FM 2012

[Medazza]

Is the Beta being tested in house again, or are they going back to what they used to do, and actually recruiting impartial testers from the community?

 

They have always tested in house and externally. From what I understand they have full time paid in house testers, then when the game is looking decent they let the "dream team" of geeky kids from within the community loose on it to bug spot and test. These guys do spent a lot of time on it and I know from access to the beta forums that an awful lot of feedback is given.

 

As a researcher and someone who isn't good at the techno side of things I only get a look as we approach data lock to check the data looks right (avoiding silly errors) and also to run soak tests to see what happens to the main teams over several years.

[Brownie]

The game is just far too big now.

[Medazza]

The game is just far too big now.

 

when i started we had to add about 25 players, with no more than about 10-12 data fields.

 

Now I have about 120 players and staff all with circa 150 data fields plus histories and other records.

[Furmedge]

A review from Goal.com

 

In under a month, Football Manager 2012 will be unleashed on the world, ready to sap 200 hours plus out of you - and you only realise seven seasons in as you are sweating to secure a top 10 finish for Shrewsbury Town in the Premier League.

 

Goal.com was given the opportunity to test drive the preview version of the hugely popular computer simulation game and found a host of developed features, although it is not a radical revolution of the franchise. Instead it builds on its world-famous scouting system, which is still mind-bogglingly impressive, while improving the game's 3D match engine so it looks less like you are playing your match on a console straight out of 1981.

 

A key characteristic of FM has always been its (often intimidating) level of freedom. Choosing which team to start with has always been the first head-scratching dilemma. After watching Arsenal's calamitous start to the 2011-12 Premier League season, Goal.com decided to see if we could marshal the Gunners troops better.

 

Arsene Wenger's "work" in the real-life transfer window is accurately reflected in the game - sadly this means we have an understrength squad full of injury risks. And thus the usual pre-season clean-up begins: promising key players you are going to bring in big names; booting out useless, over-paid relics; spending hours scouring the world for the new and, crucially, cut-price Messi; and tweaking your formation until its as delicate - and likely to collapse - as a house of cards. Agents were introduced in the 2011 version and are around this year too, always attempting to prise a bigger pay-packet for their client and themselves.

 

The in-game tutorial has been expanded to assist newcomers, which is a welcome addition as the franchise can be terrifying to leap into for beginners. For FM-veterans, readjusting yourself to the latest tweaks can take some patience but before long you're navigating the menus like a pro.

 

Developers Sports Interactive have wisely allowed you to add or remove the leagues you can control mid-game as opposed to at the start like in past releases. So when you are about to relegate Liverpool without somehow already being unceremoniously fired then all is not lost.

 

The transfer centre has been revamped which takes a little getting used to but it is unquestionably a better format. Team talks and conversations with players now have six tones: aggressive, assertive, passionate, calm, cautious and reluctant. Experimenting between the six is fun but can go horribly wrong. Thomas Vermaelen threw his toys out the pram after we "assertively" refused him a pay rise. So he packed his bags and forced a move to Manchester City. Samir Nasri-style.

 

The matches are the usual mix of high-octane classics, bore-draws and hard-fought victories. And there is still no better feeling than going 2-0 down at half-time, making a couple of daring substitutes, holding an inspirational team talk, then seeing your team annihilate the opposition to win 5-2. Even if it is Aldershot in the League Cup...

 

Football Manager 2012 remains insatiably addictive despite not making any wholesale changes. It's hard to fault a game that has evolved to mix complexity and accessibility so successfully.

[Pidge]

Just caught up with the blogs and I think it looks ace. Just wish they'd take a step away from the PA/CA formula and let performance dictate youngster development a bit more (If I play a kid and he plays well for the first team it should give him a boost, or if I send a 19 year old on loan to league one and he plays surely he'd be match-conditioned and stronger - mentally and physically - by the time he returns.).

[Jairzinho]

Just caught up with the blogs and I think it looks ace. Just wish they'd take a step away from the PA/CA formula and let performance dictate youngster development a bit more (If I play a kid and he plays well for the first team it should give him a boost, or if I send a 19 year old on loan to league one and he plays surely he'd be match-conditioned and stronger - mentally and physically - by the time he returns.).

 

Great point this. I often neglect loaning out players with the opinion that my coaching staff, and training regimes are simply miles better than any club I could loan a player out to. Whilst in reality the experience of first team football should speed up the process of development far more so.

[Joe Le Taxi]

That's true mate but I did sent out a few of the youngsters I posted in the FM11 thread to lower league clubs then top clubs. Sometimes first team experience is the best thing, it all depends on the mentality of the player.

[Jairzinho]

Depends a lot on the type of club you send them to. If I'm a Premier league club I like to have a Serie B or La Segunda club as a feeder.

[Pidge]

It does, I use loans a lot and that's fine for players with high PA. My point is that results dictate perception of quality more than anything in football. If a player with low stats and PA gets a chance and does well it should be reflected on his stats. The game just isnt flexible in that way.

 

To put it in context I had a right wing injury problem a while back, a 17 year old who was on youth terms was scoring for the reserves and since I play with high wingers and can keep possession I gave him a go and he scored. He's now got five or six goals and a few assists mainly through good positioning, but he's not improved at all and the coaches still say he's a league two player who could become a decent Championship player. The stats just don't reflect what he's doing in-game and I think I should be able to build him into a good backup winger given time. It would just be a good reflection of how important luck and opportunity can be to young players in real life.

 

edit: It's my only real gripe with the game (as allowing players to develop according to how much good work the manager does with them would allow mini-narratives of players come through and keep the game compelling imo) apart from the ME which is really unrealistic and annoying at times.

[Joe Le Taxi]

I've loaned my youngsters out to the likes of

 

Villarreal, Hoffenheim, Bolton, Bayern, Dortmund, Pontevedra (start off lower league but after a tycoon are the third biggest club in Spain) and Genoa

 

I usually send 2 or 3 players to these clubs and they have improved dramatically over 1-2 years of first team football abroad and I now have probably the best squad I've ever had on a game of Football Manager.

[Joe Le Taxi]

Pidge I suppose it could be hard to implement that though I do see your point mate.

[Chairman Meow]

They nearly had me lured in due to the ability to add and remove saved games because of the journeyman thing however:

 

Each year we give you an update on the status of copy protection and activation of Football Manager and the decisions taken as we know it’s a hot topic for many of you, although for many others it’s not really an issue at all.

 

As you may remember, last year we decided against any activation as we couldn't find a solution that we thought struck a balance on combatting piracy and not penalising the genuine consumer. We did make our position on anti-piracy pretty clear though, we see it as a big problem for our game and we said we'd continue to look for a solution that stopped, or made it very difficult to pirate the game and play it for free.

 

This year we have found what we believe is an acceptable solution. Any version of Football Manager 2012 bought on disc will have to be activated through the Steam network, so therefore purchasers will have to have an internet connection for initial activation. This is a one-time only activation which requires you to sign up for a Steam account (which is free) and to install the Steam client and once it has been done the game can be played offline by turning on Steam's Offline mode. With those two simple steps done there are no more hoops to jump through or steps to take.

 

We appreciate that the vast majority of people reading this post on the forums are genuine consumers of the game, and that having to activate is not as simple as putting the game in the drive and playing. However we hope that, as a fan of the game, you feel that having to do a one-time activation is worth it to try to prevent others playing the game for free and stealing what you purchase with no punishment, and with no contribution toward the future of Football Manager and it's development. Make no mistake, if a quarter of the people that usually pirate the game switch to purchasing Football Manager 2012, the sales of the game worldwide would more than double. This would lead to increased development budgets and more benefits for all of you who do buy the game.

 

We've taken this decision because we believe that the steps the consumer has to take are not excessive, and that as a one-time only measure with no tracking or reporting it is not too intrusive. Having worked with Steam for a few years now we also believe that their system is ever improving and gives Football Manager players a good service of free auto-updating, achievements and other great benefits without cost or hassle.

 

We hope you understand and support the decision. It's by no means taken lightly, although I hope for the vast majority of you it's nowhere near as big an issue as we treat it as being.

 

In summary:

• You need to connect to the internet to activate Football Manager 2012 on PC and Mac before you start playing it

• To activate you will need to sign up to, and install the Steam client

• Once you have activated Football Manager 2012 you can then play it in Steam's "offline mode" - meaning you do not have to be connected to the internet to play

• Saved games are stored locally on your machine, but you can play Football Manager on any machine by signing into Steam and selecting it from your purchased games

• Staying connected to Steam will mean Football Manager 2012 is automatically updated with any patches or data updates released

 

http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/274801-A-Message-On-Football-Manager-2012-Activation

 

Pre-order now cancelled. I fucking hate steam, and hate this need to have another bit of software just to be able to play the fucking thing.

[Lee909]

What the issue with steam?, I have FM and Total War through them and find it ok

[Chairman Meow]

Nothing specifically wrong with it Lee.

 

I just don't like it and I don't like being forced into another piece of 3rd party software just to run the game. You have one of the most processor and memory hungry games going and then force people to run something else which take up resources.

 

As I said earlier in the thread I really wish they would spend a couple of years dealing with how the game processes and fine tuning what we have, dealing with the size of save game files etc. rather than adding things like tone, which generally take a few patches before they actually work properly.

[Jonny83]

Oh dear. I think even in this day and age it's a bit presumptious to assume that every single person buying the game will actually have a working internet connection when they want to activate the game. I know the vast majority will but for instance I've recently moved house and had a period of time without any internet access at home, I do now but what if the timing is different for someone else?

 

And of course sod's law dictates someone will have an internet outage the day they buy the game too.

[Lucky Pierre]

So if I want to install it on two PCs, I can't?

 

Demo out this weekend, supposedly.

[Frankenhooker]

Demo is up on steam.

[Dan Vito Corleone]

SI's one company march against piracy strikes again. I have a Steam account, but I don't like it and I definitely won't be buying the game because of this issue. It's ridiculously slow.

[Guest simon]

Ubisof games are pirateable so will steam.

[Pidge]

Love the demo so far.

[moof]

dl'ing as we speak. Looking forward to giving it a bash

[stevienando]

When will they learn? You can't stop the internet warriors.

 

I'm not downloading and installing steam just to play the demo, shame really.

[Furmedge]

I've had steam for the best part of 3 years, don't see the problem. Was asked if I wanted to download it or log into my account when getting the demo and noticed it's only 1.5 meg, a mere dip in the ocean of available memory.

[Guest Dog Chaser]

Cannot believe the size of the demo. With my crap internet speed the game will be out before the demo downloads.

[Furmedge]

Cannot believe the size of the demo. With my crap internet speed the game will be out before the demo downloads.

 

Same here. Started to download it the other day but gave up after a couple of hours as it was slowing down everything.