liar, have sub par standards or be flat out corrupt. That said, Sega should have paid the likes of IGN more when writing their Alien:Isolation reviews for sure, no less because it was actually aiming at some mainstream gaming exposure too -- and was arguably a bigger product in their portfolio that season, perhaps there one "Star" game that year. Pity. That game didn't deserve that flak it got on some places, either way. Mainstream "Football Manager" reviews aren't that in-depth anyway -- not to sound condescending, but I don't think most reviewers have the" standards" that apply to the long-term hardcore, or else you would read more about possible flaws in AI tactical decision making, transfer dealings, and more. Then again, the hardcore may not be the majority who pick this up. Plus: FM isn't the game that necessarily is the target audience of traditional gaming zines anyway (though there can be an overlap).

The above post is a solid 1.0/10, either way.

[forameuss]

Day 433 of the great FM War, and the hardy band of warriors turn their sights on the most heinous of criminals - the reviewers.

When really, most should be giving them a broadly similar reaction

There are bugs in the game, like there always has been.  It's impossible to quantify which version had more, considering that more severe bugs always seem worse.  I seem to remember one title early in FM's life where the release was an absolute train-wreck, and very few could even open the game, so I'd say that was probably the worst by a fair distance.  There's also been certain design decisions that people disagree with that are getting lumped in with bugs, which is probably a bit unfair.  Two completely different things.

In the end though, with all the wailing about reviewers, why does it matter?  If you don't like the game, does it really bother you enough that you need to complain about other people who do?  The game has been hovering around the 6 or 7 out of 10 for a number of versions now in my opinion, and that's OK.  It could be better, it could be a lot worse.  Only now in the era of metacritic, everything must either be a 0 or a 10, a joke or the best thing ever.  It's OK, and that's OK.  Other people's mileage may vary, and that's ok too.

[XaW]

Well, when looking at reviews the way to get the most "correct" score is to remove all who have rated it 0 and 10, and look at the rest. The ones who give that rating will be wrong anyway. 0 should be unplayable horrid mess while 10 should be revered as the second coming, and quite frankly should only be awarded once or twice a decade.

[forameuss]

10 minutes ago, XaW said:

Well, when looking at reviews the way to get the most "correct" score is to remove all who have rated it 0 and 10, and look at the rest. The ones who give that rating will be wrong anyway. 0 should be unplayable horrid mess while 10 should be revered as the second coming, and quite frankly should only be awarded once or twice a decade.

The way to get the correct score is to play the game and form  your own opinion, to be honest.  User reviews are an absolute mess, and critic reviews, although often more accurate, are still one person's opinion.  For a more mainstream game if you find someone who has similar tastes to you, critic reviews can be quite good, but for FM you're already looking at a pretty niche game which is tough to review accurately.  Even if you had someone who likes football games, they may not really "get" FM or particularly enjoy it.  So is that review still valid?

It's currently sitting at 81 for critic reviews and 5.9 for user.  I'd say both are pretty inaccurate.  

EDIT: And from the user reviews metacritic have actually published, I can only see one that looks as well thought out as a review should be (although the review itself points to a score lower than the eventual 6 that was given).  That was offset by a large number of 0s, mostly regurgitating the usual buzzwords of tactics, injuries, morale etc (although one 0 did mention the sub bug that has just been fixed).  One person gave a 10, and I think you'll agree, it's a very good review

Quote

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*shrug*

[stoned_assasin]

Tbh a review of FM should be easy to do as not much changes every year apart from the odd new addition they add. So you arent really needed to review the whole game as much as just reviewing the new addition's. It took me literally 5 minutes of playing fm18 to know most of what its about, good and bad.

[forameuss]

18 minutes ago, stoned_assasin said:

Tbh a review of FM should be easy to do as not much changes every year apart from the odd new addition they add. So you arent really needed to review the whole game as much as just reviewing the new addition's. It took me literally 5 minutes of playing fm18 to know most of what its about, good and bad.

That's from the perspective of someone who knows the game though.  How does that give someone who is new to the game a good idea of how good the game is?  It'd be a pretty poor review that misses out most of what the game is.

[stoned_assasin]

18 minutes ago, forameuss said:

That's from the perspective of someone who knows the game though.  How does that give someone who is new to the game a good idea of how good the game is?  It'd be a pretty poor review that misses out most of what the game is.

Meaning the reviewer, If reviewed FM in the past will not have to spend as much time going over the game because 90% you can copy and paste from last year.

[Nuno Dias]

Forgetting everything else, there is a demo, why bother with reviews, if there isn't a demo then you go see the reviews and i mostly see youtube gameplay reviews, whatever the review says i can see the gameplay and make my own opinion from seeing a variety of videos and making my own mind of the different opinions, not the actual scores they give, thats so subjective, and as far as bugs go, the only bug i came across in FM 18 is some slowness from day to day, wich is a bother, but in Destiny 2 i can't log to the server for hours because...who knows why ?!?!?!?!, some other people have the same problem, some don't, that stops me from playing, the slowness, doesn't.

I undestand that some people have some bugs that i haven't come across and it is a bad experience, but to me this game is never a 6/10, but that is it, it's MY OPINION, every one has the right to have one

As for paid reviews, it can happen, but i trully don't believe that SI play in that league, i can be wrong, but i just don't believe it, i have played this game since the amiga and i never saw them in that way, sorry, perhaps i'm just dumb or something... 

[forameuss]

10 minutes ago, stoned_assasin said:

Meaning the reviewer, If reviewed FM in the past will not have to spend as much time going over the game because 90% you can copy and paste from last year.

Yeah, fair enough.  Misunderstood what you'd said.  No idea whether that's how they do it, but I seem to remember someone - may have been a mod - bemonaning how FM is a bit of an odd one to review, and doesn't always get the attention it perhaps requires to review accurately.  

I'd almost err on the side of FM being unreviewable.  Or at least reviewed with considerable caveats.  Is your average reviewer really going to spend the many, many (many, many, many) hours that it would take to accurately judge player development?  How the gameworld looks after 50 years?  Hell, to play one season in the detail I assume reviewers hold themselves to, that's going to take a fair while.  You'll get the broad strokes, but the finer detail - where a game like this stands or falls - is always going to be missed.

11 minutes ago, Nuno Dias said:

Forgetting everything else, there is a demo, why bother with reviews, if there isn't a demo then you go see the reviews and i mostly see youtube gameplay reviews, whatever the review says i can see the gameplay and make my own opinion from seeing a variety of videos and making my own mind of the different opinions, not the actual scores they give, thats so subjective, and as far as bugs go, the only bug i came across in FM 18 is some slowness from day to day, wich is a bother, but in Destiny 2 i can't log to the server for hours because...who knows why ?!?!?!?!, some other people have the same problem, some don't, that stops me from playing, the slowness, doesn't.

I undestand that some people have some bugs that i haven't come across and it is a bad experience, but to me this game is never a 6/10, but that is it, it's MY OPINION, every one has the right to have one

As for paid reviews, it can happen, but i trully don't believe that SI play in that league, i can be wrong, but i just don't believe it, i have played this game since the amiga and i never saw them in that way, sorry, perhaps i'm just dumb or something... 

This.  Get the demo, and then for that 6 month period you'll get a good enough feel on whether you're going to enjoy the game or not.  I really don't understand why people nowadays seem so intent on trusting the words of people they've never met, just to save themselves from forming their own opinion.

[Mons]

6 minutes ago, forameuss said:

This.  Get the demo, and then for that 6 month period you'll get a good enough feel on whether you're going to enjoy the game or not.  I really don't understand why people nowadays seem so intent on trusting the words of people they've never met, just to save themselves from forming their own opinion.

Mostly because it's easier that way and absolves them from any perceptive thinking and responsibility.

 

Then, if their experience doesn't match up with those of the expert, then the expert is an ignoramus or corrupt or any other adjective at hand, and it's not at all my fault for trusting them blindly.

[psucolonel]

PC Gamer probably have the most honest and thoughtful review

[Etebaer]

Some Bugs still be there since FM11...oh wait, it is my Computer bcs i bought it in 2011 too....

[Lem]

Try the demo every year. It tends to show you the same old bugs and issues and prove it's just a roster update with a new feature that doesn't work correctly yet. It hasn't come far in 6 years, but at least this version didn't crash on me in the first couple hours.
Finally coughed up £20 this year though. There's no way I'd have paid £38 for it, just not good enough.

[Tony Wright 747]

3 hours ago, Lem said:

Try the demo every year. It tends to show you the same old bugs and issues and prove it's just a roster update with a new feature that doesn't work correctly yet. It hasn't come far in 6 years, but at least this version didn't crash on me in the first couple hours.
Finally coughed up £20 this year though. There's no way I'd have paid £38 for it, just not good enough.

after trying the demo for a week I don't believe it's worth £20 at the moment, and I don't think there will be enough improvements in the next patch to change that.  I would probably pay no more than a fiver to be honest, thats what I did with FM16, got it for about that amount as part of a multi game package at the local computer shop, but have now gone back to playing FM12.