Re: Fifa 11 Career Mode talk 360/PS3
Nick Cave's Career Mode Preview... (Part One)
Ever since Wayne Rooney’s opening shot clip in FIFA 10 (which has tried all year to destroy my poor sub woofer), and my first click of what has become a long love, despair and hate relationship with the bug infested mess that is Manager Mode, I have been waiting and hoping for the next incarnation.
This was announced as the first year of the next step from EA, yet within a week I, along with countless others, were clambering for fixes and bemoaning the lack of depth in what is one of the most played and loved features in FIFA.
It was clear that the problems in Manager Mode were more than skin deep, and so it was that with the coming of FIFA 11, the now bemoaned mode was gone and in its place EA announced the next chapter, an all new Career Mode..
This was to incorporate not only the standard Manager mode, but also bring BAP to an all new level, giving you the chance to play for your club and then on to become the legend that is a player manager and follow in the footsteps of the greats like: Dalglish, Souness, Pedernera, (who! Look him up) Wise and Claridge.. well there is no guarantee of greatness..
Then once the time has come to hang up your boots it’s on to being a manager, molding your squad and finding that new talent, wheeling and dealing (not unlike a certain London based manager *cough* in denial *cough*) in the transfer market, while finding the right tactics to attain the silverware and prestige of managerial greatness..
Career mode has a great deal to achieve if it is to remove the bitter aftertaste of Manager Mode from the memories of many a devoted fan, and it was with this in mind (this and the fact Phil forgot the disc’s at the Emirates event) that I made my way down a foggy M1 to the head offices of EA at Guilford last Friday morning.
It was here, after arriving early and sampling some of the delights of Guildford, including I must add, one of the worst cups of coffee I have ever had the misfortune to taste at ‘muffy Tops’, (name changed to protect the innocent, but you know who you are you purveyors of shame) after which (while still trying to remove the taste with a whole box of Tic-Tac’s) I met up with Phil along with Tom, who as I’m sure you’ll know from the great (I’m still banned from the forum by the way) FIFA Soccer Blog site..
After Phil located the disc (no doubt some lucky EA employee was holed up with it somewhere already getting their fix) we settled down to what would be a much anticipated and long day of dissecting the all new Career Mode. A short while later we were greeted with the entrance screens, which thankfully were somewhat quieter than 10, and could be skipped in most cases, and we were into the Arena, Tom noting it was lifted straight from 10, and this would be the first moan on the boards, cue chuckles.. and then we we’re in..
Before I plunge into the modes proper I feel I need to just point out for clarification as there still seems to be some confusion as to just what the differences and limits are between the modes.
There are, as we all now know, three separate modes, Player, Player/Manager and Manager. You can start in any mode and have your VP or created player as well as selecting any squad member in Player and Player/Manager mode, the limitations are (as we were told) that as a player you will have 7 years to ply your trade, after which time if you have done well enough to have achieved the club legend status you will then have the option to extend your playing days by becoming the vaunted status of a Player/Manager for a further 4 years before the ravages of time take their toll, and you have to don the dodgy coat or retro club coloured scarf which seems all the rage at the moment, and dive into your Managerial career.
Another nice little touch is your stats being displayed in the screens between the Arena and modes..
Player Mode
The main screen has been shown in many a clip, so you will all be familiar with the three options of Player, Player/Manager and Manager.
We decide to take the first things first approach and so we hit Player Mode, and we are in, and after picking the basics such as game length etc. we are greeted with the Create/Pick Player screen. Here you can load your created player or select one from the game, and we go for Leeds and pick L.Sam, a midfield squad player.
You are then offered a contract; this will show you your wages and the personal goals you are set by the club for the forthcoming season. These will alter depending on the player you choose; a benchwarmer will have a goal such as “break into the first team” while a reserve would be “become a squad player”. Their wages as you would expect reflect their status and position.
Within the Player screen you find the options for Calendar, My Career, SkySports.com and settings. These are nicely laid out, as are all the menus for that matter, and are similar to what we have become used to since 10 and WC, but that’s not a bad thing in my book.
The main screen layout I think most people will be familiar with as certain images have been posted. You have the news from your leagues and others displayed in five smaller boxes, along with a larger screen that shows these in greater detail as it scrolls through them. The images are relevant to your club when used which is a very nice touch. You also have your league in* on the end of the screen, standings and scorers etc..
I’ll come back to the Calendar screen, as being a Player other than checking the next games the options are limited..
The Sky Sports option opens a screen containing all the relevant information and news you could need. This includes your team and player stats for all cups and leagues, along with being able to look at all the other league standings. You are also able to look at the current news in more depth..
In the My Career option you find all the information you could need from your clubs, titles and cups to your current value and wage, along with the team of the week, player of the month and year. Some of this is relevant to your VP rating, such as wage and value..
You also find your individual stats such as Played, Scored, Red and Yellow cards etc. This you can see by season or overall, but enough about screens, it’s time to play a match.
As before, you can now go in and change the game settings for things like HUD and Player Indicator as well as time, score and radar, which can be off, 2 or 3D. Also in here you can now alter the nets, and have a choice of Rectangle/Square/Triangle/Default, along with Tension, which can be Tight/Loose/Regular or Default..
On to the pre-game screen, which as with the other menu screens is nicely laid out and easy to read, with plenty of information on the squads. It shows the Player symbol next to our man in the Leeds starting 11, as well as giving information on the ground, time of day, referee (important for learning whether you have a lenient but stern word giver or a card happy name collector) and also a reminder of game type, min’s per half and weather. This you can go in and change, but the time of day is set, though we did find all our midweek games were the correct time of day around 19:30 and evening, and the weekend games were daytime and around 15:00..
You now have the option to play, controlling the player or the whole team, this makes a difference, as playing as the whole team depends on the stats collated. This means that no single player stats will be registered, and I think is an option to have when your player is injured or not playing..
At the bottom of the screen under your calendar screen giving the next game etc., replacing the manager rating bar and stars, is a small player graphic in running pose, along with a vertical fitness bar. Below is a larger 1/16 rated horizontal blue bar, currently on the near mid point of 5/16, with the text Starting 11 above, this is similar to the manager progress bar as it’s an indication of how well your chosen player is progressing, along with his current standing which, as we chose an existing squad player, is our starting point. There are several levels from Prospect and Reserve to Captain and Club legend, all of which offer unique characteristics and some open other options up to you in the game..
Now I know what you’re thinking - “why’s the rating bar out of 16?”, we did too. Is it the number of players plus the subs? Average months a full bar should take to obtain?
In the end it got the better of us and we had to pose the question to Marcel who with a little puzzlement in his voice replies, “err.. it’s just a number we came up with and it sounds right”!
..Can’t argue with that can you!
The next screen gives you more information on the line-ups, including the subs, along with a scout report on your opposition, giving details on their line up and tactics. This we noticed had a number two in brackets (4-3-3(2)) after it (I’ll come back to that) as well as their last few results and the opposition, along with information on injuries and suspensions and then we’re off to the match..
Game Play/Graphics
A nice little touch here is a “warming up” message instead of the usual “loading” line, then it’s the intro and the players in the tunnel. This all looks great and the commentators and sound are good too - it’s Tyler and Gray giving us information on the teams as they warm up, and we have the Sky style line up screens and formations..
The pitch looks vivid and from the demo at the Emirates we know there are nice varieties now. How good you can get these looking will be down to your TV or monitor and some tweaking. You’ll be glad to hear we ran out from the corner at the Theatre of Dreams. Though the now much commented on 10 v 11 handshake was in there, but these things can be fixed pre-release..
We also have some substitutes shown on the benches. These I’m sad to say are of the same generic static type, along with the same cameramen (sorry persons) and stewards we had in 10. Apart from the bibbed players, all in the same colour tracksuit to match the team strip on the bench, there is little if anything new here..
There are no managers or trainers, nor is there a 4th official. This is my first negative in the day so far, the crowd looks slightly better than FIFA 10, and the ground looks full apart from the odd empty seat dotted about, though I’m still a little sad they did not add more here..
I won’t dwell too long on the game play as this is mainly about the CM, and the game play has been commented on so many times by others in the forums, but I will add that as before we found the AI to be far more aggressive and attacking this time, doing little feints and tricks to beat players as well as holding the ball better. It’s not without its issues though, the Zidane pirouette was used far too often by the CPU and some glitches such as overlapping, and players doing great little moves to beat one player, then running headlong into the next defender..
There was also a concern that some animations still seemed to have a need to complete, regardless of whatever else has occurred, but coming from 10 to this was a big difference for me. No doubt WC players may see less of a leap. On another plus side we did see less bunching, and apart from one kick off I did not run into a fellow team mate that I can recall. Even the referee seemed to stay out of the way far better..
There are some nice touches during the game, such as stats dropping down under the scores, as I believe they did in WC. These are also joined by goal flashes from the other games in your league and cup rounds, which is initially pointed out by the Commentators too, which is nice. You are also greeted with the other scores so far at half and full time where cup games drawn have the penalty results at the side. Also the in-game camera now singles out one of your players and gives some of his individual stats during the substitution loading time, here we were glad to note in the games we played that the substitutions made by the CPU were now more realistic as we saw strikers’ replacing strikers’ etc..
I have to add a rather large bugbear here I’m afraid, As anyone from the football boards will know I’m a Manager Mode fanatic and I along with others have been pestering anyone who would listen to fix the in-game injuries in the mode. This has become somewhat of a mini crusade, and I was somewhat dismayed to find that in all the games we played through we saw no injuries.
We did however see a few come through simming games and the general day-to-day knocks.
These were given via emails from the coach and medical staff, ranging from a few to 123 days. Even here though there were not enough given today’s footballing world, where injuries are commonplace and make the need for good squad depth vital. In desperation we played Injury Prone players such as Owen Hargreaves and spent the whole game mercilessly hacking the legs from under him, this we did for around four games but all to no avail!
For me injuries are a vital part of Manager Mode and should be happening on a regular basis, theses will mostly be minor knocks making players questionable for the next game or a risk to play. Then there will be the ones meaning the player misses one or two games, followed by slightly worse injuries which may also occur from playing players with knocks. These could be anything from a couple of weeks to a few months. After that you will have the rarer severe injuries that can last anywhere from a month to a season and anywhere in between.
None of these dates should be laid in stone ether; a small knock could turn into month on the side lines. And some injuries could heal quickly or turn out to be less severe than first thought. The possibilities are endless and would all add to the immersion of the game..
Part two is on its way...
