merecat Posted June 1, 2017 Share Posted June 1, 2017 [Apologies if these have already been proposed.] Manager world impact and interaction needs refining, in my opinion. And it needs to be tackled by addressing the things in the game that seem like a good idea at outset but, after five seasons, just end up the same dirge on repeat. Worse, because these elements (exampled below) are largely extant in the game in isolation, they become increasingly irrelevant. Let's begin with the recent decision to break the old inbox into three: Inbox, News & Social Media. The SM element is a nod to the real world these days, but it's just too gimmicky and meaningless at the moment. I know, for instance, that if I make an offer for a player, two fans will like it and one won't. Forget momentarily that the wording on the SM comments tends to be cringeworthy, it's too predictable. MoM results will almost ALWAYS result in two "Imagine thinking there are better players out there than Fitzpatrick McTavish" and one "Here's comes the McTavish overreaction" tweets. Immediately it felt like a move in the right direction, but it's made pointless by its formulaic repetitiveness and gets no attention from me ever. What makes it irrelevant is that is focuses on too small a factor in the game: transfers, contracts, injuries, performances. It needs refining and expanding to include, as a minimum, true player form opinions and arguments, prematch team selection discussions (this dominates twitter feeds on match days), but most importantly manager decision reactions as well as fan reactions to manager press interactions! That this is completely absent from the feature is stupid. Unless I've completely missed it going on, that is. I would expect, when I praise the players after a match instead of taking the plaudits myself, for example, the fans to react to that - one way or the other! And this leads me to my next improvement... Manager press interaction is just rubbish. Year after year, the same nonsense interview questions with seemingly no basis in context. The world context algorithm needs a lot of work. And if one more paper hack asks me the same question four times, I'll not be held accountable for his untimely death. Why is this so infuriating? Because I am only doing the interviews awaiting the 1 relevant question out of eight weekly repeats. And this farce of choosing your demeanour when answering; it's ridiculous unless you wrap some controls around it. I can easily answer three questions in a row, one calmly, then aggressively, then calmly, and finally passionately...yep, I'm schizophrenic! Or at least borderline bi-polar. How about, if I am angry enough to choose aggressive as a demeanour, I can't just switch that off for the next question? And if I show a history of reacting angrily, maybe make it harder for me to calm my responses once I choose an aggressive response. Then I am building a manager profile that is consistent, and I am being held accountable for my choices. THEN players can make a choice on whether they want to work with a manager that is cuddly or authoritative etc. Know what I mean? It's about building a meaningful profile for yourself as a manager instead of stringing together a million isolated responses and trying to describe my manager profile under the stupid phrase: "Always answers questions calmly." No! No I don't! Last night I spat in a reporter's face for asking me twice about my opponent's weakest link! And here's an idea: If I've answered 'No Comment' every time to the same question for five years, maybe stop asking it. This emotional reaction stuff needs a lot of attention to make it more realistic and less "obvious game mechanic" otherwise it just needs binning; it's a pointless click at the end of the day. The pre-game cinematic clips are gimmicky (manager handshakes etc) and just give me another click to get past them ahead of every game. And the inbox MotD style highlights feeds are pointless too. And finally, it'd be great if SIGames saw and sought to emulate the excellent work some contributors make to developing interesting skins to replace the Out of the Box skins the game is saddled with from the get go. Seriously, I ran a game on FM07 last week and it looks almost identical to the version ten years older! Don't even get me started on the Amstrad CPC464 graphics on the game engine. Love the game though; off to put more hours of my life into it. (Braces oneself for the backlash) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Preveza Posted June 1, 2017 Share Posted June 1, 2017 I made some similar points; but the OP seems like it is just being harsh without any real suggestions. Is this not the suggestions thread? Not trying to be smart. I do agree though on all your points, but would love to hear the but......I think they should.. etc etc. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
merecat Posted June 1, 2017 Author Share Posted June 1, 2017 I think the overall suggestion is to stop throwing ideas into the game in isolation. The developers should string it all together, understand how a single function in the game (eg press conferences) once developed and implemented should be made to interact with other aspects of the game, creating a more holistic experience. I think perhaps I got a bit waffly, but that's the suggestion point. I stopped short of suggesting that SIGames had gotten away with charging full price every year for a game that simply hasn't changed that much since 2007...oops, I said it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
CFuller Posted June 1, 2017 Share Posted June 1, 2017 1 minute ago, merecat said: I stopped short of suggesting that SIGames had gotten away with charging full price every year for a game that simply hasn't changed that much since 2007...oops, I said it. The truth of the matter is that A LOT has changed in 10 years of Football Manager. If you think that SI adding a 3D match engine, press conferences, touchline shouts, tactics wizards, fully customisable leagues, the ability to add/remove leagues in-game, in-depth match analysis tools, live negotiations and additional manager customisation options (and that's not all) results in a game that is "almost identical" to FM07, then your expectations must be ludicrously high. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
merecat Posted June 1, 2017 Author Share Posted June 1, 2017 I didn't say it was the same game, but when you think of developments in gaming over the last ten years, I'm just suggesting considering there have been annual iterations of the game at full price, it perhaps could have moved on a great deal more with regards to the interconnectedness of elements; the holistic deployment of functions. I'm not expecting it to have a live action match engine or anything else like that. Even proposing a match engine with FIFA-like graphics is probably unrealistic at the moment. But to suggest going from the old, annoying protracted contract negotiation system to live negotiations during that number of version developments etc is some kind of groundbreaking game development is somewhat apologist. But just load both games up and compare them...I was shocked myself!Although obviously, after clicking around for a while I was disabused of the total notion. But still! 10 years! hehehe Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
merecat Posted June 1, 2017 Author Share Posted June 1, 2017 And actually, yes: my expectations are pretty high. Our expectations should be high; that's how supply and demand works. We demand more, supply improves to meet demand. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Preveza Posted June 2, 2017 Share Posted June 2, 2017 15 hours ago, CFuller said: The truth of the matter is that A LOT has changed in 10 years of Football Manager. If you think that SI adding a 3D match engine, press conferences, touchline shouts, tactics wizards, fully customisable leagues, the ability to add/remove leagues in-game, in-depth match analysis tools, live negotiations and additional manager customisation options (and that's not all) results in a game that is "almost identical" to FM07, then your expectations must be ludicrously high. No doubt a lot has changed; but in over a decade, I still feel enough has not changed at the same time. Many features have been left untouched. Press conferences, team talks, training, tactics to an extent. Match day experience (Sounds). AI squad management and transfer logic is still not good enough. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
lo_spostato Posted June 2, 2017 Share Posted June 2, 2017 In defense of SI, improved press conferences would be totally unrealistic. Real life sport journalists are as imaginative as a golden fish with Lewy bodies. Training got worse, imho. I really miss the freedom of choice in FM12. Tactics needs to be consistent. One year the game seems to favor the 442, the other they see to loath the use of wings. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Neil Brock Posted December 6, 2017 Administrators Share Posted December 6, 2017 Reviewed so locked. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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