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Don't expect FM to get any better until FM21 (2021)


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Having now clocked over 2000 hours, Im finally stopping playing FM18 and maybe FM for the next 3 to 4 years! I appreciate all the time and effort put into the game but we have been sold the same game for the past  5 years or so without any radical changes to gameplay... Defenders are still unresponsive to defensive tactics, Attackers are just playing their own game by the goal post and let's not mention keepers! ... That sense of satisfaction is lost for me and i don't expect FM to get any radical immprovements for the next  to 3 to 4 years!

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I don't understand people like this. Simply play the demo before buying the game. If you then go ahead to buy the game, you've made YOUR decision and should stick with whatever consequences might be on the offing. 

It really doesn't get much simpler than that.

I've not bought the game since FM 2014, as I still have a long-going save going (and to a lesser extent, I feel the FM 14 version is the most balanced of the ME's and Player interactions).

And guess what, after what, is it 5 years? I'm happy as a bunny (:

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9 hours ago, samuelawachie said:

I don't understand people like this. Simply play the demo before buying the game. If you then go ahead to buy the game, you've made YOUR decision and should stick with whatever consequences might be on the offing. 

It really doesn't get much simpler than that.

I've not bought the game since FM 2014, as I still have a long-going save going (and to a lesser extent, I feel the FM 14 version is the most balanced of the ME's and Player interactions).

And guess what, after what, is it 5 years? I'm happy as a bunny (:

We'll have none of this common sense lark in here.  Don't you know that SI forces people to buy the game?!

On a more serious note, I've never understood the people that talk about buying the game at the same time as saying it hasn't improved for a number of years.  Why are you still buying it then?!  The free demo won't tell you the whole story, but if you're happy to proclaim that nothing has changed, you'd be able to form that opinion with the demo too.  Then save yourself some money and go do something else.  It's almost like people are absolutely terrified at the thought of not having an FM game to play that they're happy to put themselves through the agony of buying and then hating something just so they have it.

As for the OP and his sports almanac, I expect he'll probably be back next year, probably complaining about it again.  Unless he's absolutely sure about the completely made up assertion that somehow 2021 will be "the year".

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In 5 years the situation will be more or less the same, its the nature of the beast. FM is very stale series with very little change and improvement. To some people this is good, to some its whatever and to some its the kiss of death.

I personally accept it and still buy their games, but deep down I hope someone else develops a better game, so I can switch and support them instead.

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I played the FM18 demo. I didn't think it was an improvement on FM17, so I decided not to buy the new game and stuck with the older versions instead. Try before you buy - that's the purpose of the demo, isn't it?

21 minutes ago, Baodan said:

In 5 years the situation will be more or less the same, its the nature of the beast. FM is very stale series with very little change and improvement. To some people this is good, to some its whatever and to some its the kiss of death.

I personally accept it and still buy their games, but deep down I hope someone else develops a better game, so I can switch and support them instead.

FM probably seems like "very stale series" because, as far as management simulators go, it is already comprehensive. Of course, things can and will be gradually improved over time (much like in FIFA and PES). But if you are expecting radical changes for every new version of a game that already simulates football far better than anything else on the market, your expectations are probably too high.

As for somebody else releasing a better game... EA tried that. Eidos tried that after the split. FIFA Manager, Championship Manager, Ultimate Soccer Manager, Premier Manager... they've all more or less fallen by the wayside, simply because SI have released consistently excellent titles for 25 years and boast a comprehensive database that nobody else can come close to competing with. That's why FM have no real competition now, and that's why they won't have any in the near-future.

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1 hour ago, Baodan said:

I personally accept it and still buy their games, but deep down I hope someone else develops a better game, so I can switch and support them instead.

They've already cornered the market. Nobody would be mad enough to risk an investment to compete with them.

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It's important people share their experiences and frustrations, to the OP I can understand some of what it feels you are trying to portray as effectively the game is the same.  I think my frustrations are more that rather than building the game up and tweaking it to further improve it the changes they make year on year at times decrease the appeal of the game or they change aspects that are superfluous to the experience and overlook far bigger problems.  I don't mind minor changes if they are improving a core function but the usual '200 changes this year' really is more a marketing ploy than anything else as sometimes if feels they change things just for changing sake.

The 3D ME was always going to be a problem when introduced as it has and is nowhere near watching a real game of football representation wise.  I would have hoped that the improvements would have been far more drastic than they have but maybe time is needed in that regard.

I like the game, I just don't love it anymore.  

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1 hour ago, CFuller said:

FM probably seems like "very stale series" because, as far as management simulators go, it is already comprehensive.

Sure FM is already very comprehensive and that is definitely one of the reasons why its such a stale series. This is not necessarily a bad thing and I still support the series despite this, like I said.  

1 hour ago, CFuller said:

Of course, things can and will be gradually improved over time (much like in FIFA and PES). But if you are expecting radical changes for every new version of a game that already simulates football far better than anything else on the market, your expectations are probably too high.

Fifa and PES sadly suffers from the exact same staleness as FM, no doubt about that.

Most people want exciting new changes for next years version of one of their favourite games, maybe not you but I do believe this covers most. Wanting and expecting something is not the same thing. I want something new to give me greater joy and help me forget how stale this game really is, but I expect nothing.

1 hour ago, CFuller said:

As for somebody else releasing a better game... EA tried that. Eidos tried that after the split. FIFA Manager, Championship Manager, Ultimate Soccer Manager, Premier Manager... they've all more or less fallen by the wayside, simply because SI have released consistently excellent titles for 25 years and boast a comprehensive database that nobody else can come close to competing with. That's why FM have no real competition now, and that's why they won't have any in the near-future.

I preferred and played both Fifa Manager and Championship Manager over FM and I was very sad to see them fail to challenge FM. I very much doubt they failed due to SI having released consistently excellent titles for 25 years, because that's simply not true. From the fellow manager enthusiasts I've talked to, it seems to be more due people sticking with what they know. Its nice a familiar to play FM, as it changes so little, and its a decent enough game so why bother trying to learn something new and confusing.

Neither Fifa Manager nor Championship Manager were great games that outclassed FM, but they did have some nice ideas - especially Fifa Manager. 

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All neat ideas in the world (and those games did have them) won't win anybody over when the core football simulation is either a one way soccer Fifa 3d engine that even when encouraged to play differently, sees two sides playing constantly 2x6 minutes kick and rush attacking football against another -- or when the text simulation that every single other game simulated goes through including optionally your own is basically a random throw of the dice that sees the stronger team (e.g. team with "stronger" players) winning more often than not.

That's also why PES Management and all the other stuff failed. I think the last CM also had great ideas (set piece editors, etc.), but the core football of it is the crux of the matter. And why CM/FM have prevailed. During a significant portion of that time, it was competing with purely text against then high-end 3d visuals -- and official licenses to boot. And prevailed. That's the core of the gig, and still is. Without a somewhat robust match simulation where everything comes together: transfers, player development, man management, tactics, any such game is at best like a pretty-on-the-outside sports car running on the motor of a Citroen 2CV. It's by far the hardest part to get right too, or else not that many games had failed so badly -- and any budget or free to play release skips any serious attempt at a match simulation proper completely. Speaking of which, I'm looking forward to upgrades and long-term improvements on that front as to FM too.

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1 hour ago, diddydaddydoddy said:

@Baodan I never played FIFA Manager, so out of interest what 'nice ideas' did it have?

They had a sort of sim city feature where you could build or improve facilities including subway access and better parking, hotels and such. Some of these things drained money while others generated money for the club.

You also had the option to actually use the money you earned in game to buy houses, cars and other luxury goods. Or alternatively buy stocks or put the money in a savings account to try to maximize profits. You could also donate money to your club or by a club outright.

You could chose to periodically get a girlfriend with random attributes, who you could then have children with or break up with and find a new one. Your children could become interested in football and become players in the game, coming up trough your own clubs youth academy.

Merchandise was a much bigger part of the game, because you could chose what kind you wanted to sell and buy advertisement or place fan shops in countries with a lot of football fans or simply countries where you had players from and was more well known. 

The match engine was also more entertaining, in my opinion.

I'm still missing out on a lot of things here I know, but its been a long time since I last played Fifa Manager.

They did the manager part very well but the football part less well.

I just remembered you could also build and upgrade youth camps and hire coaches to train those players. You then had the option to transfer any good youth players from the youth camp to your own youth team, if that was your wish.  I'm also pretty sure you had more youth teams U19, U17, U15 and such. In general you had much more control over that entire aspect of management, compared to FM.

 

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13 hours ago, samuelawachie said:

I don't understand people like this. Simply play the demo before buying the game. If you then go ahead to buy the game, you've made YOUR decision and should stick with whatever consequences might be on the offing. 

It really doesn't get much simpler than that.

I've not bought the game since FM 2014, as I still have a long-going save going (and to a lesser extent, I feel the FM 14 version is the most balanced of the ME's and Player interactions).

And guess what, after what, is it 5 years? I'm happy as a bunny (:

The demo gives a reasonable snapshot of FM but it’s only 6 months which means a lot can be missed or simply not manifest in such a short play window.

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11 minutes ago, Baodan said:

They had a sort of sim city feature where you could build or improve facilities including subway access and better parking, hotels and such. Some of these things drained money while others generated money for the club.

You also had the option to actually use the money you earned in game to buy houses, cars and other luxury goods. Or alternatively buy stocks or put the money in a savings account to try to maximize profits. You could also donate money to your club or by a club outright.

You could chose to periodically get a girlfriend with random attributes, who you could then have children with or break up with and find a new one. Your children could become interested in football and become players in the game, coming up trough your own clubs youth academy.

Merchandise was a much bigger part of the game, because you could chose what kind you wanted to sell and buy advertisement or place fan shops in countries with a lot of football fans or simply countries where you had players from and was more well known. 

The match engine was also more entertaining, in my opinion.

I'm still missing out on a lot of things here I know, but its been a long time since I last played Fifa Manager.

They did the manager part very well but the football part less well.

 

Fifa Manager had some great ideas, Most of them SI are adding to the game now as a new feature which is poor IMHO. team dynamics, more varied team talks,3d stadium editor,kit editor, scouting packages, analysis tools,Have your own son,Specialised staff and some other impressive visualisation styles.

 

all these were present 6 and 7 years ago, FM still has a way to go to be honest specially that the match engine is just not representative of a the game of football and is lacking in variation and excitement.

 

By the way Fifa manager failed because the match engine was as poor as FM’s by the end.

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A lot of what FIFA Manager had that FM didn't (and still doesn't) was that life simulation stuff, which basically just glossed over what was - by and large - a poor-quality game. Basically, as TMS said, all style and no substance.

I played its predecessors FA Premier League Football Manager (2000) and Total Club Manager (2004/2005), plus a couple of FIFA Manager demos, but never got past the first season. I did like the idea of 2005's 'Create a Club' feature, which allowed one to create a club in the local leagues and take them up to the Premiership, as well as those very young age-group teams. That being said, there was an awful lot of filler, none of which I would like to see in FM.

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29 minutes ago, themadsheep2001 said:

FIFA manager never had a match engine even close to FM. Can't even begin to compare the two on that front. All impressive shine, which you'd expect from EA, but no real substance.

As said, there wasn't even the slightest bits of strategy involved, from none of the teams (including AI). One team wins the ball and kicks it forward. On the plus side for some, you would never ever face a match where you may have scored little of 30 shots, as both the engine as well as the AI was completely incapable of even approaching the dynamics at play here (teams parking the bus, teams shuffling possession around for little space and relying hugely on individual skill to unlock a thing, etc.). :p

Lump the ball forward, and goal, that's it. It's not a one off though. PES Management was the same. The tech was never coded with management in mind to begin with. One of the last reviews from PC Gamer pretty much nailed it, and that's not a one off. On one of the first releases, the 3d engine didnt'even adopt the formation you put in, they all played 4-4-2. That said, there were good parts. But I'd argue these games failed precisely because the core sim didn't add much up to it (outside of looking nice). That's not even arguing FM has ever been the finished deal.... the contrary, and some recent stuff I found puzzling (wide midfielders FM17...) But it's arguably been the only management series, major one, that didn't treat the match days as an afterthought or Fifa visual gimmick, but places it core and center, as that's where every action you take, same as any AI comes together. Transfers, player development, etc. There's a lot of distances the go as to FM, and approached purely as a "Total Club Managament" kind of game, Fifa et all could still be some bun. But the gap was never close. The match days plain even didn't work, except on a very basic level: Two sides kicking it about with some nice animations.

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Just now, CFuller said:

A lot of what FIFA Manager had that FM didn't (and still doesn't) was that life simulation stuff, which basically just glossed over what was - by and large - a poor-quality game. Basically, as TMS said, all style and no substance.

I played its predecessors FA Premier League Football Manager (2000) and Total Club Manager (2004/2005), plus a couple of FIFA Manager demos, but never got past the first season. I did like the idea of 2005's 'Create a Club' feature, which allowed one to create a club in the local leagues and take them up to the Premiership, as well as those very young age-group teams. That being said, there was an awful lot of filler, none of which I would like to see in FM.

Should be at added, that some of the life quality stuff was good (team dynamics), but a lot of it are things that SI have long stated they have no interest in.

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I think the expectations of the ME is the biggest letdown . From the first time they introduced it about 7 or 8 years ago the ME and its graphics have ? ?? well not improved in great leaps and bounds . Players are still ice skating , and we all know about how the defences are somewhat ordinary . It must get on with improving the ME dramatically because really its the same game it was 6 years ago with a few extra features . 

Its an opinion that I'm feeling so don't go ape over it :) 

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46 minutes ago, Baodan said:

They had a sort of sim city feature where you could build or improve facilities including subway access and better parking, hotels and such. Some of these things drained money while others generated money for the club.

Not the job of a manager. Not even close. That is sim chairman and don't have anything in FM, in my opinion.

47 minutes ago, Baodan said:

You also had the option to actually use the money you earned in game to buy houses, cars and other luxury goods. Or alternatively buy stocks or put the money in a savings account to try to maximize profits. You could also donate money to your club or by a club outright.

You could chose to periodically get a girlfriend with random attributes, who you could then have children with or break up with and find a new one. Your children could become interested in football and become players in the game, coming up trough your own clubs youth academy.

You can do most of this in another game, it's called The Sims. Once again, nothing to do with FM.

48 minutes ago, Baodan said:

Merchandise was a much bigger part of the game, because you could chose what kind you wanted to sell and buy advertisement or place fan shops in countries with a lot of football fans or simply countries where you had players from and was more well known. 

It seems you really like to play simulations, and while FM is a simulation, it's not a life sim. Hopefully, it will stay this way.

50 minutes ago, Baodan said:

The match engine was also more entertaining, in my opinion.

I'm still missing out on a lot of things here I know, but its been a long time since I last played Fifa Manager.

They did the manager part very well but the football part less well.

I just remembered you could also build and upgrade youth camps and hire coaches to train those players. You then had the option to transfer any good youth players from the youth camp to your own youth team, if that was your wish.  I'm also pretty sure you had more youth teams U19, U17, U15 and such. In general you had much more control over that entire aspect of management, compared to FM.

Never played it, so I can't comment on the ME, but looking at others here it seems rather bad.

I would change the line to "They did the life sim good, but the football part less well" since that is more what you are mentioning. Real life or business are not part of FM. The same way you don't manage the cleaning staff, security or other part of a football club not directly linked to the sport.

Training camps and wanting to upgrade youth facilities are already part of the game, the same goes for coaches and training. FM also supports real life teams down to U18 (if I recall correctly).

While there are many parts of FM I would like improved, your examples are mostly on my personal "I will quit FM if this is implemented"-list. 

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I remember playing some manager games years ago that some management aspects I quite enjoyed, be it setting the ticket prices, building the stadium, selecting the sponsors etc. It can be fun done in the right way. I even remember in Ultimate Soccer Manager way back when you could offer bungs to referees! :D 

However saying that, we've always been quite clear in terms of the direction of Football Manager and type of game it is. We see Football Manager as a simulation, therefore those types of thing aren't in our game. They're not within the manager's remit so it's not a realistic part of the simulation. For the full fat Football Manager I wouldn't expect to ever see these types of things implemented. 

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I find it difficult to play any other version other than FM12.

  • I bought FM13 and it was far too slow because of a shortlisting issue causing the computer to slowdown. Went back to FM12.
  • Skipped FM14 as I played the demo and hated the new interface.
  • Got FM15 free and didn't enjoy it at all.
  • FM16 played the demo about 50 times just didn't like it.
  • FM17 Played it for a few hours went back to FM12.
  • FM18 - yet to try it and reluctanct.
  • Currently - FM12, Having a great time with Barcelona having spending 30 years getting through the bottom leagues of the english conferences, to league champions.

 

I don't know, FM12 just feels more complete and realistic. More of a game and more fun.

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5 hours ago, Neil Brock said:

I remember playing some manager games years ago that some management aspects I quite enjoyed, be it setting the ticket prices, building the stadium, selecting the sponsors etc. It can be fun done in the right way. I even remember in Ultimate Soccer Manager way back when you could offer bungs to referees! :D 

However saying that, we've always been quite clear in terms of the direction of Football Manager and type of game it is. We see Football Manager as a simulation, therefore those types of thing aren't in our game. They're not within the manager's remit so it's not a realistic part of the simulation. For the full fat Football Manager I wouldn't expect to ever see these types of things implemented. 

I’m saving this post for when SI announce stadium building, Sponsors and kit designing as a marquee feature in 2021:D

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1 hour ago, qwerty22 said:

I’m saving this post for when SI announce stadium building, Sponsors and kit designing as a marquee feature in 2021:D

I'll admit I'm down for incorporating some level of "Football Owner 2020" lol

Give me something to do with all the money I earn over a career! Hahaha.

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7 hours ago, Neil Brock said:

I remember playing some manager games years ago that some management aspects I quite enjoyed, be it setting the ticket prices, building the stadium, selecting the sponsors etc. It can be fun done in the right way. I even remember in Ultimate Soccer Manager way back when you could offer bungs to referees! :D 

However saying that, we've always been quite clear in terms of the direction of Football Manager and type of game it is. We see Football Manager as a simulation, therefore those types of thing aren't in our game. They're not within the manager's remit so it's not a realistic part of the simulation. For the full fat Football Manager I wouldn't expect to ever see these types of things implemented. 

Completely blocking out these non management features could eventually be the downfall of FM. There seems to be a big demand for this crossover between football manager and real world sim. Fifa manager failed and other failed because they never got a ME that could compete with FM. If this game was to return with a ME that could compete with these previous features then it would wipe the floor with FM. This game has become stale. The ME and tactics haven’t progressed enough recently and the 3D graphics and animations are still very poor.

The game has got to the point for me where something has to happen to move it forward. Whether that be a tactical overhaul, shiny new graphics or a brand new completely fantasy owner mode with some of the stuff you found in the old Fifa manager games. 

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8 hours ago, Neil Brock said:

I remember playing some manager games years ago that some management aspects I quite enjoyed, be it setting the ticket prices, building the stadium, selecting the sponsors etc. It can be fun done in the right way. I even remember in Ultimate Soccer Manager way back when you could offer bungs to referees! :D 

However saying that, we've always been quite clear in terms of the direction of Football Manager and type of game it is. We see Football Manager as a simulation, therefore those types of thing aren't in our game. They're not within the manager's remit so it's not a realistic part of the simulation. For the full fat Football Manager I wouldn't expect to ever see these types of things implemented. 

I always I'll face FM as a SIM game and not a Managering course as someones face it. I see some fails in FM as game and as simulator too, mainly about the tactics, ME and even the club managering, as the lack of youth academies outside the club. Things that could be included already in the game and I would expect see something of this in the next version, mainly the tactical part. 

Motorsport Manager, IMO, is dealing well bringing a fun of a game and the simulator part. 

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@XaW

I never said I wanted any of those features in FM, I merely answered Diddy what nice ideas they had in my opinion. You make a lot of assumptions that I quite frankly don't care for.  

18 hours ago, XaW said:

Never played it, so I can't comment on the ME, but looking at others here it seems rather bad.

I'm no expert on match engines or a tactical genius, so my evaluation is based solely on the enjoyment I experienced while watching the matches.

20 hours ago, Baodan said:

I just remembered you could also build and upgrade youth camps and hire coaches to train those players.

How do you read this quote and assume I'm talking about training camps and normal youth facilities already implemented in FM? Also how do you read me saying that youth development goes deeper than U18 and then comment saying U18 is already in the game? If you are confused just say so and I'll try to elaborate.

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22 minutes ago, Baodan said:

@XaW

I never said I wanted any of those features in FM, I merely answered Diddy what nice ideas they had in my opinion. You make a lot of assumptions that I quite frankly don't care for.  

I'm no expert on match engines or a tactical genius, so my evaluation is based solely on the enjoyment I experienced while watching the matches.

How do you read this quote and assume I'm talking about training camps and normal youth facilities already implemented in FM? Also how do you read me saying that youth development goes deeper than U18 and then comment saying U18 is already in the game? If you are confused just say so and I'll try to elaborate.

You said it was nice ideas, and I disagree. I think those ideas are more in a life sim than a football sim like FM. By all means, many people might like a game like that, but it's not for me. I had no intentions of offending you, rather that I disagree any of those ideas are something I would want in FM. If a user asks what nice features the game had that FM does not, I would assume these are features you would like added. If not, then why mention them at all? If you didn't like the features, why would you even think to mention them as nice, missing features?

For the match engine I read here that whatever you did had no impact on what actually happened in the match. Like tactics were always 4-4-2 even if you had chosen something else. And quite frankly, that's not even close to acceptable in my mind. I've been tinkering with tactics since I first played CM in the early 90s, so a football management game without a real tactical impact is not something I would even consider paying for. Even a game such as FM have certain tactical aspects that are sorely lacking, however hard to implement, but it's the closest thing out there.

29 minutes ago, Baodan said:

How do you read this quote and assume I'm talking about training camps and normal youth facilities already implemented in FM? Also how do you read me saying that youth development goes deeper than U18 and then comment saying U18 is already in the game? If you are confused just say so and I'll try to elaborate.

Regarding youth camps and such you wrote;

20 hours ago, Baodan said:

I just remembered you could also build and upgrade youth camps and hire coaches to train those players. You then had the option to transfer any good youth players from the youth camp to your own youth team, if that was your wish.  I'm also pretty sure you had more youth teams U19, U17, U15 and such.

My comment to that was:

19 hours ago, XaW said:

Training camps and wanting to upgrade youth facilities are already part of the game, the same goes for coaches and training. FM also supports real life teams down to U18 (if I recall correctly).

So, yes, I think my comment was on point. SI have stated several times that there are legal reasons why they don't include any younger than U18. In FM18 you are able to build youth facilities, hire youth coaches and set training focus and ask the board to set a higher budget for youth recruitment and youth coaching, and once a year we have a youth intake based on those, so exactly what are we missing with youth, within legal boundaries?

So yes, I am quite confused as to how I misread or misinterpreted your comments? Please enlighten me, if you would.

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8 hours ago, RobertPage said:

Completely blocking out these non management features could eventually be the downfall of FM. There seems to be a big demand for this crossover between football manager and real world sim. Fifa manager failed and other failed because they never got a ME that could compete with FM. If this game was to return with a ME that could compete with these previous features then it would wipe the floor with FM. This game has become stale. The ME and tactics haven’t progressed enough recently and the 3D graphics and animations are still very poor.

The game has got to the point for me where something has to happen to move it forward. Whether that be a tactical overhaul, shiny new graphics or a brand new completely fantasy owner mode with some of the stuff you found in the old Fifa manager games. 

I've pointed out my views of non-management things before so I wont add to it here, but you bring up a couple of valid points at least to bring the game forward.

1. For graphics and animation I don't think the core fans of the series would matter much. A lot of us have played this game since long before 2D was a thing. I usually don't play 3D at all, and it has nothing to do with the quality. That said, many do enjoy this and with the new graphics engine we got for FM18 will hopefully let SI improve this quite a bit for future games.

2. Tactical improvements. This is something would love to see improved. In my last post I linked to a suggestion I had a while back for transitional instructions. Not an easy feature to implement, but still one of the most important feature lacking in my opinion. I used Liverpool under Klopp as an example. If they lose the ball they pressure immensely for a few seconds, but the opponent is able to play of the pressure, then they drop back and invite the ball into their half. This is not possible to replicate at the moment. This will also let teams play a counterattacking option, but only when the played deem it possible (based on player skils, vision, decisions etc) or else do back to a slower paced football.

3. Not something you wrote about, but I would like the AI to be improved a lot. Both for players in the ME and for managers and their reactions both in matches and outside. When you play FM for a bunch of seasons and almost all players are newgens, it gets all too easy to steamroll over AI teams. Seemingly because of poor squad balancing from the AI, and/or the quality of training from the AI.

So, respectfully, while I agree that change is most welcome in FM, a fantasy chairman or life sim on the side are not at all things I would like see added.

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There are simply limitations for how much new you can put into a management game (without disrupting the original purpose of what you intent a management game to be).

As SI have said before, they continuously work on the ME to be better for each version (and improvements can be seen for each new versions IMO).

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@XaW

I was asked about nice ideas and I answered, keyword here being ideas and not well implemented features that I would like to see in FM. I like the ideas because they're outside the very confined box of FM. If some of them got reworked then maybe they could make for decent additions.

Regarding the ME - I never felt like I wasn't able to make an impact through formation and play-style choices. Again I'm no expert and I never did a ton of testing, but I was happy enough and if I recall correctly FM still didn't have 3D matches, so that might have been part of it.

Youth Camps were basically Youth Facilities you could build in other countries, preferably places with good talent-mass such as Brazil or Argentina. The Youth Camp then started generating players based on a variety of factors such as: The country, Population, Facility rank and competition from other clubs in the area. You could then pay to upgrade the Youth Camp to have better facilities, you could hire a good coach to function kinda like HOYD and then transfer talented players back to your main clubs youth team.

I don't know anything about the legal side of things, but I did like having the ability to influence youth development on a much deeper level.

I like starting out in the lower leagues and then work my way up, and right now its extremely time-consuming to bring a clubs youth recruitment up to an acceptable level. 

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How many clubs bring players in from youth camps in other nations? There may be the odd club that does them, but realistically without concrete evidence they're widespread in football it's not really something that is realistic to add into the game.

Likewise talking about youth development - how much direct involvement do the manager's of clubs have on the players coming in at ages under 16? If you remove Wenger from the equation, the average time a Premier league manager gets before leaving a club is now under a season. Realistically they're out the door before they've even had the chance to consider the youth side of things. Again realistically, aside from a general overview you'd find most managers leave the youth side of development to their Head of Youth Development. 

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1 hour ago, Toonrock said:

There are simply limitations for how much new you can put into a management game (without disrupting the original purpose of what you intent a management game to be).

As SI have said before, they continuously work on the ME to be better for each version (and improvements can be seen for each new versions IMO).

I disagree - from I started playing again (FM 2014) and to now (FM 2018) its pretty much the same. The closest you get to a wow-factor is when someone hits an insane longshot, the rest is very standard unexciting football.

This is just my opinion.

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@Neil Brock

I have no idea how prevalent the use of Youth Camps is in the real world of football. In Denmark we have a club like FC Midtjylland that has managed to produce quite a few good players from their Youth Camp in Nigeria.

I don't know much about the day-to-day business of managers in the real world, but I myself try to get as involved as possible. So naturally I'd look to get involved as early as possible and preferably as broadly as possible.

If the HOYD didn't have any influence on the hidden stats of the youth players, then I wouldn't bother with him at all. He seems like he has the role of taking care of something the player has opted out of doing.

In any case realism is not really something FM follows religiously, although it does try.

 

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Most of these kind of complaints are from people who think too much of the Manager as the 'manager' figure in traditional UK football. Well, that figure exists less and less nowadays. Maybe Wenger and Pochettino but not much more have that kind of control.

Most managers just handle training and tactics. Transfers are dictated by the board/DOF, they can offer some suggestions but they are anywhere near negotiations.

While I like that part of the game, and if you choose to operate without a DOF it's ok to include this part, some of the things said here are borderline outrageous and have never been and should probably never be considered to include in the FM series.

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On 21/02/2018 at 09:04, forameuss said:

We'll have none of this common sense lark in here.  Don't you know that SI forces people to buy the game?!

On a more serious note, I've never understood the people that talk about buying the game at the same time as saying it hasn't improved for a number of years.  Why are you still buying it then?!  The free demo won't tell you the whole story, but if you're happy to proclaim that nothing has changed, you'd be able to form that opinion with the demo too.  Then save yourself some money and go do something else.  It's almost like people are absolutely terrified at the thought of not having an FM game to play that they're happy to put themselves through the agony of buying and then hating something just so they have it.

As for the OP and his sports almanac, I expect he'll probably be back next year, probably complaining about it again.  Unless he's absolutely sure about the completely made up assertion that somehow 2021 will be "the year".

In fairness, the initial FM18 match engine was good IMO, it's the ME contained within the patch released prior to Christmas which has (for me) killed any enjoyment of the game.

The 'play before pay' argument doesn't really work for FM as patches can effectively change the game fundamentally overnight.

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2 minutes ago, fidelitywars said:

In fairness, the initial FM18 match engine was good IMO, it's the ME contained within the patch released prior to Christmas which has (for me) killed any enjoyment of the game.

The 'play before pay' argument doesn't really work for FM as patches can effectively change the game fundamentally overnight.

For the ME, absolutely.  And if someone came on and said "I tried the demo, liked it, bought it, then it changed" then that's unfortunate and absolutely fair enough.

But I'd be willing to bet that a lot of people who complain about the game never changing, and for years, then they haven't done any of that.  You can't get an idea of anything long-term given the 6 month limit, but you can get a good idea of most of the game features, certainly what has changed or not changed.  

Personally, I don't think I've ever downloaded the demo.  I trust that the game will always - even when it's one of the poorer versions - give me enough entertainment to justify the relatively low initial cost.  If it doesn't, then I really don't have anyone else to blame but myself.  It's that attitude I hate, but unfortunately it appears to be the norm across a lot of areas these days.

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4 minutes ago, forameuss said:

For the ME, absolutely.  And if someone came on and said "I tried the demo, liked it, bought it, then it changed" then that's unfortunate and absolutely fair enough.

But I'd be willing to bet that a lot of people who complain about the game never changing, and for years, then they haven't done any of that.  You can't get an idea of anything long-term given the 6 month limit, but you can get a good idea of most of the game features, certainly what has changed or not changed.  

Personally, I don't think I've ever downloaded the demo.  I trust that the game will always - even when it's one of the poorer versions - give me enough entertainment to justify the relatively low initial cost.  If it doesn't, then I really don't have anyone else to blame but myself.  It's that attitude I hate, but unfortunately it appears to be the norm across a lot of areas these days.

Likewise - I don't bother with the menu as I'd buy the game purely for access to the database. Obviously, i'd ideally also really enjoy the game but that's not been the case this year since the aforementioned December patch. 

Still, hopeful that the winter update will improve the match engine but even if not, i'll still get hours out of scouring the updated DB.*

Very much accept this is a niche and deeply, deeply geeky stance.

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FIFA manager was an entertaining game. Was it a good football management SIM? No.

 

I only played TCM2005, but I spent hours and hours on it. I loved the create a club feature which put you in the gritty pub leagues. It had some weird feature where you could take over another similar level club for a season as their Chairman/manager temporarily. I used to just sell that club and then pump those funds into my own :D

 

Also enjoyed the youth system, iirc you had control of youth players down to the age of 11 and it was pretty great seeing them finally make it to their first professional appearance at 16. 

Building your stadium from the ground up was pretty awesome too, as you had to control it sensibly. No point knocking up new stands if you were only getting 59 people turn up to a game, and over building would absolutely drain the finances. Merchandising was cool as well, just setting prices for jerseys, scarves and all the usual tat. It was pretty immersive for building a club up from nothing and bringing my team from a remote village in Gloucestershire to be the best team in the South west, then England, and eventually, Europe in a 60,000 seater stadium was pretty satisfying. 

 

But that's what I enjoyed, the little gimmicks like that. But as previously said, the actual football side of things was absolute dirge. Didn't help that wether you were playing a scrappy non league game against Bishop's Cleeve or a huge European cup final, the football looked exactly the same. 

 

I wouldn't mind another game like that at all, but those features have no place in FM. 

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13 minutes ago, fidelitywars said:

Likewise - I don't bother with the menu as I'd buy the game purely for access to the database. Obviously, i'd ideally also really enjoy the game but that's not been the case this year since the aforementioned December patch. 

Still, hopeful that the winter update will improve the match engine but even if not, i'll still get hours out of scouring the updated DB.*

Very much accept this is a niche and deeply, deeply geeky stance.

Nah, can completely understand that. I hated FM16 and 17 to the point where I didn't enjoy the game at all, but I spent a lot of time in the editor for both editions trying to build something that would revive my interest.  Didn't work, but if you could the editor as part of the game I still got hundreds of hours out of it.

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2 minutes ago, forameuss said:

Nah, can completely understand that. I hated FM16 and 17 to the point where I didn't enjoy the game at all, but I spent a lot of time in the editor for both editions trying to build something that would revive my interest.  Didn't work, but if you could the editor as part of the game I still got hundreds of hours out of it.

Pretty much the exact approach i'm taking with FM18. Have also found that editor data downloads which enable the Soviet Union league structure and J-League have revived my interest to an extent but i'm really, really not enjoying the current ME.

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i get this guys point to be fair. the game hasnt exactly been improved dramatically in the last few years. but what do we expect? at the end of the day its a game and its the closest out there in terms of the real thing. trouble is people lose a game as there top defender does something stupid and they lose their ***** saying it wouldnt happen in rl and all tht and then they watch chelsea barca and it does. your gonna lose games on this, your tactics might not work all the time, your forwards will miss 5 simple chances. your goalie will have a mare. you may get sacked. you might not be able to buy that top prospect you want as he costs 40 mill upwards. you will get frustrated. you will hate it.

but with all that the game is still the best there is!! ever been a liverpool fan of the last 20 yrs ? most of that applies to us lol.

 

when you play a fps you dont shoot your gun and expect to take down 400 oncoming soldiers. you dont play rpg and want an easy ride and win the game in a few hours so why when people play fm do they expect to win every game. score every chance? etc etc 

 

love the game and continue to feed back to make the game better 

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2 ore fa, Neil Brock ha scritto:

How many clubs bring players in from youth camps in other nations? There may be the odd club that does them, but realistically without concrete evidence they're widespread in football it's not really something that is realistic to add into the game.

In 2005, the Paris Saint-Germain Academy began expanding its network as part of the club's international development strategy.[2] To date, the PSG Academy has centres open in the Métropole du Grand Paris, elsewhere in France (Clermont-Ferrand, Dijon, Grenoble, Limoges, Montpellier), and in several other countries worldwide (Brazil, United States, Canada, Morocco, Egypt, India, Indonesia, United Arab Emirates, Lebanon, Portugal).[3][4] The Indonesian academy opened at the beginning of 2017 in partnership with local club Bali United.[5]

 

This is just PSG, but almost all top clubs all over the world have international academies. To be frank, their aim isn't really to poach top prospects but to raise the profile of the club in the region/country and generate more profit. That being said, I am not really sure FM needs something like that, besides, we have something similar already with commercial affiliates.

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On 2/20/2018 at 17:02, bassistuk said:

but we have been sold the same game for the past  5 years or so without any radical changes to gameplay

I feel like I am in a good position to have a view here. I recently returned to FM, having not played for three years, with FM13 being the last version purchased. So that means I hit the 'five year' thing square on the nose.

I suspect there is a bit of a sense of neural adaptation going on.  It's a psychology term which means a change over time in the responsiveness of the sensory system to a constant stimulus. It's like when your wife or a close friend that you see all the time gradually puts on weight. Since you see the person everyday, it's hardly noticed. But see someone who's done the same after 6 months, and you're like whoa!

Long-time players who never step aside from the game will have more difficulty seeing the changes from a broad picture perspective. They tend to bleed in to one another, particularly for games like FM that put out a new version each and every year. Having skipped FM14 through FM 17, playing FM 18 I have noticed many changes and improvements.

As an example, contract and transfer negotiations have improved in a massive way since FM13. I can recall offering contracts back then and if I didn't get it right, after a second try perhaps, the agent would slam the door and want nothing further to do with negotiating. Players seemed to always want to double their wages. In FM 18 it feels a proper negotiation. We don't always find an agreement, but it 'feels' as though both sides are actually looking to do business, to get something done, to compromise, to be professional, not throw toys out the pram. A massive improvement, in my view. One of my least favorite aspects of FM has become quite the opposite.

Another example is the medical center. It's brilliant, and for the first time ever in FM I feel like injuries, while not under my control, are at least something I can proactively monitor and attempt to prevent. There will always be a random aspect to injuries, and rightly so. But the medical center has gone some way to eliminating the exasperation I often felt, by giving me the tools to know when a player requires some time off, and when he is good to go.

New and/or improved are data analysis, heat maps, new roles, Team Report, Dynamics, and well, I could list many more. Change is there, but it's hard to see when you're looking every day. If you could step away from FM as I did, then it is seen more clearly. You or I might debate the value or usefullness of any of these changes, but I have to disagree that it's simply not there.

Then again, some players will be simply jaded, and in need of a rest :)

 

 

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13 minutes ago, MBarbaric said:

In 2005, the Paris Saint-Germain Academy began expanding its network as part of the club's international development strategy.[2] To date, the PSG Academy has centres open in the Métropole du Grand Paris, elsewhere in France (Clermont-Ferrand, Dijon, Grenoble, Limoges, Montpellier), and in several other countries worldwide (Brazil, United States, Canada, Morocco, Egypt, India, Indonesia, United Arab Emirates, Lebanon, Portugal).[3][4] The Indonesian academy opened at the beginning of 2017 in partnership with local club Bali United.[5]

 

This is just PSG, but almost all top clubs all over the world have international academies. To be frank, their aim isn't really to poach top prospects but to raise the profile of the club in the region/country and generate more profit. That being said, I am not really sure FM needs something like that, besides, we have something similar already with commercial affiliates.

For the reason you raise here, this is why it's something more likely done by a commercial director rather than say a manager of a football team. And as you go on to say, you can already do commercial affiliates or have links with certain clubs/regions in order to have players come through in your youth team. 

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On 2/21/2018 at 14:37, prot651 said:

I think the expectations of the ME is the biggest letdown . From the first time they introduced it about 7 or 8 years ago the ME and its graphics have ? ?? well not improved in great leaps and bounds . Players are still ice skating , and we all know about how the defences are somewhat ordinary . It must get on with improving the ME dramatically because really its the same game it was 6 years ago with a few extra features . 

Its an opinion that I'm feeling so don't go ape over it :) 

I never get people who complain about the defending in FM. I conceded 15 goals in my last season in my current save. I always rank close to the top in terms of goals conceded in my league, regardless of the team I play as. Even as a struggling team, teams do not put lots of goals passed me. Also, mistakes leading to goals happen. My captain and best defender in my side made an absolute howler in a Champion's League Quarter final that saw me lose 1-0. It looked horrible, it was horrible. It was not "bad defending by the match engine" or a bug. It was just a mistake. They happen. People have unrealistic expectations about what they want to see out of the ME; their team always playing perfectly and never ever making mistakes. The mistake leading to the goal I speak of was down to pressing forcing the mistake, which if my side did it I would see as excellent play by my attackers. Same goes here, well played by the AI. I can also take the blame for noticing their pressing but not changing how I distribute the ball from back to front.

 

6 hours ago, Baodan said:

I'm no expert on match engines or a tactical genius, so my evaluation is based solely on the enjoyment I experienced while watching the matches.

The ME in Fifa Manager was absolutely awful, and there was a vastly different behaviour depending on how you watched the match. It was the first football manager game I played, when I was 11 or something like that. So it was exciting and new, and I too look back fondly. But as a football sim it is nowhere close to FM. Go back and play it to see.

 

2 hours ago, fidelitywars said:

The 'play before pay' argument doesn't really work for FM as patches can effectively change the game fundamentally overnight.

If your tactic stops working because of an update, you were doing something that was exploiting a weakness in the match engine. The patch closes the loophole, the tactic stops working. I have used basically the same tactic for 3 iterations of FM now, without any problems.

 

35 minutes ago, jamessmith010101 said:

i get this guys point to be fair. the game hasnt exactly been improved dramatically in the last few years. but what do we expect? at the end of the day its a game and its the closest out there in terms of the real thing. trouble is people lose a game as there top defender does something stupid and they lose their ***** saying it wouldnt happen in rl and all tht and then they watch chelsea barca and it does. your gonna lose games on this, your tactics might not work all the time, your forwards will miss 5 simple chances. your goalie will have a mare. you may get sacked. you might not be able to buy that top prospect you want as he costs 40 mill upwards. you will get frustrated. you will hate it.

I agree completely with this. The game makes incremental improvements, and this makes the game better. For example, the dynamics thing this year is absolutely excellent. Being able to tell a team leader to sort out problems in the dressing room for you, and it actually working has completely changed how you have to deal with the squad. No more having to have a chat where none of the options are what you want to say. On your point about people wanting to always win, and seeing any mistake their players make as a bug is part of the problem. In reverse, when a player scores a goal they see it as good play, their tactical theorems opening opposition defenses.

Anyway, ultimately we can debate this until the cows come home. We will always all have different opinions about the game, and there is not really a right or wrong, especially when it comes down to personal enjoyment. Feedback and ideas are also good, because they stimulate discussion and may lead to further improvements in the game.

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16 minutes ago, sporadicsmiles said:

 

 

If your tactic stops working because of an update, you were doing something that was exploiting a weakness in the match engine. The patch closes the loophole, the tactic stops working. I have used basically the same tactic for 3 iterations of FM now, without any problems.

I'm not particularly new around here so I understand that principle. I's not the point that I was making; I tend to use (at least slightly) different tactics on each save and all broadly 'work' in terms of results as much as they did previously but the variety of goals/chances created has reduced dramatically across the board so I know find it enormously boring. I feel that crossing is overpowered, finishing is erratic and midfield decision-making/creativity is poor. As such, despite my general success not really changing, the enjoyment factor has receded to the point where i'm not really interested in playing until the next patch is available.

This of course, is just one example; there have been plenty of patches across various FMs where i've scarcely noticed a difference in the ME but that is certainly not the case currently.

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6 hours ago, Baodan said:

I was asked about nice ideas and I answered, keyword here being ideas and not well implemented features that I would like to see in FM. I like the ideas because they're outside the very confined box of FM. If some of them got reworked then maybe they could make for decent additions. 

And I responded to this with saying I didn't like the idea and, for me, it would not be a good addition to FM. There is also a whole sub forum dedicated to ideas and suggestions that SI monitor and sometimes they implement ideas or part of ideas from this.

6 hours ago, Baodan said:

Youth Camps were basically Youth Facilities you could build in other countries, preferably places with good talent-mass such as Brazil or Argentina. The Youth Camp then started generating players based on a variety of factors such as: The country, Population, Facility rank and competition from other clubs in the area. You could then pay to upgrade the Youth Camp to have better facilities, you could hire a good coach to function kinda like HOYD and then transfer talented players back to your main clubs youth team.

This might be something that could be implemented, but it would be unrealistic to be decided or handled by the manager. You can almost do this in FM however, by having a partner club in another country and add the "youth setup" deal. This causes youngster from the nation in question to randomly pop up in your youth intakes.

6 hours ago, Baodan said:

I don't know anything about the legal side of things, but I did like having the ability to influence youth development on a much deeper level.

I like starting out in the lower leagues and then work my way up, and right now its extremely time-consuming to bring a clubs youth recruitment up to an acceptable level. 

That makes two of us. I'm playing in Hungary at the moment and started as a newly promoted team in the lower tier. The goal is to win the Champions League without bringing in any players at all except youth intakes. It's part of a youth only challenge here on the forum.

And the cost and time is part of the realism, isn't it? The cost of improving youth setups are something the club needs to balance. And often you need to sell to improve. Develop players and selling them, using the profits to improve youth setups. I would very much like to have more influence over the training of younger players. At least to avoid getting wingers if I've played a narrow 4-3-2-1 for the last 10 years. Not getting defensive midfielders if I don't use the position, or at least influence more how youth players are coming along.

If you have good ideas for this, please share them in the suggestions sub forum. I'm all for better youth development, but all within the realistic role of a manager and not as a director or chairman.

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