September 4, 2008

Well, it came and it was revolutionary. Judging by some of the comments on SI’s official forums, Miles and the team have done the Football Manager equivalent of defecating in the Pope’s hat. So, what’s causing all the commotion? Well, if you don’t already know, SI’s official YouTube channel explains all.

Part the First – general documentary about SI and Football Manager
Part the Second – with all the announcements
Screens – and some screenshots

All the commotion has surrounded the announcement that, for the first time ever, Football Manager will include a three dimensional match engine. It’s a divisive topic and, as ever, the community have been quick to pass judgement.

3Dgate is building up steam because there is a vocal minority in the FM community who vigorously oppose 3D, in much the same way that the move to the top-down “2D” match engine was opposed when CM4 was shipped with it. The fact that you can turn both of these features off if you want to isn’t enough – this is, as one “fan” put it, completely selling out.

As I write this, I feel I should shed some light on my thoughts. Up until a couple of hours before the announcement, I was also opposed to a 3D match engine, even going so far as to foolishly say that anyone asking for 3D should be banned! Why did I say this? Because I felt that the technology wasn’t there to do the match engine justice. A 3D engine, based on the offerings from SI’s competitors, would look awful, take up far too much processing time, was slow and tended just to give an idea of the game, not an accurate simulation of 90 minutes of hard graft. In my opinion, SI wouldn’t add it, especially after announcing that the FML match engine would be shipped across to FM09, and then beta tested to make sure it worked well against the AI before shipping the game out to the stores. Not only did 3D seem like a bad idea, it seemed like it wasn’t even in the minds of SI.

Wrong.

But I’m not as worried as I thought I’d be. I’ll admit, when watching part one of the trailer, I got nervous. “Is that 3D? Please tell me they’ve not added that!” Then they showed it in more detail. And explained it. And now I don’t believe there will be the massive backlash against it when people actually play it. And I’ll give you three massive reasons why:

1. This has been in development for 3 years, and drawing on Sega’s resources.

In other words, not only has the time been put in by Sports Interactive to make sure they got it right, they’ve also had Virtua Striker’s graphical resources and know-how to get them set up. This means this has, in a very basic way, 12 years of 3D knowledge behind it, and at least 3 years of Football Manager love behind it. The biggest criticism of SI is that they simply add new features each year without testing them fully, only getting them “right” two or three years down the line. Well, this one’s already three years down the line and, presumably, will only get better after the patches and for FM10.

2. This uses exactly the same logic as the “normal” match engine.

In other words, whether you play text only, 2D, 3D, key highlights, extended highlights, full match, slow speed or fast speed, it will be exactly the same match going on. You can replay it from any of these methods and will know that flicking from one to another to get a different view on the game won’t compromise you. In the past, games that have used 3D match engines (or even 2D ones – see Ultimate Soccer Manager) have given you an “either, or” – you can simulate the match immediately, or you can watch it. But not both – and both would use different logic to produce the result, often with ridiculous consequences. If playing an instant match, plump for 4-4-2. If playing a 3D one, the best way to trick the engine is play 2-2-6. You can’t imagine SI ever producing a game like this. So, you still need to think football, not think how to beat the poorly designed game logic.

The other, most obvious consequence of this is you can turn the 3D off (for personal preferences, lack of computer spec., etc.) and still know you’re playing the dafuge challenge by the same rules as everyone else.

3. It’s still not finished.

The screens we’ve seen have, apparently, only about half the animations and refinements that SI wants to have in the final release. And it looks pretty good (from screenshots) already. What we’re saying here is that while it already looks OK, it’s going to get better. A good analogy is the Facegen technology. In the initial screenshots for FM08’s announcement they looked pretty awful. By release they were so much more refined and actually don’t look that bad now. Imagine that, but even better. It’s making me excited, even if it isn’t you.

Those opposing 3D have two main reasons. They fall into my camp, the doubters of the technology, or they fall into the Luddite camp who believe that FM should remain “pure” by not succumbing to the modern world. As if SI should deliberately make their game as unpopular as possible so that people can feel part of their secret little club. The fact is that the latter will always be unimpressed with attempted progress. Any attempt to move forward will have positives and negatives. Every attempt at realism will affect someone else’s idea of fun. Every move in technology will cause someone to not be able to buy the game for their computer’s spec. Everyone – in short – will find something to moan about.

The former group might have been proved wrong. I certainly hope I have; but it’s certainly a feature that I will reserve judgement on until I get my copy. It would be unfair to Football Manager to judge it as a failure before its even been tested.

Of course, that wasn’t the only feature to be announced. Oh no. We now know that Football Manager is slated for release on 14th November 2008, as is his hand-held counterpart.

The transfer module has been completely rewritten, which is good news for all you wheelers and dealers. I must admit, it was pretty annoying having my players bid for every three days and not having any ability to negotiate with the AI. Having repeatedly said I won’t sell a player for £20k, a new bid would come in for £20k. I’d ask for £25k, they’d go away. Next week – “will you sell him for £20k?” No, Kettering Town. No I won’t. This is, apparently, the tip of the iceberg for those who use transfers a lot. I can’t say that I do, but it will be interesting to see how people view it now.

Of course, people will still complain when they can “only” get Messi by bidding £70m (irl he’d go for £40m lol). This is another one of those features which could be quite buggy, but it could also be affected by people’s (incorrect) interpretations of world transfers and supply and demand. If Barcelona are willing to sell Messi, I’m sure he’d be around £40m. If they didn’t want to sell him at all, they’re going to ask for silly money. And the same is true of any player, anywhere. Of course, if SI extend the ability of chairmen to accept large bids over the coaches’ heads, expect that to be a bug report too!

You can now train PPMs. Those of us on the Tactical Bible have been lobbying SI for this for a while now, and we’re glad it’s making an appearance. The ability to get your players to focus on a particular move in training will, hopefully, translate itself onto the pitch. So, if you’ve got yourself a new Steven Gerrard who is more than capable of hitting screamers from 25m but seems reticent to do it – get him to train it! In conjunction with tutoring (which appears to remain from FM08), we could have a great amount of control over youth development this time round.

As yet, there is no announcement over whether training or set pieces have changed from their rather formulaic nature. Hopefully we’ll find out in due course.

To return to the match engine again, SI are using all the developments from the FML match engine in FM2009. Which, as anyone who has played it will tell you, is a mouth-watering prospect. FML has gutted the ME from FM2008. Gone are arrows. Full backs overlap, midfielders surge forward and there seems to be a much more noticeable effect from your tactical changes. You feel far, far more in control of things. That, and there are new statistical tools shipped over from the cyber game. Match ratings are now measured in tenths. A “7” is no longer a “7”. It’s anything from a 6.5 to a 7.4. While the form guide might still say “7”, during a match and during a season you can much more accurately tell who has that edge and who is going that extra mile for the team.

There’s also new match stats, including clear cut chances, shots blocked and long range efforts. Now you can see very clearly that not every shot is a good shot – not every shot on target is a true goal scoring opportunity. People can still get four or five clear cut chances and still lose 1-0. That’s the beauty of football (or the pain of watching Arsenal) – but now with the match engine developments it is so much more obvious where the problems are.

Speaking of these “I had 40 shots and no goals, this game cheats” arguments – that’s unlikely to happen, simply because you’re unlikely to get 40 shots. Unless you’ve made a tactic which is designed only to shoot, regardless of how far from goal you are. The removal of arrows, the responsiveness of the engine, the improvements to team instructions which respond far more to your input and to the intelligence of players means that you have to come up with logical systems to beat the AI. No more slapping arrows all over the place, playing an AMC with a forward arrow to striker, playing as narrow and with as little creative freedom as possible and storming up the league. Play unrealistically and expect unrealistic results – this has always been true, but now such tactics are not only impossible due to the removal of arrows, but very likely to be run all over by the AI, as their weaknesses will be obvious to all.

Improved media interaction has been needed for a while, as has the ability to play as a female coach. Press conferences and relationships with the local press look very impressive at first glance. The only hope really is that they don’t become too tedious, too often and too predictable in their effects. One other thing that the screenshots seem to suggest is that most of the local rags are given very generic names like “The Rushden Sports Paper”. I hope, if it’s possible, that the researchers get out there and give SI the names of the local papers. I’m sure the Leicester Mercury or the Liverpool Echo wouldn’t mind the exposure.

And, as so many people have asked for, we’re getting assistant manager feedback. This has met with mixed responses so far. Some would prefer not to have it. Some are hoping it doesn’t offer too much advice. Still others hope there is a sliding scale in the quality of advice. Indeed, the LLaMa forums are discussing whether it’s realistic or not. Personally, I’m all for it. Any advice to help new users learn and digest the game is welcome. It may even help old hands who still lose for “no reason whatsoever”. They may still do. But if a pattern emerges in the assistant’s advice, surely it’s time to take a look at that left back he keeps whining about? He will also tell you if a player looks unmotivated, lazy, too hyped up, confident, complacent – giving you much more idea of what to say in your team talks. It seems that if this option can be turned off (or ignored) it could well be a winner. Let’s hope it’s not bugged as much as board confidence was last term.

Speaking of. Board confidence has been completely reworked to give not only greater depth but to be more accurate and more intuitive. No longer will you take a team to the Championship from the depths of the Conference and then be sacked for “only” finishing 9th. Or getting distressing messages from the board for getting knocked out in the third round of the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy. This was a show stopper last time round, and was never really properly solved. Hopefully now it will work a treat and give you far more idea of where you can improve, where you’re dominant and why exactly you’re likely to be sacked.

Finances have also been revamped, so hopefully no more haemorrhaging money, and also no more stockpiling billions in the bank.

That’s the main stuff covered. Check out the links at the top of the page for the official announcements and stay tuned to the SI web page and, of course, FM-Britain to learn more and discuss what you’ve heard so far and your hopes for the upcoming release!