is a final update/patch in march acceptable regarding the end of a season?

[Marc Albrighton]

Not at all wally people are just expressing what they think about a product we all pay good money for, nice spelling of comical too you wally.

[wally13]

Not at all wally people are just expressing what they think about a product we all pay good money for, nice spelling of comical too you wally.

Eh ive seen many of post from many different people saying how things should be in there eyes despite probably not having any experience in the matter in question

[kingjericho]

The point here is if could SI try to correct all the bugs first (meaning until Xmas) and when the transfer window closed just release a transfer patch. I'm not saying they're lazy but I kind of agree with the OP in the sense that if they have been fixing bugs since 11.2.1's release, then now the transfers update should only take about one week or so.

[themadsheep2001]

The point here is if could SI try to correct all the bugs first (meaning until Xmas) and when the transfer window closed just release a transfer patch. I'm not saying they're lazy but I kind of agree with the OP in the sense that if they have been fixing bugs since 11.2.1's release, then now the transfers update should only take about one week or so.

but you then have to test the database, and also people are continuously bring up new issues, so then that has to be fixed, which it means they have to test for any knock ons etc. i see where you are coming from though. I wonder what their cut off date for issues is

[BossAsianMafia]

the question is could these forums affect 50% of FM buyers?

What's the forum got to do with it?

You think the concept of word-of-mouth doesn't exist?

[soldierblue123]

There is deinitely some merit in SI releasing a transfer update. That doesn't require a patch all it requires is a correctly update version of the database. That would satisfy most customers until a patch came along.

[x42bn6]

There are also different processor speeds, technologies, cores, caches. Different types of ram, speeds of ram, amounts of ram. There are potential problems with windows, not to mention that FM could be running on one of a few different versions of windows anyway. Then there are viruses, hard drives that are damaged, potential problems caused by incompatible devices...

None of these make a big difference when making a simple visual basic calculator. However when trying to make a game that should be taxing a top PC, but still running on an older one, there ARE issues.

Not really, no. Few software designers program down to the hardware level especially for this sort of game where you want it to run on multiple types of hardware. Unless you have very specific hardware requirements, it makes no sense to write software down to the hardware level.

For processors, a software designer doesn't have to care much about the processor speed/cores/cache size - it will either run fast or run slow depending on the processor. It is interfaced out and encapsulated away. What does matter is the architecture of the processor - for example, is it a 32-bit or 64-bit processor? That's really all that matters. Modern-day processors all implement the same software architecture too. In addition, various linkers allow AMD and Intel processors to be functionally equivalent. You will never find a software support person telling you, "Oh, you need two cores, not one. Sorry."

For RAM, a software designer doesn't really need to worry because of virtual memory and in practice nobody nowadays runs out of virtual memory (if you do, then you would know because your hard-disk is nearly full). It doesn't see the amount of RAM - the software simply consumes X bytes of memory when required - it doesn't know whether physical RAM is being used or virtual, paged RAM is being used. It doesn't care. There is of course a minimum RAM requirement - but only because Windows becomes stupidly slow and unstable with low amounts of RAM, but it takes a very low amount to get it this far (Windows XP can boot with 64 MB of RAM and I believe Windows 7 can boot with 128 MB of RAM).

For version of Windows, it largely doesn't make sense either because Football Manager does not require DirectX 11 which is not compatible with Windows XP. Very little software out there is incompatible with Windows XP. There are rough security issues but then again that's not really a software problem - the operating system interfaces that away.

For incompatible devices, I would be extremely concerned if Football Manager was incompatible with a PS/2 keyboard and mouse. Those are the only two real devices it interacts with that could perhaps pose an issue (maybe the monitor?!).

The actual issue is generally never down to things like processors or RAM - it's usually things like video cards and drivers, one stupid area where PC development has never bothered to fix properly. The actual hardware is rarely an issue unless someone tries to install software on a PC that is 6-7 years old. But processors, RAM and devices? Please...

[Nik_Dut]

I agree that since the name FM, this game is plagued by lotsa different recurring bugs.

is it possible that the game missed the guys from Eid*s ?

[r0x0r]

Not really, no. Few software designers program down to the hardware level especially for this sort of game where you want it to run on multiple types of hardware. Unless you have very specific hardware requirements, it makes no sense to write software down to the hardware level.

For processors, a software designer doesn't have to care much about the processor speed/cores/cache size - it will either run fast or run slow depending on the processor. It is interfaced out and encapsulated away. What does matter is the architecture of the processor - for example, is it a 32-bit or 64-bit processor? That's really all that matters. Modern-day processors all implement the same software architecture too. In addition, various linkers allow AMD and Intel processors to be functionally equivalent. You will never find a software support person telling you, "Oh, you need two cores, not one. Sorry."

For RAM, a software designer doesn't really need to worry because of virtual memory and in practice nobody nowadays runs out of virtual memory (if you do, then you would know because your hard-disk is nearly full). It doesn't see the amount of RAM - the software simply consumes X bytes of memory when required - it doesn't know whether physical RAM is being used or virtual, paged RAM is being used. It doesn't care. There is of course a minimum RAM requirement - but only because Windows becomes stupidly slow and unstable with low amounts of RAM, but it takes a very low amount to get it this far (Windows XP can boot with 64 MB of RAM and I believe Windows 7 can boot with 128 MB of RAM).

For version of Windows, it largely doesn't make sense either because Football Manager does not require DirectX 11 which is not compatible with Windows XP. Very little software out there is incompatible with Windows XP. There are rough security issues but then again that's not really a software problem - the operating system interfaces that away.

For incompatible devices, I would be extremely concerned if Football Manager was incompatible with a PS/2 keyboard and mouse. Those are the only two real devices it interacts with that could perhaps pose an issue (maybe the monitor?!).

The actual issue is generally never down to things like processors or RAM - it's usually things like video cards and drivers, one stupid area where PC development has never bothered to fix properly. The actual hardware is rarely an issue unless someone tries to install software on a PC that is 6-7 years old. But processors, RAM and devices? Please...

I'm not saying they program on that level. I'm saying that certain bugs, instabilities and other issues can crop up because of those issues, even though the game is programmed at a higher level.

Sure the game could run with a set amount of ram, using one core. It'd be a ****** experience for people with good PCs though. Have you actually played FM on a state of the art pc and on a 2 year old netbook? Both work, but the differences are quite startling.

FM will use more or less ram depending on leagues loaded. It will use at least 2 (probably 4) cores if available. Hell, hyperthreading was implemented in the game code back when that was the norm rather than multiple cores.

The simple fact is that testing a PC game is inherently harder than testing a console game because you can't test it on all possible hardware configurations, while with a console there are only a handfull of different models to check.

[x42bn6]

I'm not saying they program on that level. I'm saying that certain bugs, instabilities and other issues can crop up because of those issues, even though the game is programmed at a higher level.

Sure the game could run with a set amount of ram, using one core. It'd be a ****** experience for people with good PCs though. Have you actually played FM on a state of the art pc and on a 2 year old netbook? Both work, but the differences are quite startling.

FM will use more or less ram depending on leagues loaded. It will use at least 2 (probably 4) cores if available. Hell, hyperthreading was implemented in the game code back when that was the norm rather than multiple cores.

The simple fact is that testing a PC game is inherently harder than testing a console game because you can't test it on all possible hardware configurations, while with a console there are only a handfull of different models to check.

You will in general not encounter bugs because of processor or RAM issues. Hardware is definitely an issue but processors and RAM are so well-abstracted away from the user it is very difficult to blame a processor or RAM for it, especially things like multiple cores. The usual issue is video cards and drivers - where abstractions are not quite so good because AMD and nVidia aren't working together a lot on common things unlike AMD and Intel, who agree on architectures beforehand.

"Slow performance" is generally not a bug, but you will encounter instabilities on low RAM or for lots of programs running in the background, but that is really about it.

This is why I think "hardware configurations" is seriously misleading and overdramatic because it is only a couple of bits of hardware that cause issues and quite often it's driver-related, not even the underlying hardware itself.

[sneakysmeagle22]

I agree that since the name FM, this game is plagued by lotsa different recurring bugs.

is it possible that the game missed the guys from Eid*s ?

Think CM4 was an SI/Eidos game? Correct me if I'm wrong though. The first version of that was incredibly buggy, I remember numerous crashes which was far worse...

The only bug for me that is really spoiling 11 is the lack of (decent) AI offers for my players. Like flies and poo with my unproven youngsters, but they only offer me a pittance, still more than it offers for any others mind. On one of the old games they used to pay too much though so it's a difficult one for them to balance I suppose (notice FIFA/pro evo get round this by letting you set the AI xfer level? Not something I think that's workable in FM).

As for whether a march patch is acceptable, well it's somewhat irritating, but tell me, is it more or less acceptable than no patch at all?

Lots of people every year cl,aim they won't buy the next FM until the final patch is out yet every year they still do and come on here to complain about it... I didn't hardly play 08 because of bugs and consequently didn't buy 09, I waited till patch 2 was out before buying 10 as usually most of the kinks are out, have done the same with 11 and it certainly leads to a lot less frustration. FM10 was brilliant, there's plenty of people who do database updates with transfers/promotions etc so there really isn't a need to buy every year if you feel so strongly about it - surely common sense?

Also seen then people who "can't play because they know there's a new version out and they may be missing out on all the new features", then again can't wait to criticise said features for being half-soaked.

One last point, did anyone notice FM2011 has been nominated in the GAME awards (is it the golden joysticks?). Wasn't there a big sticky about it last year, haven't seen a mention on here this year...

[celebritykiller]

I agree that since the name FM, this game is plagued by lotsa different recurring bugs.

is it possible that the game missed the guys from Eid*s ?

You never played CM4 clearly

[milnerpoint]

considering what EDOS came out with on their own without the help of SI i would say not at all. Maybe they worked better together than appart but thats a different argument.

[jascko]

I do not mind if they spend longer time on the last patch. However, if this latest patch has not solved the majority of the bugs that have been reported, I swear this year will be the last time I buy this game. As I said, I do not mind waiting, but waiting has its price, ie the final product should be bugfree. Everything else is unacceptable at this point. I'm tired of waiting now, but I comfort myself that the more time they spend on this patch, the better the result. If I find one more gamebraking bug after the last patch, SI would never get as much as one penny of my pocket. Enough is enough, I have subjective boundaries, and I feel I have stretched them pretty far when it comes to SI.