Funny thing is, it wasn’t the insight from my fellow Scotsman that has me writing this, but more so something the interviewer noted during Gary’s reply to the question about adding to the atmosphere in FIFA’s career mode that raised a wee smile from me as my mind wondered back to classic PES on PS2.

”I feel like gameplay’s getting harder and harder to improve on…and I think ‘matchday atmosphere’ is something we need to invest in. (We tell Gary how we invent ‘stories’ for our players in PES Master League)”

It is that in brackets above that resonated with me as a PES aficionado as it is something that even this 36 year-old man has been known to do in his years playing the game. I have to confess that in recent years such wandering of the imagination has failed to manifest itself in quite the same way as it once did when getting my fix of PES, though that is not to say the old grey matter can’t conjure up some flight of fancy. I started to think it was just middle age creeping in and the stark reality of life finally hitting home. This was a feeling I have not felt since…George Lucas took it upon himself to butcher my childhood in 1999. Bloody Jar – Jar and that whining little kid! Lucas might have the exact haircut I wish to proudly display in my elder years but even that magnificent towering bouffant fails completely to obscure the madness of the mind in which it sits atop. Seriously, a plot revolving around a dispute over a trade agreement is meant to be interesting how? To say I digress isn’t really going to cut it here, is it?

Back on topic, I can’t help but think that the re-vamp of PES’ Master League might be acting as more of a hindrance than help to my immersion in the game. I have no doubt that my own sanity will be questioned in much the same way I question that of a certain ‘Writer/Director’ (It still hurts!) but I ask you stay with me here before passing judgement.

I just think there is a degree of sterility about the way the both footy games go about their business regards the main ‘campaign’ modes these days. Sure, there is more authenticity and realism present but along with this comes a somewhat over-bloated experience. For me at least, part of the charm of classic PES’ ML mode was it’s simple, almost RPG-lite structure in which just seeing the players abilities increase after a match was enough to keep me going in itself and I filled in the blanks of the story of transfer negotiations, players failing to settle, board confidence and other off field matters without the actual game getting in the way. I could make it as deep as I wanted it to be off the field as the real story is surely always what happens out on the field. I believe that progression through an ML campaign in classic PES was less intrusive as it is currently but more importantly the basic videogame fundamental of escapism is dulled down somewhat when you are being prodded and probed by the game to deal with various matters between matches. I dunno, it just feels like I am asked to be an accountant for the club as opposed to being a manager who is questing to realise how the beautiful game should be played. I know fine well that in real life managers are in some part asked to oversee various aspects of the running of a club but isn’t that what a manager sim like Football Manager is for? Not that I am suggesting PES or FIFA have the same level of depth (though worryingly they aspire to be just that) but these games focus you would think is about the raw, untamed beauty of the sport and not the mundane chores that admittedly make it all happen. Let me concentrate on being the ‘’tracksuit manager’’ I yearn to be in other words.

I remember signing Ibrahimovic during the winter transfer negotiation period in PES4 (when the training mini-games were in place) and he repaid my faith by performing the square root of bugger all for the remainder of the season , so instead of selling him on I had him chasing the wonderful yet impossible to calculate geometry of Iniesta, Aissati and Nasri (who were all bloodied in a similar fashion!) in training the whole pre-season while saying to myself in a Brian Clough manner ‘’You’re a bloody disgrace!’’ daring him to get better. He ended up my best player the following season and arguably the most ridiculously talented player I have ever controlled in a PES game. This is how I want to connect to my team and get the balance right, not by looking at a bank balance and worrying if my scout is the right level. I think footy games are lacking in being able to inspire such a connection at the moment and ironically it may be because they are trying too hard to do just that.

Building a Legacy, Leaving a Legacy

If there was anything I would like to have a greater level of management with outside the first team squad it would be the youth team. Wouldn’t it pretty cool if between matches and basic tactical tinkering and/or transfer negotiation you could decide to train and develop them via quick 3min half challenge matches against your first team? It not only would allow you to see how good (or bad) the first teams cohesion is but at the same time you would be developing the youth squad. This would allow the user to make a better judgement as to who could make the step up to the first team due to you actually getting to control them in non-competitive circumstances against what should be better developed players. Surely this could only add to the immersion and makes you feel like you are building a legacy and more than just a club.

Something that has never been possible in PES’ ML is the ability to change clubs. Given all that I have suggested above were to be put in place – with the ability to leave it all behind and seek pastures new – not only would moving on be a tough choice but could also spur you on to do it all over again. What would make this even more of a wrench is if the ML landscape you created kept going. What I mean is that should you change clubs, with only limited options available (think a three 1st Div clubs, three 2nd Div. club, and three ‘other league’ clubs offer scenario) what you leave behind remains intact and part of the game world, with your former clubs signings and development all remaining in place. Suddenly you are pursuing your own legacy all over again! It should be noted I would have no sackings in place, just ‘game over’ if you mis-manage, so the urge to keep the game world you have created alive is always driving you on whilst making you very mindful not to get over ambitious.

I would like to hear others opinions as to what they think would be the ideal ML experience. If it happens to be what is already in place then it would be nice to hear some thoughts as to why that is. My own thoughts are that less can result in more, or that at least a change of focus upon other aspects of ML could make the experience more richer, deep and ultimately more rewarding experience us fans.

Huge credit again to PSM3 for keeping the torch alight during the ”quiet period” for us footy game fans.

But every Milan fan will probably tell you while an embarrassment wasn’t predicted, a loss certainly was. Even before injuries decimated our squad, we all knew Man UTD were the stronger team and any positive result would be quite an achievement. As the match finished those problems came to the fore, and with it my desire to fix them. Where else to start, than PES ML.

In many ways building a team with individuals is something unique to PES, and something the FIFA series hasn’t got to grips with. Manual control? No chance, I prefer to feel the difference between players, and for their attributes to be key – apart from strength and speed. For Milan missed a true goal scorer, someone who can score 20+ in a season. Not a tricky player (Dinho), or a young quick threat (Pato), someone in the Van Nistelrooy mould.

Then there’s a goalkeeper, Dida and Abbiati keep competing to see who can do worse rather than better. And even when the likes of Seedorf, Zambrotta, Nesta and Oddo are fully fit, there’s a concerning aging trend going on that will need a look to the youth. While the result was more than frustrating, the thought of improving the squad isn’t. And in a series where the likes of Iniesta, Xavi, Fabregas, Messi etc have a place, there’s no better place to start than in PES.

And to finish…GET YOUR WALLET OUT BERLUSCONI!

The end.

To my utter amazement Konami had this aced long ago.

So where are you going to place your click? May I suggest the read more link below.

Yip. That’s right. Konami’s KCEO studio had penalties pretty much nailed 12yrs ago and for my money the system they used has not been bettered by any football title since. Sure, the Wii version of the game comes close but still fails to relay any real sense of drama to the player in the way the ISS series of games on the Nintendo 64 did all those years ago.

So let us take a look at the ISS games spot kicks in action first…

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

What made this system so effective was the battle of wits between players as the kicker could hide his placement marker and play blind. It sounds easy but when you consider that each player had a different level of accuracy(denoted by the size of the target on screen) it made taking a blind kick risky business. At the same time however, you could select your placement with the marker on screen, toggle it off and your opponent would be unsure if you had changed target.

Important : What isn’t shown in the video is how the cursor resets to the centre of goal if you release the Stick/D-pad. I think this is worth noting on account that it demands a steady hand from the player which increased the tension a tad more.

Notice in the second video that in changing the foot the player strikes the ball with affects accuracy, and also worthy of note in particular is that in the first video England actually win a penalty shoot out!

I think this is the way penalties should be implemented into the franchise. I can remember many tense, cat and mouse like encounters in the shoot outs with my mates on the ISS games on N64. These microcosms that contribute to the overall real, palpable drama of the game are sorely missed and instead I find myself now dreading a shoot out – or even a penalty during a match – for all the wrong reasons.

But why just stop at porting over an old, yet effective system and leaving it be I ask? Times have changed, technology has evolved and the level of interaction a player has in a game has along with it. As effective as the ISS penalty system was and still is, it need only be the solid foundation on which to innovate further and draw the player in even more.

First, let’s look at the obvious. Chipped kicks should allow for full control over placement. Now I know you don’t see many players place chipped kicks in the sport and tend to go down the middle but why shouldn’t we have the option to do so if we feel so inclined/brave. Maybe we could have a polar opposite to this mapped elsewhere that allows you to strike the ball along the ground with the stick/d-pad being used for placement.

Another mechanic I would welcome is the ability to switch between putting your foot through the ball and side footing it. This could be made possible by making every direction pressed towards goal having the player strike with the laces as it were, and every direction pressed away from goal have him open the foot up to side foot. Now imagine being able to switch on the fly as he goes to kick. That would be your ability to wrong foot the keeper before striking right there.

The rumble function on todays controller is screaming out for it to be used and yes, it has been implemented already to some degree, but what if the amount of feedback was dictated by a players ‘penalty composure’ stat and not just technique accuracy and power. An example here being a Kaka’ shaping up to take a kick having less feedback on the controller than say a less composed player in the same situation(John Terry anyone? sorry Chelsea fans!) It needn’t end there though as over the course of a shoot out the feedback increases more and more, varying between each player so the Kaka’ taking the first kick would be a little more composed than the Kaka’ taking one of the later kicks. In a match situation time on the clock could also impact on this(90th minute kicks would be daunting prospects) as could the matter of it being a kick taken at home or away or even the importance of what is at stake in the match itself(final/semi-final, league decider, CL qualification) and who is to say weather couldn’t also have it’s affects.

Moving on(yes I have more!) I remember playing a first person shooter recently. You know how in some first person shooters when you take aim with a sniper rifle you only get a steady aim for a short period of time, well why can’t the penalty system in a football game have similar, so going along with the feedback of the controller the aiming cursor itself is not exactly stable and only pressing say L2/Lt steadies it but only for a few seconds and the length of time in which it remains stable is again dictated by a players ‘penalty composure’ rating. I should add that the instability of the cursor wouldn’t be impossible to manage so you wouldn’t need to fine tune every kick using the L2 button.

What these additions/enhancements to spot kicks would add is another layer of strategy over proceedings. I can imagine players suddenly taking a close look at there team before entering a shoot-out and getting the order right, maybe even making substitutes in a games dying moments in order to get the best penalty takers on the field before the dreaded whistle goes. As for Master League impact suddenly penalties could be something you actually train with your squad at in order to get the right mix and even improve players abilities from the spot. Keepers could benefit from the training too.

As is often said in football, penalty shoot-outs are a different game entirely to what happens in the 90-120mins of open play that go before them. A time for composure or lack there of to surface in even the most talented of individuals as they suddenly feel like the loneliest man on the planet, so I think it is about time Konami really looked to capture that high stakes drama once and for all.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Get the HD versions here and here!

With our very own review coming Monday, we thought we would do things a little differently on the podcast. This week we caught up with Adam Webb from XboxGamingBlog, and spoke at length about master league – the one element of PES 2010 that is unanimously regarded as the best single player experience in nextgen footy gaming. Into his second season in ML, Adam W has seen and experienced some crazy things in the game, and he shares all in this weeks podcast!

Enjoy!

Click here to read it!

Again, we’ll go into the mode in the EPIC podcast. Ht the jump!

Therefore the magazine gives you it’s own take on the ML news that was released by Konami, and like many they’re very pleased with the info so far.

There’s consistent chatter about the master league improvements, as well as tidbits on online and Gamescom. Make sure you read the article here.

Thanks to jjoseca for the news.