Re: Fifa 11
errr. No. Manual isn't supposed to be easy. You practice at it and get better. You don't make it easier for the kiddies and adult gimps to rip the piss out of it! Jeez. And yeah, semi is the easier manual as somebody else mentioned.
I'm chuffed to bits that they are getting rid of the laughable ping ponging by introducing this. I just hope it works as stated.
But what Romagnoli has already speculated is that manual still won't be competitive - and that's always going to be a problem. In fact, considering these error-factors apply to manual for passing, it's arguably going to get even harder. I play manual when I can and it's the only way I can enjoy this game in non-clubs format - but currently manual just isn't viable for competitive football. It's simply too difficult to ever be more effective than assisted will be in my mind... and I don't think that's because assisted will always be too effective.
The difference between semi and manual is a big enough gulf for it to be made slightly smaller. It's probably one of the big things which makes manual so much less popular - it's just SO much harder.. and whilst I love how it makes FIFA play relatively, it's just a bit too hard. Shooting is just a bit too hard, short, quick passing is almost impossible ala Barcenal. A little assistance could go a long way to solving many issues at once.
You are right that changing manual would stop it being manual - I think that's a step we should be willing to take. The gap between semi and manual is enormous currently - larger than the gap between assisted and semi (this all could have of course already changed but.. hell). Of course manual could be kept as a super-hardcore option but even as the most zealous supporter of manual against assisted, I think we're asking too much to balance it.
If we stop constraining ourselves by calling manual settings manual and start tweaking it gently towards the middle ground, maybe we could finally get what I think is the ideal situation:
Ease:
Assisted > Semi > 'Manual'
Effectiveness for a weaker player:
Assisted > Semi > 'Manual'
Effectiveness for a medium player:
Semi > Assisted/'Manual'
Effectiveness for a great player:
'Manual' > Semi > Assisted
Freedom:
'Manual' > Semi > Assisted
Without making manual a tad easier, I think manual will always be a super niche setting which will never balanced right, and never fit the above ideal. Of course, full manual could be kept as a super-hardcore setting but, realistically, I'm not sure if 'semi' is ever going to be good enough for some really hardcore players... but then if you want to play online competitively, you can't play it. Clubs especially, on manual, is practically impossible.
I use manual for through balls on Clubs, and long balls. I can occasionally do some absolutely wonderful things - but at the end of the day doing what should be relatively simple short passing is a trial in manual. In many ways I prefer to be doing a long pass with manual than a short one - and that just shouldn't be. I'd suggest that to make manual a little easier for passing a small bit of assistance is given for very short passes.
Sweetpatch imply that there will be a stated 'solution' for the manual problem. This will be a make or break factor. I still have absolutely no gut feeling which way they are going about it.
Gab,
I'm stretched across both here and the EA forums at the mo but I posted a comment about the stamina there. Basically the stamina was not significantly improved, so I showed the stamina levels to the devs at the 90 minute mark or so and they agreed that it was well off the mark. I doubt it will have been fixed for the press build either but from the furrowed brows on their faces I'm pretty sure that will be moving quite high up their priority list.
I hope so. What I want when I first play FIFA 11, is to about the 70th minute mark, find that I've killed my less fit players. I probably play much slower less sprint-intensive football than the average player and I still think I use it too much. I want to actively have to change my playing style to work with an improved system. My slight fear is that maybe the entire way fatigue works right now is flawed, and that however much it's tweaked up and down it will never feel quite right.
Football Manager seems to do something quite different - players with low fatigue are more likely to get injuries, knocks, and to play poorly. Maybe an all round decrease of attributes as the fatigue drops (assuming this doesn't happen already in which case it should be more noticable).
I don't know how this issue has gone unsolved for so long really - do all the testers not use sprint? Maybe they always play against CPU where perhaps sprinting is less useful? There is certainly some disconnect because it's been obvious for... well frankly ad vitam aeternam.
The 5 star skills system should be removed and replaced by maybe a three star basic skills system with the complicated skills checked on or off on a player-by-player basis. Some of the four star skills are way beyond what any player bar the absolute creme-de-la-creme. That would add to the player-personalities hugely if players could only really do moves they do - rather than all skilled players being equally skilled at moves they are the epitome of using, and a move they never use.
Also, in Virtual Pro, it would be nice if things like 5 star skill abilities weren't dished out quite so easily (the same too with the 5 star 'other' foot).
A question I haven't seen answered: Interceptions. How much more prevalent are they (if at all) - and how much more likely are you to get the ball when those interception animations (assuming they remain) occur. In FIFA 10 basically, an interception animation means for a fact you won't get the ball. It will either cannon or miss entirely.
