FM 25 DEVELOPMENT UPDATE

[whatsupdoc]

35 minutes ago, Novem9 said:

The same for me. As analyst, I'm enjoying a massive data. All I wanted was more interface stability (you know how the damn columns shift in chaos), and the ability to customize modules and their size to my needs. But the alpha looked like a generic interface for all platforms at once, although this is the maximum touch version for smartphones and switch

Yeah - the columns, the lack of centralising between separator lines kills me. These are important little details that would give it a nicer feel.

[andu1]

I bet 90% of the people saying they won't buy it because of what's been removed will buy it after the reveal

[CamAshworth]

Worrying that they have pushed the announcement of the actual game even being released back to late September.

It might not even get released this year - who knows.

[Dbuk1]

15 minutes ago, andu1 said:

I bet 90% of the people saying they won't buy it because of what's been removed will buy it after the reveal

This is more than true and they will get record sales. Doesn't change anyways feelings

[JAwtunes]

42 minutes ago, Cultured Left Foot said:

To compelte remove International Football is a stranger and stranger decision the more I think about it.

It's international management, rather than international football, that has been removed. At least that's my understanding. Agree though, adding women's football is really interesting but I imagine many would find it more accessible if international management was an option.

Edited September 6 by JAwtunes

[Brentford Alan]

1 hour ago, scythian12 said:

SI have never cared about cosmetics / immersion, and this bugs me greatly. I guess a bit of it is down to licencing, but a lot of seems to be just not caring. There are some issues which would need a bit more attention and some which would be a relatively easy fix. Yet, instead now you get to wear an eyepatch!

/Start of rant/

Some of the decisions in this regard are also on the verge of sensibility: why prioritize a manager being able to put on a ring on every single finger which you never ever see after the character selection screen, yet have spectators at the matchday wear 6 uniform outfits in the entire crowd, something which you look at about 30-50 % of your time in the game?

Why the devolution of player faces compared to '18 (they had maybe less detail but were not in the middle of uncanny valley). Why does the community need to plug the gaps with facepacks like Z's. You can't licence the face of a non-existing person.

The stadium models used to be better and more varied, there was a dowgrade there as well. (For instance no more athletic track), the less said about stadium environs, the better.

Stadiums in lower leagues with 4 full stands generated where their capacity is 500-1000. All of them chock full of people on matchday.

Scraping club colours out of the UI due to legibility / ui issues instead of looking into how to integrate them in a legible way - or have a bit of logic in selecting colours that does not allow low-contrast combinations. (Example: instead of using yellow for Barcelona text, using a slightly darker blue and a slightly brighter red)

Kit / shorts / socks designs never reviewed as there are options in there which get picked 0.15 % of all kits (why are they still in and not international football?)

Kit colour clash detection is comically bad, and it would not be a difficult thing to fix. (I recently played in red vs Villareal in yellow. Game deemed my green GK clashing for some unfathomable reason and generated an orange one...)

/end of rant/

I do wonder, and I'm probably a million miles off the mark  , if some of the stuff you mention early on in your post has been dropped purely for size of install/download reasons. The game has always had compatibility with older machines in mind so may take in to consideration that not everyone has large storage space, and of course the game has to be a size shippable on disc for those who still use them and also be a realistic size of download for those with slower internet speeds. As the game has become more bloated with other features perhaps something's had to give? 

As I say I'm probably miles off with that thought. That said having played the game since CM93 and it being pure text for many years I always find it easy to immerse myself in my world with my own imagination filling in the gaps and ignoring things like crowd graphics that aren't particularly realistic. I appreciate that's not the case for everyone though.

[WizbaII]

10 hours ago, Alekos said:

FM24 advertised as the best version ever and the most polished one but at the end it failed to deliver because of new and existing from previous versions bugs..

Then they said that their development team have set their focus on FM25 that they were working on it for 2 years so that's why some bugs won't be fixed till then...

Now early September, not only we have see nothing from the new ME but they announce that the new features will be delayed until the end of September for a product they working on for 2 years!!!

Not only that but they give us info of what has been removed (shouts, international management, kilos, etc)or not working and they celebrate for premier league license and women football!?!

Guys are you serious?

For how long will you treat your loyal customers (since 1997) like that because you are a monopoly?

 

What you have going on here is not loyalty, but entitlement. How dare SI push back the release of your game by a few weeks?

Loyalty is when you understand that SI have been releasing the game in early November for many, many years. Loyalty means cutting SI some slack when they decide one time to delay release, which they almost never do, and understanding that there must obviously be a good reason for them to make this unusual decision.

You can be entitled if you want, but don't pretend like it's loyalty. What you are is a frequent customer, just like everyone else here.

[rp1966]

As others have said, removing international management in the same year as women's football is introduced is unfortunate - the international women's game probably being a much more likely target for those seeking to manage a women's team than club level.  However, I'm hoping that SI have been listening to our long-term dissatisfaction with international management and it's the fact that a substantial revamp is underway that is the reason why it's been put back and not just porting issues.

The weight thing is almost as bizarre as the Miles' holiday segment.  Why even mention it? It's such a minor thing and would have been picked up on as soon as the player profile screens were shown.  I can't help but think a huge fuss is being made about it only because it was highlighted.

My concerns are partially the delay - I've said previously that having parallel development of Unity FM alongside stretching out the lifespan of the FM18-24 engine should have been an opportunity to bring the release date closer to the end of the current season's transfer window, It's a shame that one-off opportunity has been lost.

The other thing that concerns me is reputation. We have all experienced the weird, unconvincing behaviours that arise throughout the game because of reputation and I am worried that reputation + women's game could result in some very weird stuff.  My worry is how league reputations will be set men's vs women's game and how AI manager reputations will be dealt with based on experience of men's vs women's game.  The 'one ecosystem' is obviously necessary to allow a manger to manage in either set of leagues and to reflect that everything operates in the same universe.  But if the reputation system hasn't been balanced properly I fear we could see some very odd manager movements - like the lower reputation men's leagues becoming overrun by female managers that have had success at the top level of the women's game (club or international) or, the reverse, all the female managers being pushed out the women's game by male managers. I assume SI have thought about how to keep things realistically balanced, but I'll be interested to see what happens once we get our hands on the new game.

Edited September 6 by rp1966

[DP]

1 hour ago, forameuss said:

While I agree with the overall point, I don't really agree with the detail.  Personally, none of the things you mention really bother me.  And emphasis on "personally", because it's all subjective, and I'm well aware it bothers others.  But if you fix every one of those points above, you're just putting cosmetic things over a game that remains incredibly sterile.  The gameworld would still seem lifeless if all fans wore a different shirt.  As a line, I've always said that the game suffers from a startling lack of context.  Things just...happen.  Completely in isolation, sometimes with a single news item that it's very easy to gloss over given how template they all are.  And once they do happen, that's pretty much it, there's often no real knock-on effects on future events, and any time there is, it's half-baked.  

  

While I don't agree with the decision in isolation, people are acting like they've cast it off purely because relatively few people play it.  It was clear from the language they used that they came to a point where international management was a mess.  At that point, they've got basically two choices - sink a lot of time into the module to get it to the level they want, or abandon it.  That's not a snap decision, so you weigh up the pros and cons.  Is it worth potentially delaying the game further just to get the function in when that function isn't really used by the seemingly vast majority of the player-base?  Probably not, so they made the decision, and clearly fully intend for it to return.  

Damned if they do, damned if they don't.  Had they decided to forge ahead and be adamant that international management remained in, but the game was delayed until 2025, they'd have had far more fallout.  It's a rubbish decision to have to make, but it is the right decision.

There is a third choice to just leave it as it is in 24. It’s perfectly playable, especially for a tournament here and there alongside your club. 

I’m sure there will be other elements that remain a mess that won’t be taken out. My money is on press conferences. 

What would the forum rather be removed altogether; international football or press conferences?

Edited September 6 by DP

[themadsheep2001]

4 hours ago, Fat_Frank8 said:

That’s nonsense. Of course they’ve got the game in an alpha (or hopefully beta) version state after years of development a few months before release. You think they push everything they’ve been working on for years together a couple of weeks before release and hope everything works? 

What are you talking about? I never said it wasn't in alpha. But anyone who has ever seen FM in an alpha state before, a lot can change between that and release 

[themadsheep2001]

4 hours ago, RorysRocketThrow said:

I work in Software development myself and this type of twist is actually not uncommon when you are developing either a totally different platform or brand new product.  In this case I think FM25 probably comes under the former category - brand new platform.

There will always be lots of twists and turns, especially in an agile environment.  Decisions made on an almost hourly basis that can change the course and direction of the product.

The studio director cancelling his trips to be 'back at base' sounds drastic and as if the proverbial is hitting the fan but that might not be the case.  It might be a simple case of a few deadlines being missed and it might well be a proactive move to ensure it doesn't.  It's bad for Miles of course but it might end up being very good for the product.  SI have some very experienced people at the top that will know the warning signs of a project starting to get squeezed.

It's frustrating for the end user that some smaller features are being cut for this version but again, that is par for the course when new platforms are developed as frustrating as it is.  Trust me when I say this, the frustration on the inside will be ten times more than the end user.  All software companies are disappointed when features have to be cut, it is always done with a heavy heart but also with one eye on the quality of the product.

All I'm saying is don't write things off just yet and let's not jump to conclusions.  I've been involved in some very tough projects in my career that have had many more features cut than this and it has been a success.  I've also been involved in projects that have seemed easier, more feature packed and been a disaster.

Keep the faith!

 

 

You've said this way better than i could. 

Some might say keep the faith, my view is 2 months is still quite a long time to go. 

They need a good reveal next time round though

[themadsheep2001]

7 hours ago, kiwityke1983 said:

That was only at the end of June!

Is that really the very early stages?

I'm not involved in game development but have seen enough games get developed end released over my 40+ years from afar to think that being less than 5 months from an expected release and 6 weeks from the usual hype cycle starting (and release of new features) and 3.5 months from the usual BETA drop.

I wouldn't think it would be so early they wouldn't have a single screenshot they could show off from in game at that stage.

Last year when they first announced FM25 is when I'd have expected design docs to be used not this close to release.

I dunno if that's an unrealistic expectation or not I can only go off experience of other games releases who either use in game screenshots (labelling them as Work in Progress) or really nice concept art, that usually looks even nicer than what we end up with in the game.

I'm waiting for the reveal at the end of September and getting my hands on the game before I make any final judgements of course, but what we've been shown and crucially not shown and told so far has me worried.

I genuinely know more about Miles and his holiday plans he's cancelled than the game.

(It's interesting people have mentioned Paradox in this thread because at this stage of pre-release they'd not only have screenshots but numerous developer blogs going into features and maybe even a bunch of bug filed developer play through streams)

June is typically alpha for an FM release 

[forameuss]

11 minutes ago, DP said:

There is a third choice to just leave it as it is in 24. It’s perfectly playable, especially for a tournament here and there alongside your club. 

Is there?  Depending on how much has been ripped up, that might not have been possible.  In fact, I'd be very surprised given the choice to remove it that that was ever an option.

[themadsheep2001]

Just now, forameuss said:

Is there?  Depending on how much has been ripped up, that might not have been possible.  In fact, I'd be very surprised given the choice to remove it that that was ever an option.

This. I do think it would have good to go into more detail about why though. Assuming thats possible 

[Carambau]

Oh well... exactly what i feared is happening. This is going to be "good bye new FMs from now on" for me. Going to switch to old FMs or maybe WAF2024. And I am not the only one I hear. A real pity  

Edited September 6 by Carambau

[ScotchWhisky]

15 hours ago, Brentford Alan said:

 

So there is some differential in the player animations you see in the graphics engine.

Do you honestly think they're done with pre-release announcements including updated elements and new features nearly 3 months before the rescheduled release date? Even in Miles' blog he says another one is due in a few weeks...

Europa Universalis IV, a "live service," is finally being retired after a decade.  EUV is probably one to two years out, has already been worked on for a couple years, and isn't even officially announced.  It is Project Caesar.  Every week, we get a development diary highlighting every feature in the game a few at a time.  Some changes are substantial, some are not.  Being so early in development, they are still open to making changes.  My whole point?  Modern games are complex and take time.  FM25 has to be in the final stages to be released in a couple months.  There's nothing top secret left in the hopper or they'd give us a taste.  This is unsat, and that is the bottom line.

[davehanson]

1 hour ago, WizbaII said:

What you have going on here is not loyalty, but entitlement. How dare SI push back the release of your game by a few weeks?

Loyalty is when you understand that SI have been releasing the game in early November for many, many years. Loyalty means cutting SI some slack when they decide one time to delay release, which they almost never do, and understanding that there must obviously be a good reason for them to make this unusual decision.

You can be entitled if you want, but don't pretend like it's loyalty. What you are is a frequent customer, just like everyone else here.

I don't want to speak for them, but where exactly have they mentioned anything about the release getting pushed back?

I think you are barking up the wrong tree here and have read what they wrote wrong.

[Brentford Alan]

12 minutes ago, ScotchWhisky said:

Europa Universalis IV, a "live service," is finally being retired after a decade.  EUV is probably one to two years out, has already been worked on for a couple years, and isn't even officially announced.  It is Project Caesar.  Every week, we get a development diary highlighting every feature in the game a few at a time.  Some changes are substantial, some are not.  Being so early in development, they are still open to making changes.  My whole point?  Modern games are complex and take time.  FM25 has to be in the final stages to be released in a couple months.  There's nothing top secret left in the hopper or they'd give us a taste.  This is unsat, and that is the bottom line.

 

If thats what you've decided then good for you, there will be further announcements with new features and updates over the next 2 to 3 months though.

Look, its not the way I'd do it but they seem to have asked a hypothetical 'would you like the good news or bad news first' type question of the community and decided our likely answer would be 'bad news first please'. I'm sure the good news is forthcoming starting with the expected end of September announcement. 

[ScotchWhisky]

14 minutes ago, Brentford Alan said:

If thats what you've decided then good for you, there will be further announcements with new features and updates over the next 2 to 3 months though.

Look, its not the way I'd do it but they seem to have asked a hypothetical 'would you like the good news or bad news first' type question of the community and decided our likely answer would be 'bad news first please'. I'm sure the good news is forthcoming starting with the expected end of September announcement. 

I hope you are right and I am wrong as I've loved the series since '09, but I won't hold my breath.  I'd put money on FM25 being a skeleton of a game with a broken women's football ME.

[saihtam]

1 hour ago, Brentford Alan said:

I do wonder, and I'm probably a million miles off the mark  , if some of the stuff you mention early on in your post has been dropped purely for size of install/download reasons. The game has always had compatibility with older machines in mind so may take in to consideration that not everyone has large storage space, and of course the game has to be a size shippable on disc for those who still use them and also be a realistic size of download for those with slower internet speeds. As the game has become more bloated with other features perhaps something's had to give? 

As I say I'm probably miles off with that thought. That said having played the game since CM93 and it being pure text for many years I always find it easy to immerse myself in my world with my own imagination filling in the gaps and ignoring things like crowd graphics that aren't particularly realistic. I appreciate that's not the case for everyone though.

Nope. Dont think it is related to storage but rather like your quoted person says, they dont care or find tiny unimportant details easier to implement.

Think bigger effect have always been specs that have not gone up a long time. Constantly asking devs to build on so min requirements on components that where discontinued 2009 is yea, not easy job and cant add too much. Interesting to go back to this topic and recheck that no requirement updates has been done. New engine and update is long overdue.

Now finally  there  could be pump in these and building good groundwork to support more complex stuff. Wait and see in the coming years.

[Tonton_Zola]

4 hours ago, ForTheLoveOfTheGame said:

I agree. Even from the screenshots they released for the development update in June, the UI and match day screens have no personality. No club colours. A tiny Premier League logo in the corner. 

Even this screenshot from 2013 has more life to the game than what they showed us in that update….and it’s been over 10 years since.

Crikey that is slightly better isn’t it.

how many swings and roundabouts have we been through since then to arrive at somewhere arguably worse 10 years on?

[mackem10]

23 hours ago, XaW said:

I had the first one after the split (which I didn't know about at the time) and decided then and there that I'd rather not buy any more CMs. Then I heard that SI lost the name, but the kept the game rebranded as FM and I got that and life was good again. That post-SI CM was awful, really really awful.

That said, "The Manager" was a cracking game I played way too much as a kid! For the memories:

 

I managed to get that playing a couple of months back, loved it as a kid although I'd always spend all the cash on trying to upgrade the Stadium graphics.

[srvngrc]

Unfortunately, this statement is a great disappointment. While we have been waiting for major innovations and important improvements in FM 2025 for 2 years, I think this statement means "lower your expectations". This game, which they claimed to have been working on for a long time, is not even ready yet and they had to postpone the release. I hope I'm wrong, but I'm not very hopeful anymore.

[Fat_Frank8]

2 hours ago, themadsheep2001 said:

What are you talking about? I never said it wasn't in alpha. But anyone who has ever seen FM in an alpha state before, a lot can change between that and release 

You said it will always be design drafts at that stage. I say they should be able to throw in a few screenshots from an alpha build at that stage. Sure anything can change after that but for me it would be much more interesting to see something from an actual build than from some design draft.

[-Jef-]

5 hours ago, forameuss said:

 

Almost like that's exactly what they've said will happen.  They're not silently shuffling away things to use them as marketing tools later, they've been very open and said that it's being dropped now and will return in 26 when it's in a state they're happy with.  

  

 

My comment was more in line with how they're gonna market it. Not like "oh we've said this will be back so here it is" but more like "revolutionary feature xyz"

[Sam_BFC]

Last year's announcement suggested that SI were taking all steps to mitigate the risk of another CM4 scenario. It is still too early to call, but echoes of that era will be lost on on no-one that was around during those days.

Game was released at the end of March I believe (much later than currently anticipated for FM2025), A month before, we got our hands on a beta demo included "free" with the short lived CM Magazine (smart).

The game was highly anticipated and duly record breaking once released but in truth only crossed the threshold of playability once the fifth "Enhancement Pack" (wat) was released (after the end of the regular 2002-03 season).

I remember Xbox users getting a 2002-03 version of the CM3 series. The PC release that year should have been same with CM4 saved for 2003-04 (CM 03/04 was a solid and welcome return to form). Things must be so different these days let's hope lessons of previous eras are learnt and FM2024 will be the legitimate cross-platform bridge from old to new as intended.

When CM4 was released, I recall SI stating that it was programmed in a way that would never require a full rewrite from the ground up again. 20 years is no doubt a long time in any case, but seems like this was not ultimately the case.

--

In the interest of transparency, it has been a few years since I played any FM game (which was handheld), and many more years since I played a desktop version, but I do check in here occasionally looking for reasons to take the plunge once more.

Finally, Miles' style of communication remains...odd...

[wazzaflow10]

11 hours ago, kiwityke1983 said:

(It's interesting people have mentioned Paradox in this thread because at this stage of pre-release they'd not only have screenshots but numerous developer blogs going into features and maybe even a bunch of bug filed developer play through streams

Its really unfair to compare paradox building essentially sandbox/open world/historical fiction games that have been in development for years with one that needs to be released yearly. Of course people are interested in features of those games because you don't know what you'd be able to do. And lets not forget their most recent release of Cities Skylines 2 was a hot, hot mess at release and still has some major optimization issues they can't even deliver it on console despite promising it would be there. I think both companies are great developers but there needs to be a bit more consistency with criticism here. 

[kiwityke1983]

8 minutes ago, wazzaflow10 said:

Its really unfair to compare paradox building essentially sandbox/open world/historical fiction games that have been in development for years with one that needs to be released yearly. Of course people are interested in features of those games because you don't know what you'd be able to do. And lets not forget their most recent release of Cities Skylines 2 was a hot, hot mess at release and still has some major optimization issues they can't even deliver it on console despite promising it would be there. I think both companies are great developers but there needs to be a bit more consistency with criticism here. 

I wasn't particularly criticising SI with that comment it was just an observation more than anything.

[kiwityke1983]

11 minutes ago, wazzaflow10 said:

Its really unfair to compare paradox building essentially sandbox/open world/historical fiction games that have been in development for years with one that needs to be released yearly. Of course people are interested in features of those games because you don't know what you'd be able to do. And lets not forget their most recent release of Cities Skylines 2 was a hot, hot mess at release and still has some major optimization issues they can't even deliver it on console despite promising it would be there. I think both companies are great developers but there needs to be a bit more consistency with criticism here. 

I'll also add as a long time enjoyer of Paradox games I could write several books worth of criticisms for them, how buggy their games are and the business model they have.

I actually think over the years SI have disappointed me way less.

[wazzaflow10]

2 minutes ago, kiwityke1983 said:

I wasn't particularly criticising SI with that comment it was just an observation more than anything.

Sorry wasn't meant to imply that you specifically were criticising SI. I've seen a lot of it as well with people holding Paradox as some beacon of development and are forgetting some basic facts that they screwed up a game release they worked on for much longer than SI has worked on FM 25.

I'd rather have a small but well polished game than a broad buggy mess. If removing international management achieves that goal and produces worthwhile international management in the future thats a win in my book. Its easy for me to say because I haven't played that mode in a long long time. But I can understand the disappointment of those who really enjoy that side of the game.

[Javier]

hace 8 horas, ForTheLoveOfTheGame dijo:

Yep. I would never buy the game if mods/editing were not available. 

Same here. What was the last edition without an editor? CM4? Not having an editor and not being able to change "Zebre", "Capitoline" and "Real Hispalis" to their real names might put me off FM completely.

Edited September 6 by Javier

[Lexis]

I would be extremely interested to see some data about the actual play time on women's football. Data-driven decisions are clearly being made in terms of removing/adding new features (eg. international football).  There probably is data showing that women's football is a more desired / consumed feature than international football management therefore making sense to spend more dev cycles there.

Although one might argue it's not one at the sake of the other, clearly one has a higher priority in the grand scheme of things so that would likely mean it has the required data to back that up.

Edited September 6 by Lexis

[Gh0zt]

It's sounding more and more like FM25 is a beta test for FM26. It'll be a skip from me, still enjoying FM24, see no reason to "upgrade".

[DMC-12]

21 hours ago, ScotchWhisky said:

As for women's football, only 4% of FIFA '22 players played a women's football match.  It was easy to track as playing one match unlocks an achievement. 

I actually think that number would have been higher in FM. Possibly not with women's club sides, but certainly with the international teams and I could see managing a women's side at the World Cup or Euros being popular. 

Unfortunately, they've removed international management, meaning the popular part of the women's game (and it could be argued the more well known part of the women's game) is locked off. Its massively short sighted, especially as there's a Euros coming up next summer. 

[jmlima]

7 minutes ago, DMC-12 said:

...

Unfortunately, they've removed international management, meaning the popular part of the women's game (and it could be argued the more well known part of the women's game) is locked off. Its massively short sighted, especially as there's a Euros coming up next summer. 

Yup, which makes me wonder yet again if they think bringing in women's football is only graphics plus a few tweaks to how stats are used in representing players. Having said that, who says there are not more things being canned including women's football?

What I do continue to find surprising is that press conferences and interactions in general keep surviving the 'not fit for purpose' threshold. Cue in people saying they are 'an essential part of modern game'. So what, international football is a far more important part of the modern game.

Think we can safely say that, from all that has been seen and read, FM25 is not a step forward but so far is some steps back.

[Lexis]

19 minutes ago, jmlima said:

Yup, which makes me wonder yet again if they think bringing in women's football is only graphics plus a few tweaks to how stats are used in representing players. Having said that, who says there are not more things being canned including women's football?

What I do continue to find surprising is that press conferences and interactions in general keep surviving the 'not fit for purpose' threshold. Cue in people saying they are 'an essential part of modern game'. So what, international football is a far more important part of the modern game.

Think we can safely say that, from all that has been seen and read, FM25 is not a step forward but so far is some steps back.

I can admit I'm slightly disappointed so far. Most of the updates have been on things not making the cut and stuff being removed from the game. The feature announcement will come next, I hope they kept the bombs there, because so far all they did was increase the pressure on themselves.

I can't help but think it's FM26 that will really be what we're waiting for but let's see, I want to be wrong.

[jeru]

1 hour ago, Lexis said:

I would be extremely interested to see some data about the actual play time on women's football. Data-driven decisions are clearly being made in terms of removing/adding new features (eg. international football).  There probably is data showing that women's football is a more desired / consumed feature than international football management therefore making sense to spend more dev cycles there.

Although one might argue it's not one at the sake of the other, clearly one has a higher priority in the grand scheme of things so that would likely mean it has the required data to back that up.

I wouldn’t hold your breath for data to back up the decision to favour women’s football being included at the expense of international football it’s obviously a headline feature that can be the only reason. 

if what to cut to meet the deadline as we are over running was based on a logical decision they would cut women’s football as

1) it’s not yet in the game so people won’t miss what they don’t have

2) they already announced it as a “multi year” project it would be easy to announce that it’s more work than anticipated so postponing by a year people would understand 

3) it’s infinitey more work to. implement women’s football than just porting the current international management code and creating a UI in unity for international management. it would buy devs more time and maybe would have prevented a delayed launch

buy hey SI need a headline feature to get the buzz going and for advertising and selling units that I suspect is the bottom line nothing to do with metrics or data

 

[CoffeeKittyGrey]

6 minutes ago, jeru said:

I wouldn’t hold your breath for data to back up the decision to favour women’s football being included at the expense of international football it’s obviously a headline feature that can be the only reason. 

if what to cut to meet the deadline as we are over running was based on a logical decision they would cut women’s football as

1) it’s not yet in the game so people won’t miss what they don’t have

2) they already announced it as a “multi year” project it would be easy to announce that it’s more work than anticipated so postponing by a year people would understand 

3) it’s infinitey more work to. implement women’s football than just porting the current international management code and creating a UI in unity for international management. it would buy devs more time and maybe would have prevented a delayed launch

buy hey SI need a headline feature to get the buzz going and for advertising and selling units that I suspect is the bottom line nothing to do with metrics or data

 

Can you imagine the meltdown were the women's game to be announced as it has been and then delayed? I imagine the backlash from people who don't even play, follow, watch (or simulate) football would outweigh any metrics or commercial argument. SI can't afford to make itself a target for cancellation by bandwagon hoppers.

[jmlima]

16 minutes ago, Lexis said:

...

I can't help but think it's FM26 that will really be what we're waiting for but let's see, I want to be wrong.

Who knows. It can also be a disaster waiting to happen if massive bugs are introduced with this change (very likely) that will take a lot of development time to fix, plus the reputational damage, thus preventing these mythical new and existing features being added for 26.

Think it's safe to say the process seems to be having its fair share hiccups, which is to be expected, as long as the pay off is what SI have bargained it will be, that may not matter but, breaking the current game to bits to achieve a sub-standard payoff may have ramifications down the line in what concerns the next versions.

I mean, entirely IMO but I'm now looking at 26, no longer at 25, which is looking more and more like a lame duck release for the sake of making a yearly release.

[flogside]

This is what happens when the focus is on making a game look more like FIFA than worrying about the gameplay and immersion. The game, in my opinion, never needed to be upgraded graphically. It's football manager not FIFA manager. There has been issues in the game for so many years that needed addressing more than a graphical overhaul. Yes, international management being one of them, academies and youth representation in-game, another. But year after year the game has been bogged down by pointless things like social media rubbish, press conferences etc that it takes so long to play......for the older FM fan it's now almost impossible and too tedious to play. Too many clicks to get anything done. 

I've no issue with women's football being introduced, but not at the expense of progress in other areas!

I stopped playing this game regularly around 2015 and this update and the whole move and importance of graphics to si has reminded me why. 

Certainly won't be purchasing FM25. Need to find me a legal digital download of FM12 to buy!

I hope FM25 turns out to be a huge success but SI clearly have graphics and 3d engine as priority. Perhaps including women's football at the same time as a graphical overhaul was a little short sighted, if not admirable!

 

 

 

Edited September 6 by flogside
Added more words

[Smurf]

This has all been very underwhelming. 

 

First time I think I've ever seen a release with features removed... I'm just wondering how come out was never improved overtime. 

 

I'm a bit meh about the whole thing

[ForTheLoveOfTheGame]

1 hour ago, flogside said:

This is what happens when the focus is on making a game look more like FIFA than worrying about the gameplay and immersion. The game, in my opinion, never needed to be upgraded graphically. It's football manager not FIFA manager. There has been issues in the game for so many years that needed addressing more than a graphical overhaul. Yes, international management being one of them, academies and youth representation in-game, another. But year after year the game has been bogged down by pointless things like social media rubbish, press conferences etc that it takes so long to play......for the older FM fan it's now almost impossible and too tedious to play. Too many clicks to get anything done. 

I've no issue with women's football being introduced, but not at the expense of progress in other areas!

I stopped playing this game regularly around 2015 and this update and the whole move and importance of graphics to si has reminded me why. 

Certainly won't be purchasing FM25. Need to find me a legal digital download of FM12 to buy!

I hope FM25 turns out to be a huge success but SI clearly have graphics and 3d engine as priority. Perhaps including women's football at the same time as a graphical overhaul was a little short sighted, if not admirable!

 

 

 

To be fair, we don’t even know what it’ll look like yet. But anything less than a major upgrade on the graphics would send this forum into bedlam. Poor graphics + removing multiple features/actions will not end well…

[Dagenham_Dave]

7 minutes ago, ForTheLoveOfTheGame said:

To be fair, we don’t even know what it’ll look like yet. But anything less than a major upgrade on the graphics would send this forum into bedlam. Poor graphics + removing multiple features/actions will not end well…

I'd be very surprised if the graphics in the first version of the new engine will be that amazing, comparatively speaking.  To run SI's match engine and marry it up with state of the art graphics would be a big ask whilst still making it accessible for a lot of the user base. 

I can foresee a lot of people expecting too much to be majorly disappointed. 

On the plus side, I've got the order in for extra popcorn, so it's all good. 

[Mars_Blackmon]

22 minutes ago, Dagenham_Dave said:

I'd be very surprised if the graphics in the first version of the new engine will be that amazing, comparatively speaking.  To run SI's match engine and marry it up with state of the art graphics would be a big ask whilst still making it accessible for a lot of the user base. 

I can foresee a lot of people expecting too much to be majorly disappointed. 

On the plus side, I've got the order in for extra popcorn, so it's all good. 

That is what happens when you overpromise and underdeliver. I think the thing that's lost here is that they stopped working on FM24 to work on 25 and here we are with a delay and removed features. 

Not cool.

[wazzaflow10]

2 hours ago, flogside said:

The game, in my opinion, never needed to be upgraded graphically. It's football manager not FIFA manager.

The graphics don't need to be perfectly lifelike. FIFA is in uncanny valley right now. However the match engine could be better represented visually. Adding sprites and motions that better capture play (i.e. deflections or shooting into the ground like we had this year) are major graphic improvements that help with immersion. The more the match engine integrates better with quality visuals the easier it is to understand what is working and not working within a tactic.

[flogside]

2 hours ago, ForTheLoveOfTheGame said:

To be fair, we don’t even know what it’ll look like yet. But anything less than a major upgrade on the graphics would send this forum into bedlam. Poor graphics + removing multiple features/actions will not end well…

True, and of course the judgement should be reserved regards the graphics until we do see something.....but for me personally, graphics were never something that needed an overhaul. For most, that isn't why people play it. Side, the 3d match engine can be good to watch but I was happy with the 2d matches lol maybe I'm outnumbered regards to that. 

Not saying the graphics overhaul won't end up being decent, just personally have no interest in that.

I do feel this all has the makings of a mini disaster for SI.......we shall see!

[flogside]

1 hour ago, wazzaflow10 said:

The graphics don't need to be perfectly lifelike. FIFA is in uncanny valley right now. However the match engine could be better represented visually. Adding sprites and motions that better capture play (i.e. deflections or shooting into the ground like we had this year) are major graphic improvements that help with immersion. The more the match engine integrates better with quality visuals the easier it is to understand what is working and not working within a tactic.

Oh I agree that this would be beneficial, I'm sure! Id rather see even more work done on the ME and the time and effort used for the graphics to be put into other stuff that's long needed changing. 

But anyway, that's not the case and we shall hopefully at least see some screenshots soon! Maybe I'll be blown away by the new graphics and layout! For me to be able to play regularly though, I need the bloatware gone and/or a definitive way to streamline the game without losing the immersion and certain details, like an FM Touch but with more players/clubs/leagues able to be loaded!

[Dagenham_Dave]

Everyone should play 2D in the new game, because we all know what happens if it's less than 5% of us. 

It's like an SI equivalent of the film 'Speed' with Miles as the Dennis Hopper character. "If the amount of people who use this thing goes below 5%, we're going to blow it up" 

I, of course, would be Keanu Reeves*

 

 

*can't act for toffee. 

[alian62]

2 hours ago, Dagenham_Dave said:

Everyone should play 2D in the new game, because we all know what happens if it's less than 5% of us. 

It's like an SI equivalent of the film 'Speed' with Miles as the Dennis Hopper character. "If the amount of people who use this thing goes below 5%, we're going to blow it up" 

I, of course, would be Keanu Reeves*

 

 

*can't act for toffee. 

I suppose you still play this

 

 

[kiwityke1983]

2 hours ago, Dagenham_Dave said:

Everyone should play 2D in the new game, because we all know what happens if it's less than 5% of us. 

It's like an SI equivalent of the film 'Speed' with Miles as the Dennis Hopper character. "If the amount of people who use this thing goes below 5%, we're going to blow it up" 

I, of course, would be Keanu Reeves*

 

 

*can't act for toffee. 

The thing is there have been two different justifications so far.

5% of players for some game modes.

5% of SAVES for international management.

Which would suggest the number of players using international management is much higher than 5%!

Personally I've never used 2D since they introduced 3D so it wouldn't bother me if they cut it but I know a lot of people love it.

I'll be happy with even a moderate graphical improvement and players having actual physical form so collisions between players happen, that would be the number 1 immersion increaser for me in the ME.