Pro Evolution soccer

Unfortunately, this post has nothing to do with Gauntlet. Mostly because there is no news about Gauntlet, and therefore, nothing to write about it. It’s one of those handy chicken-egg scenarios.

What I do have to write about however, is my beloved Pro-Evolution Soccer… But since, some time back I covered the deficiencies of the game, I thought I’ll take a different route through PES09 and comment on the new mode.

Become a Leg end

If Pro-evolution’s become a legend mode was a section in a sex shop, It’d be the dark dank corner with a big bald bloke called Norman, wearing a gimp mask, stroking a ferret, whilst wearing an assortment of attachments in leather.

It’s sadomasochistic in it’s approach to game play. The premise, for anyone fortunate not to have encountered this mode is this:-

Basically, you have a training match, with a shit skill-less character, and you’re expected to play this game and perform well. Now, no matter how well you do play (For example, I scored a hat-trick, and three assists) – your character will still come out like a Glen Hoddle induced spastic – like you’ve been bad in a previous life and now have the stats of a postman.

You then spend the rest of this “game mode” playing for a selection of teams (the first, invariably is shit) – and have to impress the manager into giving you a starting line up position.

But there are problems, and unfortunately they are quite large.

1. Because you always start with a shit character, the animation system gets in the way of you being able to do anything. So, for an example, when receiving the ball, your character will instead, let it bounce off him, then get tangled up on the super-AI opposition, lose his balance like a spacker, spin round on the spot, wobble, then watch as the ball simply bounces off you to another enemy AI.

2. The opposition AI know the game a lot better than you do. They read your predictable passes, and stop them… Every single one of them – because the passing system is fundamentally broken, any intended pass ends up in the oppositions possession. Any optimistic long-ball pass, you guessed it, ends up in the oppositions possession. Any throw-in, anything.

3. Even if you pick your position as a Centre Forward, because your stats are so shit, the “manager” will put you as a side mid-field. He will never play you up front because you’re not as good as Cisse on paper. – And because you’re not playing up front, you’re not scoring consistently, or performing very well, because being a side mid-fielder who can’t pass isn’t particularly useful, So your ratings aren’t that good, So the manager doesn’t play you as a “first team player” – so you get subbed on or off, every game.

4. Then, at some point during a match, you’ll be one-on-one with the keeper, practically walking towards him with the ball at your feet. One of two things is going to happen, first, the opposition defender will probably simply walk in front of you and take the ball from you, (and I do mean walk, without even a hint of a tackle or challenge, they simply take the ball from you) – or two, and much much worse, you actually pull off a shot, which is akin to having a haircut by a rapist.

5. So there you are, stuck with shit stats, being subbed every game, being played in the wrong position, and desperately fighting the fucking AI cunts who are capable of blocking every single thing you do. And then your team mates- because you’re so shit, stop passing you the ball. Even when you’re stood in the oppositions half, on your own, with no-one within two miles of you, they’ll still pass the ball backwards. And then lose it, because they are cunts, and the opposition striker will then glide past you and your team mates and stick a goal in.

6. Or maybe, your team will fluke an early goal, this is a dreaded scenario, because within twenty seconds of your team scoring, the opposition suddenly become ball-possession super-mutants, who simply fuck with the laws of the space time continuum and become impossible to take the ball off. Pro-Evolution has always raped the AI when you score, so that they become much more skilled. Even fucking Bognor Regis become super-footballing-gods when they are 1-0 down in the first half. But in Become a legend mode, it’s made all the worse because you are a single guy and can do approximately bollocks all about it. Seriously, you might as well just put the joypad down and watch because you simply cannot stop a corner with a header, you cannot clear a bouncing ball in the box because your stats are so wank, and you can’t dribble it out either because that’s just fucking doomed.

7. And to top all that, the you’ve obviously buggered the referee’s wife before the game. If you press the X button, you’ll get a yellow card. Honestly, it doesn’t matter if you make a challenge that so obviously got the ball that the ball has your fucking name sewn onto it, it’s a yellow. Or if you tackled from anything but head-on, it’s a red. I went so far as to actually physically remove the blue button from my joypad. As this button is also shoot, it’s a bit of a problem for a normal striker, but not me, because I’m fucking side mid-fucking-field.

8. The in-between match screens are fucking hideous, Not only are they slow, but they are fucking awfully laid out. There is no way on earth you can see the line up of a team that isn’t your next team. So you can’t go and see how Barcelona play, (for their inevitable transfer request) – so you’ll end up playing in a team that plays 4-5-1 again, and you’ll be a side midfield again. Want to find out how many goals you’ve scored for your team? Well, good luck mate, cos you’ll never fucking find it.

9. But it’ll all be okay, because you’ll power up eventually. Play out of your skin, score two goals, set up three and watch as you get a 6.5 on the rating… What the fuck? How can a hat-trick hero get subbed off? Why do I only have 5.5 – OH, it’s because I’ve only made 1 “interception” – which I assume means tackle, or block of a pass. So a strikers primary goal in life isn’t to score goals, it’s to make interceptions. The “manager” rating system is the following formula.

Rating = ((Number_of_interceptions – number_of_goals) / time_on_pitch) * Rand()

10. But that’s alright because the game is just so enjoyable you won’t be able to put it down, you’ll look forward to every other game thinking “this is my chance now!” – “I’ll do better in this game!” – but you won’t, it’s impossible. You’d have to be a sadist to enjoy this fucking game.

11. I thought the Japanese made RPG’s – you know, with depth, and with stats and attributes, and back stories (that bore to me tears) and options, and shit characters with animal ears. I thought that was their bag. So why then, does it always go to shit when they make a sports game? Why do they have the depth of a paddling pool? Why can’t I be interviewed by people after a game for my honest (or not so honest) opinion of the match? Why don’t I get the bottle of champagne for being Man of the match? Why can’t I negotiate with the boss for more money? Why doesn’t my manager give me a pep-talk during half time? Why don’t I see any specific instructions from a foxy chick holding a clipboard? Why DO I NEVER- EVER- EVER take a corner/freekick/penatly? (Honestly the post match screen has these stats listed, so it’s presumably possible, but why do I never take anything?)

12. Edit: I thought of a new one – it’s all going to be okay though, perhaps putting the game on four stars difficulty at the beginning was a mistake. It’s taken you five seasons to realise it, but perhaps you’d enjoy it more if you knocked down the difficulty a bit, you know, just whilst your stats are shit, you’ll put it back up when you become a football god… “I know, I’ll go to the options now and do just that now” you’ll say… You’ll go to the options, and you’ll see that everything is grey’d out and unselectable. Apart from the match length time, you can alter that…. (but as, all that does, is determine how much of a football match you’re going to have to watch before coming on as a sub, it’s pretty fucking A useless too.) – So to alter the difficulty, you have to basically start again, with a shit-skilled character again… On easy… Which then can’t be turned UP when you do become too good. So, the purpose of having a “difficulty setting” is……..?

Basically, this mode is fucking shite. I hate it, I don’t know why I’m even bothering, I guess it’s because I so fundamentally hate the game that I want to see how bad it can possibly be. Pro-evolution is fucking dead to me. Unless I read “Seabass dies in horrific sex spack-attack”, I am never ever ever going to buy another Pro Evo again. You’ve had my money too many times you cunt, I’m going to sell pirate copies of Pro Evolution 2010 on eBay, for a loss. THAT’s how much I hate the fucking game

I want to play with my national side. That’s it. I’m going to keep going till I get an international call up… Then I’m going to go give Norman “Seabass’s” address.

Is Seabass the most shitty name you’ve ever heard for a pseudonym? It’s not “D34thBringeR” now is it?

I wrote a post a while ago about how to improve Pro Evolution Soccer. (Although it does go on a bit randomly about being red wizard from the gauntlet games too)

Anyway, it’s good to see Seabass isn’t listening to me one bit and has made PES 2009 essentially the same game as the old one, and no doubt I’ll buy it and post exactly the same “suggested improvements”…

So in an effort to double my chances of video game producers actually listening to me, here’s a list of improvements that Tiger woods 2009 should implement.

- If you’re going to release the game so obviously timed with the ryder cup, why not, I dunno, include the ryder cup?
- Let me introduce a new phrase to you guys at EA. It’s called “Server migration” and it has been in use for approximately twenty billion years. When the server quits out of the game, don’t just quit the game how about, I dunno, making one of the OTHER xbox’s the server. I mean, they can easily be the server anyway after a bit of setting up. How fucking easy is it to do it on a GOLF game.
- For god sake sort out some sort of method for hitting the ball 30-50 yards predictably, the punch shot doesn’t work anywhere like predictable, and no club can be tuned to that range.
- Where are the divets in the ground? Do you not watch real golf? I’m not being funny or owt, but seriously, comparing TW09 to real golf shouldn’t have such a huge difference. It’s not like you’re chucking around a billion particle effects now are ya?
- Particle Effects – Funny, when I watch the raging sea, it doesn’t just intersect with cliffs.
- That howling wind noise is wank and the loop is far too small. It makes me want to eat my own face in anger thinking that someone was paid for that.
- There simply isn’t any weather, yes, wind, but no rain… Come on… When I’m playing in fucking January in Scotland, What the fuck am I doing wearing a T-shirt? – I’d be dead by hole 3.
- Where is the caddie? How about your golf cart that you can customise with pimped out wheels and things? How about your golf bag. The caddie could do cool things like, hand you your club, or pick up some grass and drop it, say how he banged twelve bitches last night.
- Not during tournament play, how come you’re the only one on the course, why are there not people playing in front of you.
- You call that a crowd? It’s wank.
- Anti Aliasing is your friend. I’m sure there’s a #define somewhere that you’ve commented out that says something like “Enable Anti Aliasing”
- The commentary is WANK – And I do mean wank, you’re wanker than Pro Evolution Soccer, tell me, why can’t the commentators actually behave like commentators, making little jokes and chatting between themselves about your play. For reference, go and play the EA NFL games.
- See above, the commentary is wank, I mean, “That is a master right there” every single time I sink a birdie is pissing me off.
- Make the game a tinsy winsy bit more difficult, Sure I can go to “tour pro mode” but I don’t want to lose the features that make it fun, like the ball spin and things. Just make it so your stats don’t go from 0 to 12 in four swings of the bat, or whatever it’s called.
- Go and download a Gametrailers video of the crysis editor. Why on fucking gods earth can we not make our own courses? It’s simple. Here is the source code:-

10 Generate Height Map
20 Provide player with some height map manipulation tools. Copy these from PlanetSourceCode
30 Allow the player to paint on bunkers, greens, fairway.
40 Allow player to spray down trees and other items.
50 goto 10

You’re just being lazy.
- Look at real golfers. They do not have nicknames like “Princess” and they do not dance after every fucking birdie – UNLESS they are American, when they just behave like 4 year old cunts.
- Please, for the love of god, get rid of the “post shot” animations after EVERY. FUCKING. SHOT.
- Artists. Take a look at real grass, and real rough. What the fuck are you looking at for reference? Grass isn’t one single colour.
- Do we *really* need a load every single bloody hole? Honestly? Really? – Do we though? – I mean, why not asynchronously load during game play? Amazingly, what you could do is drip feed the data from the disk whilst the player is watching the repetitive as shit animations… Now that’d be fucking cool wouldn’t it?

And here are some new USP back of the box things:-

- Have the players model talk when they talk. Have the other players spectating each shot if you spin the camera around (it’ll still work in simultaneous play, honest)
- Time of day.. Funnily, Golf takes a long time to play… Amazing eh?
- A clubhouse that stores 3d representation of your winners trophies, captains tournaments, playing joe public, let the player buy an S-Type jaguar, (that was a joke) – let the player get a little bit pissed on whiskey one day and chat up the 40 year old barmaid that isn’t really that fit but is the only female within two hundred miles, so you probably would.
- “I don’t want to play any Yanks” tick box for the servers. That’d be ace too. Screaming little shites.