FMC (FM Classic) - Your thoughts after having played it

[Beardeye]

I have played a couple of months of the FMC demo. As a relatively new father I don’t have time for the full fat version.

Initially it has taken me a long time to adjust to the new layout/ skin so the game hasn’t moved quickly for me. Hopefully this will change as it becomes more natural. To echo a lot of the above things I do miss the following full fat features:

1. Tutoring- the game is surely designed for long term/ youth development type saves. Not being able to adjust a high potential youngsters personality and determination yourself is a frustration.

2. Training- I have just signed a promising youngster with strength 4. I desperately want to put him on a strength training programme but have to leave this in the lap of my ass man (not great at lower league level) or the FM Gods. Frustrating.

3. Scouting- initially i didn’t ‘get’ it and was frustrated at not being able to micromanage where scouts go/ what they do. having said which i have sent my scout on a new talent search (Scotland by default) and he has come up with a huge number of good players, so im not too upset with this anymore

4. Parent/feeder club- i would still like to make this decision/ have the option

5. Database size- I would like to increase the number of players in the database.

Im still on the fence but will finish off my demo season and if this can be done quickly without too many frustrations I will buy it. I do like a lot of the time consuming features being stripped out- i.e press conferences, team talks (removal of which hasn’t seemed to have a big effect as i thought it might), player registration, reserve team handling etc.

[milnerpoint]

Dare i say it, but at the moment it FEELS like your tactics play a bigger part in FMC, i have managed to turn some games around with careful tinkering, whereas in the full game id most likely wait until half time and roast my players hoping for a good reaction. It will be more the way i play now a days, but it FMC def gives you great satisfaction when you turn games around.

I have to say again, the challenge mode is brilliant, ive gone through the kids one and im working through the relegation one right now, both have been a huge amount of fun, its great playing the game without thinking 3 seasons ahead. Plus it runs so damn quick, last night i got through 6 months in game in a few hours.

[Beardeye]

Dare i say it, but at the moment it FEELS like your tactics play a bigger part in FMC, i have managed to turn some games around with careful tinkering, whereas in the full game id most likely wait until half time and roast my players hoping for a good reaction.

Only played about 10 games but as far as i can tell the motivation module has been toned down for FMC and if the assistant is giving HT team talk its not as powerful as in full fat, do you agree? My players tend to play similar in both halves and don’t get fired up/ looking motivated in the “performance” (ex-motivation) widget.

The only thing that seems to affect the players is a mistake (mistake led to goal shows) or an assist/ goal (having a good game).

[higgins]

After some weeks I realized that probably something between these two game modes would be great for me, anyway, you could read some thoughts about FMC in my blog.

[milnerpoint]

Only played about 10 games but as far as i can tell the motivation module has been toned down for FMC and if the assistant is giving HT team talk its not as powerful as in full fat, do you agree? My players tend to play similar in both halves and don’t get fired up/ looking motivated in the “performance” (ex-motivation) widget.

The only thing that seems to affect the players is a mistake (mistake led to goal shows) or an assist/ goal (having a good game).

Yeah moral seems to have less effect, i started the relegation challenge with Athletico, i know not the hardest challenge but i just wanted a feel for it, and my first game was Real, with all moral as low as it could be, i still managed to pull out a respectable result, on the full game you'd be lucky not to conceed 3/4.

[jayahr]

What is missing from training? Just the micro-management or also the mor egeneral options?

And, even more importantly, what restrictions apply to scouting?

Will the missing parts, like tutoring or individual training, still be going on under the hood and managed by the AI (and maybe dependent on your assman quality?) or is it just missing?

[cruiseee]

Played FMC for about 10 minutes - just didn't feel right

I know what you mean. I didn't try the beta (even though I had a code) and only tried the demo for the first time a couple of days ago. Went straight for FMC to see what all the fuss is about and it was odd. Was losing my first friendly to Malaga at half time and it didn't feel right not being able talk to the players. For me, half-time team talks are pretty much an essential feature now, I see no reason why they can't be included in FMC as they don't take long at all.

[backpackant]

I loved the idea of it, as I am one of those FMers who just doesn't have the time he used to, and it can take a week or more to get through a season. I'm not sold on it now I've played it but then I only had a tinker for about an hour. I'm not sure if I did something wrong but I normally don't mask attributes, as I find it takes up valuable time, and either this is different in FMC or I - as I suspect - missed the bit where it gave me the option (which would be weird since it's supposed to save time in playing it).

[spankie]

What is missing from training? Just the micro-management or also the mor egeneral options?

And, even more importantly, what restrictions apply to scouting?

Will the missing parts, like tutoring or individual training, still be going on under the hood and managed by the AI (and maybe dependent on your assman quality?) or is it just missing?

Training

No individual training, but I think the squad training is the same as full FM. So you set the matchday prep and training and the intensity.

I don't know if a better quality ass man will arrange individual training for players automatically, I suspect not.

As you only have one person coaching at the club I suspect that his coaching attributes aren't as important as his mental attributes, personality and playing style.

Players can still learn PPMs presumably set up by the ass man and the first you'll know of it is when you receive a message saying that a player can do a new PPM.

I currently have no idea if the ass man will set up tutoring or even if tutoring is in FMC.

Players can apparently learn new positions but you have to constantly play them in that position, I guess that Versatility is still a major factor in the success of this.

The most important thing for developing players is first team football, more important then in full FM.

Scouting

There are two availble searches.

New Talent is the scout looking at nations where he doesn't have 100% scouting knowledge

Known Talent search is the recommendations from where the scout has full knowledge.

The scout can only run a single search at a time, so if you want to run a new Known Talent search you have to cancel the running New Talent and completed old Known Talent searches (saving any possible signings first in a shortlist of course) then run a new Known Talent search with better then the default settings of 3 star CA and PA as you could miss out on young players with potential because they're only rated with 2 star CA. After the scout comes back with the completed Known Talent search (which is instantaneous) you can start a new New Talent search.

Everytime you run a New Talent search I believe that the scout will start in the highest reputation nation within the scouting range that he doesn't have 100% knowledge of (the reputation isn't confirmed the 100% is confirmed by SI)

I do recommend running a new Known Talent search after signing a new scout because of the default searches aren't too good for those of us that like getting in a youngster with potential and develop him. It may be useful running it again every so often especially when the new batch of newgens come into the game.

[jayahr]

Training

No individual training, but I think the squad training is the same as full FM. So you set the matchday prep and training and the intensity.

I don't know if a better quality ass man will arrange individual training for players automatically, I suspect not.

As you only have one person coaching at the club I suspect that his coaching attributes aren't as important as his mental attributes, personality and playing style.

Players can still learn PPMs presumably set up by the ass man and the first you'll know of it is when you receive a message saying that a player can do a new PPM.

I currently have no idea if the ass man will set up tutoring or even if tutoring is in FMC.

Players can apparently learn new positions but you have to constantly play them in that position, I guess that Versatility is still a major factor in the success of this.

The most important thing for developing players is first team football, more important then in full FM.

Scouting

There are two availble searches.

New Talent is the scout looking at nations where he doesn't have 100% scouting knowledge

Known Talent search is the recommendations from where the scout has full knowledge.

The scout can only run a single search at a time, so if you want to run a new Known Talent search you have to cancel the running New Talent and completed old Known Talent searches (saving any possible signings first in a shortlist of course) then run a new Known Talent search with better then the default settings of 3 star CA and PA as you could miss out on young players with potential because they're only rated with 2 star CA. After the scout comes back with the completed Known Talent search (which is instantaneous) you can start a new New Talent search.

Everytime you run a New Talent search I believe that the scout will start in the highest reputation nation within the scouting range that he doesn't have 100% knowledge of (the reputation isn't confirmed the 100% is confirmed by SI)

I do recommend running a new Known Talent search after signing a new scout because of the default searches aren't too good for those of us that like getting in a youngster with potential and develop him. It may be useful running it again every so often especially when the new batch of newgens come into the game.

Cheers for that

So you cannot scout individual players at all and there is only one scout doing one search at a time??? I guess it may then be worth hiring a new guy every year in order to have more variation in the recommended players.

[Lucas]

You can scout individual players - you'll get more reports back in a day than you would from FM. And if you buy/unlock the unlimited scouting unlockable, you'll get a lot lot more.

[spankie]

Cheers for that

So you cannot scout individual players at all and there is only one scout doing one search at a time??? I guess it may then be worth hiring a new guy every year in order to have more variation in the recommended players.

You'd lose the built up knowledge of the scout. Personally I'd only do it if the new scout already had knowledge of other nations and/or was significantly better then my existing scout.

Like Lucas says you can easily get 10-15 scout reports a day from your single scout when you ask him to scout players. I do have a tendancy to select a batch of players form the player search screen and get him to give me a batch of reports over a few days.

[rafiky]

have played FMC for a bit, but i think i still prefer the full game, i dislike things like teams talks and opp instructions so i just have my assistants do alot of that boring stuff so i can still play the full game at a decent speed

[jayahr]

You can scout individual players - you'll get more reports back in a day than you would from FM. And if you buy/unlock the unlimited scouting unlockable, you'll get a lot lot more.

Thank you for the input.

I have to say though, that this kind of unlockable is something that I oppose. I'm okay with unlockables which are basically cheats or adding something new to the game. I'd never use them but I see that there might be people who would and I don't judge anybody who plays the game to his own preferences. So I'm one of those who have furiously led the initial discussions about the unlockables.

Having to pay for having options in FMC which are available in the FF version is however an absolute no-go to me

[milnerpoint]

Why tho, you say your ok with an unlockable being a cheat, which that one is, you cannot have an unlimited number of day scout reports, with a cheat you can. Simples

[Lucas]

Thank you for the input.

I have to say though, that this kind of unlockable is something that I oppose. I'm okay with unlockables which are basically cheats or adding something new to the game. I'd never use them but I see that there might be people who would and I don't judge anybody who plays the game to his own preferences. So I'm one of those who have furiously led the initial discussions about the unlockables.

Having to pay for having options in FMC which are available in the FF version is however an absolute no-go to me

The option isn't available in the main version to return dozens of players in a single day - it's an accelerated scouting process, specifically for FMC (and you already get more reports faster in FMC than FM).

[jayahr]

The option isn't available in the main version to return dozens of players in a single day - it's an accelerated scouting process, specifically for FMC (and you already get more reports faster in FMC than FM).

Okay, may have misunderstood then

I understood that the unlockable basically offers you the same scouting tools which are in the full-fat version.

[Linie]

how does FMC look for a longterm save? Facility upgrades, stadium etc. Is the dynamic league functionality fully integrated?

[Toothless Gibbon]

I'm really enjoying FMC so far (Which has surprised me a lot tbh) the drawbacks being DB size currently. When 3 nations loaded its actually not too bad though.

Does anyone know how many players are included?

[Beardeye]

I'm really enjoying FMC so far (Which has surprised me a lot tbh) the drawbacks being DB size currently. When 3 nations loaded its actually not too bad though.

Does anyone know how many players are included?

PaulC posted this somewhere recently. I think 20k.

[serek]

I've not touched "full fat" FM once. FMC is exactly what I was hoping it would be; fast, minimalistic, simple, hassle-free, fun, no nonsense. It takes me back to the days of the old Champ manager where I just bought some players, picked a team, and played some matches.

+1

I wish it would allow classic tactics, and I wish I could actually use custom database (like when you start a new game), but otherwise it's great.

[Babak G]

Ive started a full game, and its taken me about 4 hours to get through the first 3 weeks but I usually spend time getting to know my squad, getting in new staff, sending scouts away and setting up training and tactics initially for pre-season. How long did it take some of you guys during pre-season with the said things to do?

[MuppetMaestro]

wheres the instant result option?

[mr. president]

fmc is defiantly much faste

is there a way to make the player screen the same as the one in fm classic? it so much more comfortable

[Kriss]

I'm really enjoying FMC so far (Which has surprised me a lot tbh) the drawbacks being DB size currently. When 3 nations loaded its actually not too bad though.

Does anyone know how many players are included?

It equates to a medium DB selected but depends which leagues you select.

Select the same leagues in a full game and it'll be pretty much that many players in your FMC game.

[Unknown Hacker]

I am currently powering through a season with Santos. The whole game mode seems to be pretty reasonable however I'm just not sure that it fits with my style of play.

[SmurfDude]

Ive started a full game, and its taken me about 4 hours to get through the first 3 weeks but I usually spend time getting to know my squad, getting in new staff, sending scouts away and setting up training and tactics initially for pre-season. How long did it take some of you guys during pre-season with the said things to do?

I get through pre-season in about 10-20 minutes, and 90% of that is spent buying and selling players.

[Kamil-S]

Does anyone have any idea how to retrain positions? Just playing them in the position you want to play them in, doesnt seem to do anything

You can load full FM2003 skin, set new position training and revert to standard FMC skin

[RTHerringbone]

It is hugely fast if I compare with FM12. I have hit 30 hours of game time to finish two seasons on the Beta; I wouldn't be at the mid-point of one season of FM12 in that time.

I do want to do a comparison of FM13 Simulation vs. Classic where I delegate as much as possible in the full version, but I can't drag myself away from FMC.

In a magical way, in spite of stripping out loads of functionality (some or it superfluous), it retains the key essence of the "old" CM/FM games and it's damn good fun.

I find it actually concentrates my mind on the key stuff, which for me are tactics and transfers, and clears out all the bits I was less interested in (interaction, training).

[phillip5150]

PLEASE! Someone, anyone....?

Can you add a note to a player playing FMC?

[boppa]

id love it if it had thew option to include more leagues / players

[hubx]

I would play it IF I could only select the highest playable leagues from the selected countries

[Faille]

Can anyone point me to the list of unlocks and what you need to do to unlock them.

thanks.

ps that info should be listed on the steam achievement page imo

[Colorado]

I think you can change the playable nations midway through the game, using the add/remove feature.

Must say, the transfer news page is better than the full version.

[akubaem82]

It's cool but I wish there was like an option screen to choose exactly which things you wanted to use. Like ticking boxes that I want full scouting, contracts, etc. but I don't want (angrily) the tone system, media management, etc. That would be perfect for me at least.

Yes, this is the way we want... For me, I want to play until 10-20 season, and develop my young player according to my need... But in FMC, you cannot do anything to train this guys... even tutoring is not allow... I also wanted to teach the player to learn some preferred move, that is really important in my tactics... If only they can do preference to choose which option we want to play and which not, that would be very2 good, and I would give 5 star out of 5 for this game...

Btw- back to the thread question... For me, FMC is really what I want, because in almost 10 years of playing this game, I never once get until 10 season... The most greatest thing about FMC is the automatic instruction, where you can change the tactic according to scenario (winning +1 goal or losing +1 goal). This kind of thing is very hard to control even though you play in full mode, because you just need to watch and react to every single thing that happen, and sometimes emotion do cloud your judgment...

[Babak G]

I thought the match scenarios were only for the instant result feature and not for matches you are watching?

Have player attributes developed well in FMC over a period of few seasons?

[Beardeye]

Ive started a full game, and its taken me about 4 hours to get through the first 3 weeks but I usually spend time getting to know my squad, getting in new staff, sending scouts away and setting up training and tactics initially for pre-season. How long did it take some of you guys during pre-season with the said things to do?

It took me at least 4 hours pre-season on the demo. I was also making massive squad changes (lower league), setting up scouting, backroom staff changes etc. It also took me a long time to get used to the interface as haven’t played for a while.

[Beardeye]

As this seems to be the go to thread for FMC i’ve got two more questions:

1- Database is confirmed as medium- but how much of that is searchable via player search? I seem to bring up a lot fewer players than on full fat. Scout reports seem to compensate somewhat for this.

2- Can you preload shouts into a tactic in FMC? I cant see how if you can.

[Mark H]

Loving FMC, so clean and simple and gets rid of all the annoying stop/start nature of the full game.

HOWEVER, I have only played the demo. How do you get U18 players? Do you get a new input into the reserves at the end of the season, or does your head scout do it all?

Thanks! Good thread btw KUTGW!

[Gwyn]

Why on earth do you have to run three leagues?! Mostly to make the game faster, I only ever play the EPL. Surely having the OPTION of running up to three leagues would have been much better?

[spankie]

As this seems to be the go to thread for FMC i’ve got two more questions:

1- Database is confirmed as medium- but how much of that is searchable via player search? I seem to bring up a lot fewer players than on full fat. Scout reports seem to compensate somewhat for this.

2- Can you preload shouts into a tactic in FMC? I cant see how if you can.

1 - It depends on things like your scouting knowledge and any conditions you have set for the search just like in previous FMs. You should be able to search for all the players where your club has 100% knowledge and those players based in other countries that have a relatively high reputation.

2 - No. But if you need to have shouts preloaded then that means that your starting tactics aren't 100% right. The shouts apparently do have an effect on the players familiarity with the tactic. You may want to set up the base tactics so they are right and then only use shouts to make tactical changes through the game.

Mark H - the U18s have been combined with the reserves. New U18 players wil apparently appear in there just as if it's an U18 side. Your HoY will have an effect, but I've not been far enough in te game to see that for myself.

[PinballFury]

question about unlockable, If a harddrive was to be reformatted would does unlockable need to be unlock again or does it work like dlc where they stay within steam account

[Lucas]

It is tied to your Steam account so you would be able to reapply it to your new saves.

Your saves wouldn't be protected in that instance though so if you have used up transfer money on a save it will be tied into that save game.

[PinballFury]

thanks lucas

[Mark H]

1 - It depends on things like your scouting knowledge and any conditions you have set for the search just like in previous FMs. You should be able to search for all the players where your club has 100% knowledge and those players based in other countries that have a relatively high reputation.

2 - No. But if you need to have shouts preloaded then that means that your starting tactics aren't 100% right. The shouts apparently do have an effect on the players familiarity with the tactic. You may want to set up the base tactics so they are right and then only use shouts to make tactical changes through the game.

Mark H - the U18s have been combined with the reserves. New U18 players wil apparently appear in there just as if it's an U18 side. Your HoY will have an effect, but I've not been far enough in te game to see that for myself.

Excellent! Thanking you!

[spankie]

I'm actually starting to like the scouting in FMC particually the Known Talent search.

I recommend running through that quite a few times as so far every time I have run it the scout has come up with new players with new reports. As I'm playing in the BSN there's virtually no chance of signing players from anywhere other then England I've not bothered to run a New Talent search. I just run the Known talent search and look through the results to add to shortlist, trial or just get an additional report and then run the Known Talent search again to get a new batch.

I suspect that I might be abusing this feature a little as it doesn't take more then a day or two to run the search.

[Babak G]

Sounds like FMC is tailor made for a long-career game for LLM?

[Steve1977beyond]

I used to really enjoy taking a team in the lower leagues (League 1 / League 2), signing a few gems, tweaking the tactics and then trying to get them promoted but the intense micro management of FM11 and it's ilk virually made this impossible as it took so long to do. Also, even with maximum Database I struggled to find players but now on FMC I'm finding more players than before, if I can afford to get them (like before) then they'r in the team in no-time scoring goals. Meanwhile in normal FM I'd still be answering questions on their arrival in the press conference.

Honestly i cant say this enough, FMC is a proper simulation that FM should have always been. Normal FM is more akin to a sims type game with how long it takes to do the most menial of tasks. If you want to 'manage' then FMC is the one to play. It's a shame that having viewable 'unlockables' makes it seem a bit amateruish in this regard.

Also Team Talks...please leave these out! If you want to give your team a boost you invariably change tactics anyway and long may this continue. Whilst it's true that managers do give words of wisdom to encourage their players, what do they also do at Half Time? They tell the players to 'get stuck in', 'pass to feet' etc. - basically any manner of the touchline shouts thats in the game. So TeamTalks are in the game except you now dont have to put your arm round them and plead for a good performance.

[20leGend99]

What I like about FMC is that it's gone back to basics. You get to do all of the core areas of the game without getting roped into all the other bells and whistles that the full fat version has. At the end of the day all I want to do is build a team, develop a few tactics and then play matches.

The way I used to play FM was to not bother with large parts of the game. Each year I'd check my staff were ok and allocate them to training (ie aerobic/defence/attack) but that's as far as I'd take it (apart from retraining positions). I'd always let my scouts go off and do their own thing as well. I did use to do teamtalks and press conference but only because my assistants were incompetent. You'd have thought after 10 years in the job they'd see what answers I'd given and just copy them but alas they aren't that bright. Other than that I just tried to get through the seasons as quick as I could because the developing a team over time is how I like to play.

FMC allows you to play the quicker longer game without getting bogged down wading through 24 hour seasons. It's the ideal mode for me and thats why I've not even looked at the full fat version so far!

[Babak G]

Just to clarify the unlockables are optional or once they're unlocked they actually take effect?