FIRST DRAFT
Okay, it's took me three hours, but here's the first draft of the letter. I need a few things from you guys now; suggestions of
improvements, and suggestions of
where to send this to, plus suggestions of
who will publicise this.
A couple of notes before I proceed:
I was in shock when I realised just how far backwards PES has gone. Look at the amount of features that have been removed in the last year or two. That is absolutely shocking. Konami, you should be truly ashamed.
Is the UEFA Champions League competition in the Master League called the WEFA League? I can't remember the name of it.
And one last thing, I remember reading that some definite goals result in corners. Am I right? Nobody has reported this in these topics.
Cheers for all the effort you've put in, guys.
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Dear Sir or Madam,
I help run a website,
www.evo-web.co.uk, that has been dedicated to Pro Evolution Soccer for nearly 7 years. It is a community of over 80,000 PES fans. With each new release of the game there has been discussion, praise and mostly happy gamers - PES has always been the most realistic football game available. But the next-gen release of PES2008 has been met with almost unanimous derision, with very little realism being seen when playing the game. In the hope that this will contribute to future PES titles, several topics of debate were created on our website so that all of the problems with PES2008 could be listed and fixed in future years by the PES development team.
Three kinds of issues were researched and compiled; factual issues (definite faults), subjective issues (improvements that are desirable but of less importance and also debatable), and finally removed features (features that were in previous PES titles but have inexplicably been removed and should be brought back).
I ask on behalf of 80,000 PES fans disillusioned with the direction that PES is heading in, please read this list and take on board our criticism to make the next PES the game it once was.
FACTUAL ISSUES
- (PC ONLY) It is impossible to save data if the Konami folder is on a drive that isn't the C: drive.
- (PC ONLY) Short hair looks corrupt on certain graphics cards (e.g. R9550).
- (PS3 ONLY) The game crashes if downloading from the PlayStation Network (PSN) whilst playing, offline or online.
- Slowdown is evident throughout the entire game, on all console versions and even on high-end PCs. This occurs during gameplay, especially when playing on the wide camera angle in a stadium like the Bernabeu, but it occurs most horrendously during cut-scenes, replays and highlights.
- Slowdown is particularly bad on PlayStation3, when playing the game through a non-HD lead on a non-HDTV. This renders the game unplayable for those with non-HD equipment.
- Online play is disgraceful, with players disappearing and reappearing in different positions of the pitch, all of the time. The game is unplayable online, goals can be scored without even seeing the ball go into the net.
- Graphical "tearing" is visible throughout the game.
- There is a bug where you cannot man-mark a player if the player is within the zone of a zonal-marking player.
- The referee in the Master League is always the same referee.
- The player and team database is very inaccurate in certain areas; Leto is not transferred to Liverpool. Solksjaer is included in the Manchester United squad but he retired months ago. Puerta, the Sevilla player, has tragically died, but he is still included in the game.
- Players sometimes run into the net and get stuck there for the half. They cannot be moved out of the net.
- Cut-scenes can sometimes show errors such as players running through advertising hoardings and the physical building of the stadium when celebrating.
- Facial hair is not allowed when using a camera to create a face. This means the player's face cannot be created properly.
- In the edit mode, you cannot edit or photo-import onto the back of any kit.
- You can only save upto 8 camera-created faces and upto 4 camera-created kits. There should be no limit imposed but the available space on the storage device.
- When using the editor, you cannot create a new team, only replace an old one. You should be able to add new teams to the database without removing any. Or at least, there should be 100s of blank team slots, instead of just 20.
- There is an invisible barrier when trying to get close to a throw-in taker. This should be removed.
- The pass power-bar during free-kicks serves no purpose because it is hit with a set amount of power no matter what you do.
- A lot of shots (free-kicks and normal shots) change curl direction abruptly in mid-air. This is not physically possible in reality.
- Players sometimes freeze on the field and can only move again once another player touches the ball.
- When playing in "fixed cursor" mode, it is impossible to pass and then immediately run quickly upfield. Pressing the pass button causes the player to pause after finishing the pass animation.
- Players (including goalkeepers) do not always kick/throw the ball in the direction you press.
- One-two passes fail when the original passer of the ball runs out of play. This would not happen in real life.
- One-two passes fail when the original passer runs into an opposition player. He then stops completely rather than continuing to run, preventing the opportunity to pass back to him.
- When bringing out goalkeepers to claim the ball, they will occasionally run in a straight line without trying to reach out and grab the ball, letting the striker shoot at an open goal.
- The referee sometimes takes a long time when blowing the whistle for a free-kick, which can prevent the kicking team from having an advantage.
- Once the ball goes out of play the "replay" option instantly becomes unavailable. This should not happen.
- Substitution animations only occur when the team is winning.
- Teams from "League C" cannot be used in the Master League. This should be fixed.
- Night matches in the Master League Division 2 are very rare.
- Rain effects (splashes when rain hits the pitch) are missing.
- When diving in your own box, the referee cannot react.
SUBJECTIVE ISSUES
- (PC ONLY) Not many resolutions are available to choose from.
- (PC ONLY) Online play has been set to 30fps only, which results in terrible slowdown issues.
- The gameplay is much too fast.
- It is much too easy to score.
- Goalkeepers parry almost every shot, sometimes it seems that they are incapable of holding onto the ball.
- Defenders sometimes let you run past them without even trying to get the ball off you.
- Build-up play (midfielders passing the ball and trying to find spaces in the defence) doesn't seem to exist, the majority of the time you can run from defence to attack and have a shot without being pressured. Defenders might as well not be on the field.
- Scorelines are ridiculous because of an imbalance in the game engine (attackers always have the advantage over defenders); 8-8 draws have been witnessed.
- You can score from the half-way line quite easily using the long-pass button.
- Scoring when 1-on-1 with the goalkeeper is much too hard.
- The CPU scores almost every free-kick that is on target.
- The CPU scores from almost every corner and there is very little you can do to defend them.
- It is very hard to pass the ball to a player in your own half; the opponent always stands in the way between your players and the ball, so you have no choice but to hit it all the way up the field.
- High through-passes can't be hit with enough power to land in-front of the player you want to pass to, meaning every attempt is intercepted.
- A long-pass from one side of the field to the other moves far too quickly, much more quickly than is possible in real life.
- Player stamina levels become low much too quickly. Players do not have the energy to play after two consecutive matches, which is not at all realistic.
- Ball physics have become a lot worse, the ball does not move like a ball would move in real-life.
- Collision detection in the game is very poor, players are constantly moving through each-other's physical bodies. Goalkeepers sometimes miss the ball with their outstretched hand by a large distance, but the ball bounces away off some invisible barrier. The ball can even go through a goalkeeper's chest and into the net.
- Players take far too long to recover when stumbling, resulting in opposition players being able to collect the ball.
- The game is sometimes very unresponsive, pressing a button to perform an action can sometimes not be recognised for several seconds.
- Referees give far more cards to human players than to CPU players. Human players are punished far more regularly than CPU players.
- The new penalty camera makes it very difficult for the goalkeeper to guage the situation.
- You cannot create a cup with a Champions League format in the game (a cup with two-leg group stage matches).
- The WEFA League in the Master League does not represent the real Champions League format (with two-leg group stage matches).
- The WEFA League in the Master League includes three teams from your own league, which does not happen in the real Champions League.
- There is no need to remove teams every year, such as Egypt. Why do new teams have to replace old ones?
- CPU "cheating" is more evident now more than ever. Sometimes your player will take an extra-long time to react to a loose ball so that the CPU player will reach it first, sometimes your player will take a few extra steps before taking a shot so that the CPU player can tackle the ball from him, sometimes your player runs away from the ball and you have to use the "super-cancel" button to bring them back - but then it is too late. Sometimes there is even an invisible barrier around CPU players that your player bounces off when you try tackling him.
- The Master League needs to be scrapped. Using "points" instead of real currency is very poor. Not being able to switch jobs in your Master League career (for example, starting with a small team and then managing a bigger team later in your career) is very disappointing. Only having two divisions, and not enough teams from each country (so, for example, you have an English top division and then a multi-league bottom division, meaning that you can't have a single-country league structure like real life), is very unrealistic.
- Lower-division teams need to be included, not just top-division teams.
- Why were Newcastle and Tottenham chosen for the two English Premier League license spots? Manchester United have won the Premier League title back from Chelsea, Chelsea finished a close second and won the title the year before, Liverpool have been in two Champions League finals in three seasons and Arsenal are one of England's biggest sides (currently top of the Premier League in the 07/08 season).
- The Fantasista mode of Winning Eleven J-League Club Championship 2007 (where you controlled one player through his career) should be a part of the PES series, not just the WE series.
- Players occasionally "skate" along the ground when switching between animations.
- Running animations look ridiculous, some players nearly hit their backside with their heels when you press sprint. This does not look like real-life running.
- Crowd graphics are poor, pixelated and ugly.
- All goal-nets are now the same, when they used to be different in different stadia.
- The English commentator, Mark Lawrenson, is a terrible voiceover artist. His commentary doesn't sound at all realistic.
- Every time a player kicks the ball it makes a loud "thud" sound. You would not hear this noise from the distance of the camera in real life.
- Players constantly use Brazil and Barcelona online, there should be a reward system where if you use a poorer team to win, you get more points.
- There are only eight directions of movement. In reality a player can move 360-degrees.
- Please consider cancelling the development of current-gen games and concentrate on PC/PS3/Xbox 360 versions only. Please consider rebuilding the game from scratch to take advantage of new technology. There are so many problems in the game from old versions - it is time that the game was rebuilt.
REMOVED FEATURES
- (PC ONLY) In-game chat messaging has been removed.
- (PS3/XBOX 360 ONLY) You can no longer control the CPU sides in tournaments, meaning that you can't play multiplayer tournaments and control the team your opponent is facing.
- Online 2v2 play has been removed.
- The "rematch" option when playing an unranked game is no longer available.
- Community mode (where the scores are recorded for each profile) has been removed.
- Spectator mode has been removed.
- The "International Challenge" mode, which includes World Cup Qualification, has been removed.
- In the edit mode, the ability to edit the emblems of unlicensed teams has been removed.
- The boot editor has been removed.
- The option to untuck a player's shirt in edit mode has been removed.
- The kit selection option has been removed. This results in several matches being played in same-colour kits.
- Stock formations are no longer available when playing a league.
- You can no longer turn off replays in the game settings menu.
- You can no longer select a camera angle number.
- You can no longer remove the radar from the screen.
- The off-screen player indicator, an arrow that appears at the side of the screen when your selected player is not in view, has been removed.
- The "percentage of completed passes" statistic has been removed from the match summary.
- The snow weather condition has been removed.
