FM 25 DEVELOPMENT UPDATE

[canry]

Please let it be  light skin. As light skin lovers, we cannot enjoy the game. please don't ignore this

 

I don't want any other innovations

[CountTrapula]

Does anyone else share the fear that with a brand new engine and game having to be rebuilt from the ground up to a point, that this initial version on the new engine will be stripped back and dumbed down compared to what we are used to? Obviously we have already been told a few features that won't be returning at least initially, but I mean in terms of how deep the game is. 

[jmlima]

5 minutes ago, CountTrapula said:

Does anyone else share the fear that with a brand new engine and game having to be rebuilt from the ground up to a point, that this initial version on the new engine will be stripped back and dumbed down compared to what we are used to? Obviously we have already been told a few features that won't be returning at least initially, but I mean in terms of how deep the game is. 

I think that's called 'streamlining the product'.

That was the only reason I bought FM24. End of an era kind of thing, start of the big unknown.

[eekaboo]

19 hours ago, HUNT3R said:

It isn't September yet. That's why it is quiet.

I totally get that & I did read it. I just ment that it seems a strange way to promote a new game if you leave your big announcements until literally a couple of months before you fully release your game. Especially considering that their opening gambit this year was to announce what wouldn't be featured accompanied by some meh 'in development' pictures. It hardly whets the appetite...

[DJ Sir Matthew]

46 minutes ago, eekaboo said:

I totally get that & I did read it. I just ment that it seems a strange way to promote a new game if you leave your big announcements until literally a couple of months before you fully release your game. Especially considering that their opening gambit this year was to announce what wouldn't be featured accompanied by some meh 'in development' pictures. It hardly whets the appetite...

Who says it's only a couple of months before the release? I wouldnt be surprised if FM25 came during Q1 2025...

[grade]

27 minutes ago, DJ Sir Matthew said:

Who says it's only a couple of months before the release? I wouldnt be surprised if FM25 came during Q1 2025...

Hum... never considered that one.

Nah... my bet remains for November release or December.

If it goes beyond that, I begin to consider the production of FM25 has hit some sort hiccup.

[Wolf_pd]

1 hour ago, DJ Sir Matthew said:

Who says it's only a couple of months before the release? I wouldnt be surprised if FM25 came during Q1 2025...

Would fit the number

[Craigus89]

2 hours ago, CountTrapula said:

Does anyone else share the fear that with a brand new engine and game having to be rebuilt from the ground up to a point, that this initial version on the new engine will be stripped back and dumbed down compared to what we are used to? Obviously we have already been told a few features that won't be returning at least initially, but I mean in terms of how deep the game is. 

I mean if I had a hunch about how it would go, I would echo the sentiments of one of the very first responses to this thread.

On 27/06/2024 at 15:33, danyates8 said:

I've got deep worries that due to the popularity of the console version of the game over the last few years we are heading in a far to simplistic direction. The new UI doesn't look good at all in my opinion.

It would not surprise me in the slightest if the engine is essentially the same (how would we ever know anyway)  with many of the bloated useless features removed from the game in order to streamline things, sliding further towards a much more simple and accessible game. This could be a good thing, but I worry that some of the depth will be gone and people who want a deeper experience will have to rely further on basically role playing the game, something we already have to do a fair amount of to get the desired experience.

 

[jmlima]

51 minutes ago, Craigus89 said:

...This could be a good thing, but I worry that some of the depth will be gone and people who want a deeper experience will have to rely further on basically role playing the game, something we already have to do a fair amount of to get the desired experience.

 

Just go dosbox and USM2. I mean there's even an actual moves designer, to design specific plays and moves between sets of players and a proper set pieces designer. And there's an RPG element if you want it. You can also automate all of the tactical side and just play El Presidente.

[Fausto]

In a week time we will have release date, probably videos of the engine.

I been thinking about this since miles talked about it last year , so close cant wait.

And been Playing since CM 01/02, so i trust the team and Miles so i think release date will be similar to last games 

[DaveMUFC]

21 hours ago, DJ Sir Matthew said:

Who says it's only a couple of months before the release? I wouldnt be surprised if FM25 came during Q1 2025...

I think it'd be a pretty dumb move considering the November release date already feels too late, and a lot of players like me lose interest in the current version when the season ends in May, so an even longer wait between games wouldn't go down well..

[rp1966]

16 minutes ago, DaveMUFC said:

I think it'd be a pretty dumb move considering the November release date already feels too late, and a lot of players like me lose interest in the current version when the season ends in May, so an even longer wait between games wouldn't go down well..

I kind of expected SI to use the opportunity of multi-year parallel development to shift the release window for FM25 so that it could be closer to the start of the season. 

[pedrosantos]

Is it known if fm25 changes are all about 3d me, or also tactical instructions changes?

[jmlima]

4 minutes ago, pedrosantos said:

Is it known if fm25 changes are all about 3d me, or also tactical instructions changes?

Biggest change (IMO) is female football. 3d is not so much a change as a (hopefully, I mean it's unity so...) refinement  and instructions (as can be seen by the removal of shouts) are being nerfed until further notice (or progress update that actually shows anything being added rather than removed). Oh and, for better or worse remains to be seen, the interface is also being changed.

[pedrosantos]

1 hour ago, jmlima said:

Biggest change (IMO) is female football. 3d is not so much a change as a (hopefully, I mean it's unity so...) refinement  and instructions (as can be seen by the removal of shouts) are being nerfed until further notice (or progress update that actually shows anything being added rather than removed). Oh and, for better or worse remains to be seen, the interface is also being changed.

Thank you, i am hoping tactical instructions will be revamped and also some new features such as Goalkeepers making a penalty 

[john1982]

23 hours ago, Craigus89 said:

but I worry that some of the depth will be gone and people who want a deeper experience will have to rely further on basically role playing the game

The truth is that there is not deep experience in last 4-5 years of FMs.. illogical tactics work with almost any team, and if you try to play logical you do much worse than a "stupid" plug n play tactic.. going with Nottingham Forest play away into Man City and if you play a good thought out counter or defensive tactic you have terrible results.. if you plug in a full attacking gegenpress wrong tactic with wrong roles and positions you may also win the match.

And this is a problem ever since I remember playing FM. The only thing left for me is to enhance my role playing, which means better graphics, better animations, better stadiums etc etc. I want it to lean more towards the old fifa manager to be honest..

[El Payaso]

43 minutes ago, john1982 said:

The truth is that there is not deep experience in last 4-5 years of FMs.. illogical tactics work with almost any team, and if you try to play logical you do much worse than a "stupid" plug n play tactic.. going with Nottingham Forest play away into Man City and if you play a good thought out counter or defensive tactic you have terrible results.. if you plug in a full attacking gegenpress wrong tactic with wrong roles and positions you may also win the match.

This is the point of view that people should change in their gameplay. Logical tactical choices do lead to somewhat logical results. For example playing with Nottingham away against Manchester City, it should be expected that anything else than a heavy loss is a bonus. And at least I'm more than fine with a loss as an outcome and have never had the need to try something unrealistic just because I have to win to be able to enjoy the game. 

I don't have experience on any unrealistic tactics as that is not my style of playing but I would say that it is possible to approach these games with realistic defensive approaches. With Chelsea I took points away to both City and Liverpool with a realistic defensive approach and I have done the same with Real Betis against Real Madrid and with Torino against some of the bigger Italian teams. Sure, I could have probably done better with an aggressive approach and all-out attack but I don't see a point playing the game that way as it strips away the whole idea of the game for me. 

Sure, I would love to see things being balanced and plug and play tactics and overpowered style of plays not existing but currently using something like this even when you know what the outcome will is people just ruining the gameplay for themselves and doing this knowingly. 

What I am trying to say is that if you stick to a realistic tactical choices, you are also going to have the most realistic outcomes and thereby also the most enjoyable gameplay. 

Of course if your attitude is "I have to win", then feel free to ignore my piece of opinion. And this is not directed to anyone specifically. 

[whatsupdoc]

9 minutes ago, El Payaso said:

This is the point of view that people should change in their gameplay. Logical tactical choices do lead to somewhat logical results. For example playing with Nottingham away against Manchester City, it should be expected that anything else than a heavy loss is a bonus. And at least I'm more than fine with a loss as an outcome and have never had the need to try something unrealistic just because I have to win to be able to enjoy the game. 

I don't have experience on any unrealistic tactics as that is not my style of playing but I would say that it is possible to approach these games with realistic defensive approaches. With Chelsea I took points away to both City and Liverpool with a realistic defensive approach and I have done the same with Real Betis against Real Madrid and with Torino against some of the bigger Italian teams. Sure, I could have probably done better with an aggressive approach and all-out attack but I don't see a point playing the game that way as it strips away the whole idea of the game for me. 

Sure, I would love to see things being balanced and plug and play tactics and overpowered style of plays not existing but currently using something like this even when you know what the outcome will is people just ruining the gameplay for themselves and doing this knowingly. 

What I am trying to say is that if you stick to a realistic tactical choices, you are also going to have the most realistic outcomes and thereby also the most enjoyable gameplay. 

Of course if your attitude is "I have to win", then feel free to ignore my piece of opinion. And this is not directed to anyone specifically. 

Big no to this. The engine will never progress as an attempted football Sim if people recommend avoiding metas. 

See why the meta tactics over-perform and give the Devs feedback about it. 

 

Besides, conventional or "logical" football tactics are very hit and miss in FM24 imo. 

Edited August 29 by whatsupdoc

[El Payaso]

14 minutes ago, whatsupdoc said:

Big no to this. The engine will never progress as an attempted football Sim if people recommend avoiding metas. 

See why the meta tactics over-perform and give the Devs feedback about it. 

 

Besides, conventional or "logical" football tactics are very hit and miss in FM24 imo. 

Well, for how many years has for example knapp made his meta tactics available for the public? And for how many years have people noticed that a simple high press combined with counter-press turns into something that performs at least a bit too well? And I bet the developers have way more information about these than for example I do.

My point of view was simply to encourage people to change their thinking from having to win into a more realistic approach where a team predicted to finish 9th might actually finish 9th or 10th. This is called realism and a career and can be quite easily replicated with logical tactical choices. 

[Birdman10piyu]

When they announced FM25 awhile back, they said we can expect "significant" improvements in th matchday experience, improved animations and physics.

S yes, with that I'm expecting the ME to look better than it does now and I'm happy about that.

[whatsupdoc]

17 minutes ago, Birdman10piyu said:

When they announced FM25 awhile back, they said we can expect "significant" improvements in th matchday experience, improved animations and physics.

S yes, with that I'm expecting the ME to look better than it does now and I'm happy about that.

Looking better (graphics) is a given. Improved football Simulation is always up in the air and hopefully they've devoted some resources to it despite major work on other areas. 

[jmlima]

31 minutes ago, whatsupdoc said:

Looking better (graphics) is a given. Improved football Simulation is always up in the air and hopefully they've devoted some resources to it despite major work on other areas. 

I'm always a bit surprised people seem to take for a given that the graphics of the match will improve significantly. not really sure the answer to 'we need a cutting edge 3d gaming engine' is unity. I mean if you want easy(ish) multi-platform then yeah.

[whatsupdoc]

Just now, jmlima said:

I'm always a bit surprised people seem to take for a given that the graphics of the match will improve significantly. not really sure the answer to 'we need a cutting edge 3d gaming engine' is unity. I mean if you want easy(ish) multi-platform then yeah.

Sure, unity isn't perfect but I said "improvement" not "cutting edge". 

[john1982]

7 hours ago, El Payaso said:

This is the point of view that people should change in their gameplay. Logical tactical choices do lead to somewhat logical results. For example playing with Nottingham away against Manchester City, it should be expected that anything else than a heavy loss is a bonus. And at least I'm more than fine with a loss as an outcome and have never had the need to try something unrealistic just because I have to win to be able to enjoy the game. 

I get what you say but maybe my example was very exaggerating. Sometimes you are suppose to win, play logical, cautious, etc and game does not reward you...

My problem is not that I cannot ignore "stupid" tactics. I can ignore them and play logical. But the fact that I know these tactics exist and have success makes me thing that match engine is not right and have many flaws. That I cannot get off my mind..

ps. sorry for bad English

[El Payaso]

10 hours ago, john1982 said:

I get what you say but maybe my example was very exaggerating. Sometimes you are suppose to win, play logical, cautious, etc and game does not reward you...

My problem is not that I cannot ignore "stupid" tactics. I can ignore them and play logical. But the fact that I know these tactics exist and have success makes me thing that match engine is not right and have many flaws. That I cannot get off my mind..

ps. sorry for bad English

I understand. That is also why I don't follow for example FM YouTubers (except for Deep-lying Playmaker) or many career updates as these in general give a really bad image of the game. 

I was fairly satisfied with my own gameplay through FM 2024. Even though two seasons per save was the maximum I played, I got 7th with Torino in season one (a slight over-achievement), about the same with Real Betis and then an over-achievement with Chelsea after taking control mid-season and having the highest amount of points since then. 

I would still play the game but the general effect of set pieces ruined the enjoyment for me. Conceding +20 goals per season from throw-ins is something that is impossible to enjoy as that has nothing to do with logical outcomes. 

What was also a bummer is the fact that I haven't been able to even try out a high pressing system as I have the information that if I will, my gameplay will be ruined as instead of realistic results, I will be most probably over-achieving heavily in the game with one or two simple team instructions. I know that many people would enjoy that but I don't and things like this simply shouldn't be in the game.

In real life every style of play has their own strengths and weaknesses while on FM you simply don't get punished for over-attacking even when you are the smaller side attacking against a big side. 

The sad story seems to be that many people turn into these totally senseless tactical approaches because they cannot stand to take a defeat. With a sensible approach you can easily have realistic results and slowly build towards something better but a majority of FM players don't seem to want to play the game that way. I personally don't understand why but I won't go into that discussion again. 

And this is also probably why the game works in the way it does at the moment: to satisfy the masses. I have seen screenshots from the buildup to FM 2024 where it was clearly said that the time of plug-and-play gegenpress tactics is going to be over but we have all seen that this is not the case. And this issue can only be fixed if SI will take a risk and start implementing some balance and common sense to the gameplay. In a bigger picture: putting human players and the AI to the same line and by that make it possible to human players actually to fail at the game. 

[jmlima]

2 minutes ago, El Payaso said:

...And this issue can only be fixed if SI will take a risk and start implementing some balance and common sense to the gameplay. In a bigger picture: putting human players and the AI to the same line and by that make it possible to human players actually to fail at the game. 

But is this really different today from what it used to be? I mean, you just need to follow groups that still play CM01-02 and CM97-98 to see that utterly nonsensical results were already present and that ubber tactics that despite having little correlation to reality still rampage in the game. Even in the FM series, going back as far as FM12 I remember clearly being pretty trivial to turn any above average team into a monster team. Don't think the game was ever all that realistic, always more fun looking like realistic.

[El Payaso]

1 minute ago, jmlima said:

But is this really different today from what it used to be? I mean, you just need to follow groups that still play CM01-02 and CM97-98 to see that utterly nonsensical results were already present and that ubber tactics that despite having little correlation to reality still rampage in the game. Even in the FM series, going back as far as FM12 I remember clearly being pretty trivial to turn any above average team into a monster team. Don't think the game was ever all that realistic, always more fun looking like realistic.

That's the problem: it never has been. Even after SI have given us years and years to learn how to play the game and use the features. As humans are generally lazy, not many of them are going to put that effort if not forced to do so. 

I have always backed my views with a simple point: it is much easier to try and learn to do something instead of trying to forget and purposefully sabotage your own gameplay with limitations. 

In my opinion FM is not supposed be a game where you have to limit your own gameplay with artificial rules to create a somewhat realistic simulation. 

 

[jmlima]

39 minutes ago, El Payaso said:

That's the problem: it never has been. Even after SI have given us years and years to learn how to play the game and use the features. As humans are generally lazy, not many of them are going to put that effort if not forced to do so. ...

I may be misunderstanding but I would disagree with regards to laziness. Actually, I think it's the opposite. People actively searched for the way to break the engine and they did it. Always. The engine is weak by itself (there are multiple examples over the decades of odd results out of it) but still, it's clearly open to be exploited and people searched and found the ways to do it. Then it's up to the developers if they want to close those loopholes or if they are not fussed about it for whatever reasons of theirs.

Take gegenpress. You can certainly play the game without using it but, is gegenpress not used in reality? So why should you not used it? The real reason not to use it, is that gegenpress seems to offer an unrealistic advantage in the game when compared to reality. As you correctly quote, SI are aware of this. It's not laziness from the players that use it, it's an exploitable loophole that has been left in place for whatever reason.

Edit - To say, I understand SI's position. People often want 'realistic' but, 99% of simulations, if they were 100% realistic players would hate them.

Edited August 30 by jmlima

[El Payaso]

5 minutes ago, jmlima said:

I may be misunderstanding but I would disagree with regards to laziness. Actually, I think it's the opposite. People actively searched for the way to break the engine and they did it. Always. The engine is weak by itself (there are multiple examples over the decades of odd results out of it) but still, it's clearly open to be exploited and people searched and found the ways to do it. Then it's up to the developers if they want to close those loopholes or if they are not fussed about it for whatever reasons of theirs.

Take gegenpress. You can certainly play the game without using it but, is gegenpress not used in reality? So why should you not used it? The real reason not to use it, is that gegenpress seems to offer an unrealistic advantage in the game when compared to reality. As you correctly quote, SI are aware of this. It's not laziness from the players that use it, it's an exploitable loophole that has been left in place for whatever reason.

My point about the laziness was directed to the difficulty level. I have many times said that the bar should be raised but this is almost always then played down because "people would start complaining as they can't win anymore". And a response to this "learn how to play the game then" is not acceptable. 

In my opinion FM can never really take steps forward as long as the general difficulty level is as low as it currently is and has always been. 

The game would take big leaps to right direction if the difficulty was higher. 

[jmlima]

2 minutes ago, El Payaso said:

My point about the laziness was directed to the difficulty level. I have many times said that the bar should be raised but this is almost always then played down because "people would start complaining as they can't win anymore". And a response to this "learn how to play the game then" is not acceptable. 

In my opinion FM can never really take steps forward as long as the general difficulty level is as low as it currently is and has always been. 

The game would take big leaps to right direction if the difficulty was higher. 

Gotcha! And yes, agreed.

[lied90]

19 hours ago, El Payaso said:

My point of view was simply to encourage people to change their thinking from having to win into a more realistic approach where a team predicted to finish 9th might actually finish 9th or 10th. This is called realism and a career and can be quite easily replicated with logical tactical choices. 

And what if people simply want to play gegenpress. It's one of the most fun playstyles to watch irl, people should be able to use it without feeling like they are cheating the game.

[El Payaso]

2 minutes ago, lied90 said:

And what if people simply want to play gegenpress. It's one of the most fun playstyles to watch irl, people should be able to use it without feeling like they are cheating the game.

Exactly. I haven't been for example even try how that style of play works as I know that it will make the team over-perform. 

[Icy]

Totally agree with you both. I recently wrote this in the unofficial reddit channel and will paste here as well as it applies to your points:

In some cases it's a matter of how difficult is becoming to self impose rules so it reaches a ridiculous point like ok let's play with our eyes closed and moving the mouse with our feet while singing and cooking.

I have been playing LLM rules forever, even before it was like a standard set of rules. Initially they were trying to make the game more realistic juts using common sense, let's not do things that are not realistic even if the game allows me to do them, but now I find myself restricting what I can do more and more not for extra realism but because deficiencies of the game.

Like in FM24 if i use a 4-2-3-1 with two support DMs they over perform and play better than a more realistic anchor or defensive midfielder on defend and B2B or playmaker, one containing, the other running or passing. But on the other hand, to use two support DMs is not totally unrealistic, so why not to use it?

What about using a 4-2-4... it's not usual but... not totally unrealistic to use it either, so if I'm losing a game and I switch in the last 10 minutes to 4-2-4 attacking... am I cheating or being unrealistic? I feel I do, so I don't use it.

If I praise the players training every week for 3 weeks, their morale goes up (If I do a 4th time they lose it because I'm praising them too much). So should I stop praising my players training to not to get that morale boost?

Press conferences mind games. Besides how repetitive and boring they are, once you master the mind games, and you don't need to be so smart, just use common sense and observe results. Then you can use them to your advantage vs the AI, should I then delegate press conference?

I can be so aggressive signing quality staff so it's so easy to have the best staff in your league and for cheap. Should I delegate then staff signing to the AI to not to take advantage of it?

I can rotate my players much more than the AI, like every game in the second half I do the max 5 player changes, so all my players are in good form, reduce injuries and nobody complains about playing time. The AI does not, is that unrealistic what I do?

The famous gegenpress tactic, we know it's overpowered in the ME, but there are many teams playing like that in real life, so can I use it? what is the limit of it being unrealistically used? What about attacking mentality the 90 minutes even against teams better than mine?

Signing young players fired from top teams is something that happens a lot in real life, and some of them with that second chance become decent top division players but... in FM it happens way too much to the point that it's so easy to have the youngest team in the league with low salaries. There is no incentive to sign old veterans as their mental and tutoring skills do not matter that much. Should I restrict myself to 1 young FA signed per year? or 2 or 3? what is realistic?

I can continue with many examples that are not just abusing the game with weird formations and sadly it extends to more and more parts of the game so at the end if I don't want to feel like I'm overachieving because I'm gaming the game I just must delegate everything to the AI and just click on continue, that of course is no longer playing a game but watching it.
 

[El Payaso]

39 minutes ago, Icy said:

Totally agree with you both. I recently wrote this in the unofficial reddit channel and will paste here as well as it applies to your points:

In some cases it's a matter of how difficult is becoming to self impose rules so it reaches a ridiculous point like ok let's play with our eyes closed and moving the mouse with our feet while singing and cooking.

I have been playing LLM rules forever, even before it was like a standard set of rules. Initially they were trying to make the game more realistic juts using common sense, let's not do things that are not realistic even if the game allows me to do them, but now I find myself restricting what I can do more and more not for extra realism but because deficiencies of the game.

Like in FM24 if i use a 4-2-3-1 with two support DMs they over perform and play better than a more realistic anchor or defensive midfielder on defend and B2B or playmaker, one containing, the other running or passing. But on the other hand, to use two support DMs is not totally unrealistic, so why not to use it?

What about using a 4-2-4... it's not usual but... not totally unrealistic to use it either, so if I'm losing a game and I switch in the last 10 minutes to 4-2-4 attacking... am I cheating or being unrealistic? I feel I do, so I don't use it.

If I praise the players training every week for 3 weeks, their morale goes up (If I do a 4th time they lose it because I'm praising them too much). So should I stop praising my players training to not to get that morale boost?

Press conferences mind games. Besides how repetitive and boring they are, once you master the mind games, and you don't need to be so smart, just use common sense and observe results. Then you can use them to your advantage vs the AI, should I then delegate press conference?

I can be so aggressive signing quality staff so it's so easy to have the best staff in your league and for cheap. Should I delegate then staff signing to the AI to not to take advantage of it?

I can rotate my players much more than the AI, like every game in the second half I do the max 5 player changes, so all my players are in good form, reduce injuries and nobody complains about playing time. The AI does not, is that unrealistic what I do?

The famous gegenpress tactic, we know it's overpowered in the ME, but there are many teams playing like that in real life, so can I use it? what is the limit of it being unrealistically used? What about attacking mentality the 90 minutes even against teams better than mine?

Signing young players fired from top teams is something that happens a lot in real life, and some of them with that second chance become decent top division players but... in FM it happens way too much to the point that it's so easy to have the youngest team in the league with low salaries. There is no incentive to sign old veterans as their mental and tutoring skills do not matter that much. Should I restrict myself to 1 young FA signed per year? or 2 or 3? what is realistic?

I can continue with many examples that are not just abusing the game with weird formations and sadly it extends to more and more parts of the game so at the end if I don't want to feel like I'm overachieving because I'm gaming the game I just must delegate everything to the AI and just click on continue, that of course is no longer playing a game but watching it.
 

I think we have very similar views about many things on FM. In general I would stay that the game should be more about "how to make of this feature" instead of purposely chopping of some of features completely from your gameplay to not be unrealistically successful. I think this is also one of the main reasons why some of the features are under-used in the game: because you don't need to master them or even use them to be successful. 

I for example would love to put more effort on the training features, data hub etc, but feel that if I do, I will be even more successful in the game and that is what I don't want. 

When it comes to tactical approaches, I remember back in the day on FM 2007 that switching to a 4-2-4 in the end was a common practice when chasing a goal. The difference to nowadays is that you had at least equally big chance of conceding as scoring. Nowadays going to a top-heavy formation and ultra aggressive approach feels more like typing IDDQD on Doom as there is at least way bigger chance of benefit than lose. This is why I feel that I am forced to just change the mentality even when scoring a goal would be vital. I don't know if I'm the only FM player in the community but I haven't played with a high blocking and pressing system for a single minute during FM 2024 because I don't want to utilize that kind of "cheat code". 

[whatsupdoc]

1 hour ago, Icy said:

Totally agree with you both. I recently wrote this in the unofficial reddit channel and will paste here as well as it applies to your points:

In some cases it's a matter of how difficult is becoming to self impose rules so it reaches a ridiculous point like ok let's play with our eyes closed and moving the mouse with our feet while singing and cooking.

I have been playing LLM rules forever, even before it was like a standard set of rules. Initially they were trying to make the game more realistic juts using common sense, let's not do things that are not realistic even if the game allows me to do them, but now I find myself restricting what I can do more and more not for extra realism but because deficiencies of the game.

Like in FM24 if i use a 4-2-3-1 with two support DMs they over perform and play better than a more realistic anchor or defensive midfielder on defend and B2B or playmaker, one containing, the other running or passing. But on the other hand, to use two support DMs is not totally unrealistic, so why not to use it?

What about using a 4-2-4... it's not usual but... not totally unrealistic to use it either, so if I'm losing a game and I switch in the last 10 minutes to 4-2-4 attacking... am I cheating or being unrealistic? I feel I do, so I don't use it.

If I praise the players training every week for 3 weeks, their morale goes up (If I do a 4th time they lose it because I'm praising them too much). So should I stop praising my players training to not to get that morale boost?

Press conferences mind games. Besides how repetitive and boring they are, once you master the mind games, and you don't need to be so smart, just use common sense and observe results. Then you can use them to your advantage vs the AI, should I then delegate press conference?

I can be so aggressive signing quality staff so it's so easy to have the best staff in your league and for cheap. Should I delegate then staff signing to the AI to not to take advantage of it?

I can rotate my players much more than the AI, like every game in the second half I do the max 5 player changes, so all my players are in good form, reduce injuries and nobody complains about playing time. The AI does not, is that unrealistic what I do?

The famous gegenpress tactic, we know it's overpowered in the ME, but there are many teams playing like that in real life, so can I use it? what is the limit of it being unrealistically used? What about attacking mentality the 90 minutes even against teams better than mine?

Signing young players fired from top teams is something that happens a lot in real life, and some of them with that second chance become decent top division players but... in FM it happens way too much to the point that it's so easy to have the youngest team in the league with low salaries. There is no incentive to sign old veterans as their mental and tutoring skills do not matter that much. Should I restrict myself to 1 young FA signed per year? or 2 or 3? what is realistic?

I can continue with many examples that are not just abusing the game with weird formations and sadly it extends to more and more parts of the game so at the end if I don't want to feel like I'm overachieving because I'm gaming the game I just must delegate everything to the AI and just click on continue, that of course is no longer playing a game but watching it.
 

Good post. 100% agree. 

In our online save we've banned focus out wide and low crossing. The effect has been pleasing in that its nerfed many OP tactics without us needing to ban certain formations or roles. 

That said, obviously not ideal, and symptomatic of what you're saying. 

[Icy]

17 minutes ago, El Payaso said:

I don't know if I'm the only FM player in the community but I haven't played with a high blocking and pressing system for a single minute during FM 2024 because I don't want to utilize that kind of "cheat code". 

We are two already  but it sucks as some teams I enjoy watching in real life use it and I'd like to use it without feeling "dirty".

[jmlima]

2 hours ago, Icy said:

..

Signing young players fired from top teams is something that happens a lot in real life, and some of them with that second chance become decent top division players but... in FM it happens way too much to the point that it's so easy to have the youngest team in the league with low salaries. There is no incentive to sign old veterans as their mental and tutoring skills do not matter that much. Should I restrict myself to 1 young FA signed per year? or 2 or 3? what is realistic?

...

Yeah, there's been a steady increase in the info available to the player, this in turn facilities grabbing opportunities offered but, there's a similar growing gap in the way the computer teams use the info available to them. At some points it seems there are either errors in the logic, or there's more info available to the human player than there is to the computer teams.

[WizbaII]

There are three problems with the current discussion of OP tactics.

1. The problem with your personal experience is that you can simulate 100 seasons in FM in the time that it takes real life to go through one single season. Why is this important? Because when you are playing through seasons 100 times faster than real life, you will see unexpected things that you don't expect in real life. You should never expect a sim to be more realistic than real life.

2. I think it is fair to point out that the number of OP tactics should be minimized. However, one thing you guys are missing is that some people are better at this game than others. Some of the OP tactics you are complaining about are ones that people who want to play in an "honest" way will never find. The devs cannot necessarily spend all their time trying to squash tactics that only the best players know about. The focus is usually going to be on FM player of average skill because they also love the game just like you and, more importantly, they are more common.

3. The ME has improved every year. I don't know why anyone would even suggest that this won't happen unless they haven't been paying attention. There are people here who don't realize that the SI team is much bigger than it was 5 years ago. They have the ability to improve the ME while also switching to a new UI. It's silly to question whether to ME will improve.

[El Payaso]

23 minutes ago, WizbaII said:

 

2. I think it is fair to point out that the number of OP tactics should be minimized. However, one thing you guys are missing is that some people are better at this game than others. Some of the OP tactics you are complaining about are ones that people who want to play in an "honest" way will never find. The devs cannot necessarily spend all their time trying to squash tactics that only the best players know about. The focus is usually going to be on FM player of average skill because they also love the game just like you and, more importantly, they are more common.

In my opinion the biggest problem with the so-called OP tactics is the fact that the current state ie the game prevents you to use some simple and valid tactical instructions like high press if you want to keep things realistic. I haven't even tried it but I know that this simple switch would have made all the teams that I have managed perform significantly better and that is not what I want with my gameplay. Obviously I want to reach the goals like getting a top-half finish with a club predicted to finish 9th but I don't see any point in winning titles with a team like that as that is not a career anymore. 

I have full confidence that FM 2025 will be a better game once again and I hope that a big amount of focus has been put on balancing things and how different tactical approaches work. Attacking style with high press should have its advantages but also the weaknesses like players getting jaded and injured as well as big teams making dog meat out of you with quick breaks. And then on the other hand a low-block and standing off should in general be defensively more solid than some overly aggressive approaches like this. 

[Mobius]

Isn’t the idea to win football matches?

The CPU should be smarter and adapt to tactics, if a ‘game breaking’ tactic is discovered, why can’t the engine be tweaked and a patch released?

It seems crazy to me people have to purposely not use tactics that exist in football to make the game more realistic (e.g draw or lose the occasional match) 

At least there is some logic to some self imposed restrictions we put on ourselves in the game. You can justify a youth only challenge, or not making big signings. But handicapping yourself by purposely not having players press, or not playing a high line because statistically you’d win more football matches… why not just put a goalie up front if you want to get intentionally gain 3 points less often for immersion. 

Edited August 31 by Mobius

[El Payaso]

24 minutes ago, Mobius said:

Isn’t the idea to win football matches?

Partially yes, but for me clearly over-achieving and winning trophies with mid-table level teams is not something that shouldn't be part of a football management simulation. That won't be a career anymore as it has nothing to do with realism. 

If you for example pick something like Manchester United or Tottenham as your team, it should never be that you win the Premier League with the team in season one. A top-four finish should be a really good finish and help you both keep your job and give you something to build on. That is also what you call a career. 

Being able to win the league with teams like these in season one or two is something where I don't see any sense at all. And it also doesn't have anything to do with playing a career. Yeah, someone or even a majority of people playing FM might enjoy but it doesn't have much to do with the general idea of the game itself. 

Edited August 31 by El Payaso

[jmlima]

1 hour ago, WizbaII said:

... They have the ability to improve the ME while also switching to a new UI. It's silly to question whether to ME will improve.

I mean, to be fair they are doing far more than that, including code conversion but... the only actual fact we have is that they are removing features that don't work as intended because they cannot make them any better in time for the release. And that's  a fact as stated in the only update we had to the game.

Not to say they won't make significant announcements from here on but, at this point in time, we have no evidence of upgrade and we have evidence of no upgrade.

Of course, we could make the silly argument that, by removing something that does not work as intended, that is actually an upgrade.

[pedrosantos]

Options should not be shut down, meaning why wouldn't I be able (ir AI managers) to lead a Middle table team to win titles? This is precisely how managers build their careers, doing and achieving more with less

[Psycho.]

Any chanche they will update the scouting system? It's so broken.

[grade]

I for one love that ability to visually build my club grounds from ground up. Sure it is not part of the manager, but it is a game, is it not?

What is exactly the point of having such a feature… sure it can be more gamifying FM, but well if you do a LLM, it would add flavor to our saves, making the ability to see the stadium expand and have your input and become bigger has we move up the leagues.

I seen that We Are Football have this.

As much you disagree with this, what are features that you have seen in current or past other football sims games, would like it to becoming part of FM game?

Edited August 31 by grade

[jmlima]

51 minutes ago, grade said:

...

As much you disagree with this, what are features that you have seen in current or past other football sims games, would like it to becoming part of FM game?

As a big fan of FIFA Manager many but, if I had to select just one, then I would select the tactical model of USM2. I mean, the possibility of designing actual plays, as well as a proper set-piece designer, plus all the rest of the options available in there. It would add sooo much to FM's tactical options. (and in the end, gegenpress would still win. )

Edit - I always thought the RPG aspect of FIFA Manager had huge potential, a shame it was never properly developed other than some incipient ideas poorly thrown together. That would also add another dimension to the game. Imagine receiving an ultimatum from your family to move away from that **** poor place where your career is starting to bloom, refusing it, and then become known in the world of football as a selfish bastard that only cares about himself, with all the consequences in terms of relationships with players, media, board, etc.

Edited August 31 by jmlima

[forameuss]

10 hours ago, Mobius said:

The CPU should be smarter and adapt to tactics, if a ‘game breaking’ tactic is discovered, why can’t the engine be tweaked and a patch released?

Nobody likes rain, why can't it just not rain any more?

You're massively oversimplifying,  These things are probably ones that SI agree need attention, but they're incredibly difficult to get right.

[Mobius]

1 hour ago, forameuss said:

Nobody likes rain, why can't it just not rain any more?

What? Lots of people enjoy the rain

[Federico]

8 ore fa, grade ha scritto:

I for one love that ability to visually build my club grounds from ground up. Sure it is not part of the manager, but it is a game, is it not?

Well that's not totally true. Many clubs see their grounds growing up by improving facilities and buildings. Many clubs have in their board the coaches themeselves (speaking of lowest tier leagues of course), ordinary people with passion for football and willing to help the community they live in. Gameish? Maybe. Unrealistic? not at all.

[Ti Ago]

Will they give us some kind of news at the worldcup final ?