Discussion: Is FMM too easy?

This is the second of my Vibe discussion pieces. The first can be found here:

Spoiler

 

One of the comments I often see on the forum is ‘the game is too easy.’ It’s not one I necessarily agree with as it’s a very subjective comment as it very much relies on how you load-up your save, the constraints you add within your career, and the challenge, if there is one, that you choose to face. 

The best scenario as an example of this is the classic 1,000 goal challenge (known as a 1kc). I utterly love seeing people smash their first 1kc. Whilst some observers have, in my opinion, obnoxious and unnecessary snobbery regarding clubs and players challengers use, I genuinely think any first-time 1kc is brilliant. However, once you’ve done a few 1kcs you end up finding them easy as you know what to do; you have a well-developed and balanced go-to tactic. At the end of this scenario you think ‘this game is too easy’, yet the original incarnation of yourself found getting your first 1kc hard and was extremely happy you achieved it. So what was it: easy or hard?

In addition, the PC version of Football Manager is notoriously detailed and requires a lot less ‘plug and play’ than FMM. People therefore see FMM, which is essentially Coke Lite to the PC version’s Full Fat Coke, as a simplified and easier game. But are they muddling the word ‘easier’ with the words ‘less detailed’?

I’ve asked three very respected Vibers for their opinion: Foxy, Ian, and Woody. So without further or do, here they are:

@Foxy:

‘I think once you have played the game for a significant amount of time, so in my case 20+ years including Champ Man and the PC version of FM before moving over to FMM, you learn how the game works and how to consistently win but that doesn’t make the game easy. Take a look at this years or any years forum on Vibe and the top read threads will be tactics. This year the top 5 most read threads are all tactic posts and then if you add the pinned threads in as well the Tactics Index is the most read thread this year with over 300k views.

The only reason for this can be that not everyone who buys the game finds it too easy and that many are looking for some help with tactics. The game is easy if you always pick the big teams but then as many of us do we find other ways to enjoy the game with challenges but there is many people don’t play that way and don’t necessarily find the game simple. The one area the game needs to improve over just making the game more difficult artificially is the AI managers as if they weren’t quite so dopey in squad building and buying/selling players the game would be tougher.’

@Woody:

‘I agree completely Foxy.’

@Ian:

‘It’s a difficult question to answer as I think you could say that the game is both too easy and too hard if that makes sense. Pick a top team and the game seems a little too easy but pick a poor team and for me the game could easily be considered slightly too hard or harder than it should be compared to how things are when managing one of the bigger teams anyway.

Most features on the game seem to have to be added in a one size fits all way to make the game small enough to be playable on most mobile devices which must make things tricky to get everything right. Take the conditioning fiasco from last year where the developers finally admitted they’d made a mistake with the update but some actually thought it was ok. Of course, when managing a top team with really fit players across the board it was perhaps and I say perhaps playable but managing at a lower level was anything but as I proved when I did a little test at Blyth. I only got about five or six games in, could then hardly field a team and it became clear that it was unplayable. It’s almost like you really needed a different system for different levels of the game but as I said earlier, it doesn’t seem possible. Same with budgets, where it seems to be a basic one way system and the developers have said previously that the only way they could get the game to reflect the spending power of certain clubs like PSG without messing up the whole system was to just add the sugar daddy feature to them at all times. 

The a.i. is very poor when it comes to squad building and it seems to have always been that way so doesn’t seem like it’s an easy fix. The thing is, I’ve actually found that this year once you get about 7-10 years into a save, there just doesn’t seem to be the quality of peak aged players available. It may have been similar in previous years but it does seem worse this year and it’s very frustrating in truth. I could be cynical and say that I think the developers have done this deliberately to try and make the game harder and it has in some ways but only in a frustrating way which is the only way I honestly think they can make the game any harder.

So, basically I think the game is easy in some ways and hard in others and can’t see a way where it can be any different without a major overhaul of the game.’

@Woody: ‘I agree completely Ian.’

So there’s our views. What are yours? All comments welcome.

[Rich]

Nice article and it’s and interesting one for sure.

I guess the game is catered to a variety of levels in a way. If you want the hard version then that’s the PC one which I’ve played since 1998 myself and I’ve always loved management games. Football manager generally got harder as the years went on and would take forever to even finish a season, which in a way made me lose my love for the pc version. 

 I personally find the mobile version refreshing as you don’t have to take so long doing tactics, picking players, training etc. You can get very far in terms of seasons in very little time. I think it can be relatively “easy”  for people who have played for years or have played PC as it’s a lot more straight forward with a lot less options on tactics and things. I think if it were harder there would be less users as they could just play the PC version. It’s trying to get that happy medium and I think it’s at that now with how many people that play it and enjoy the game.

I also find when I’m doing well on a game and it feels like it’s getting easier, I try and beat the previous years record etc. Which I actually enjoy doing.   
 

So yeah to end I think it can be easy, but it’s better that way in my opinion as it gives me more enjoyment and I want to play it more often.

Hope that makes sense 👀

[George Traistă]

If you are new is not that easy, I mean I've played the pc versions for few years between 2008 and 2014 and the mobile version in 2012 and now, that I bought FMM20 few months ago I didn't find it easy, maybe medium and that because some things are the same. For a beginner I think is not easy at all, as you stated, the tactics posts are the most active and it happened to me that someone to ask me for tactics, and I'm new around here. 

After you learn to understand the game it will be easier but that why we have challenges, to make the game fun.

Do I want a harder version? Yes, because I'm up for the challenge and no because the geme will lose users and the community will be smaller. 

I do understand the developers because if you had a hard to understand and hard to play game it wouldn't sell and you go bust. 

 

Edited September 14, 2020 by George Traistă

[Ashez]

I've always said there is a fine line between difficulty and frustration and in looking to add difficulty FMM occasionally crosses that line. 

Take the stamina bug issue which caught Vibe by storm, while realism got the blame it was also a cause of difficulty that fans weren't happy with, it's a fine line. 

I agree with @Foxythat it's all about experience and the time you're willing to commit. We're the niche. I've been with the game for over a decade, obviously I know what I'm doing but for brand new players it must be extremely daunting, especially as so much of it is hidden. Tactic threads and guides are our bread and butter for a reason, they're what the community needs. I often wonder how overwhelmed I'd be if I picked FMM up for the first time as it's not an easy game to learn, especially considering it's meant to be an entry level experience. 

That's why I do love the variable difficulty the game has, I do believe it's more accidental than planned but being able to hand craft how difficult we want the experience is perfection. 

Anyone who moans the game is too easy always ask if they make their own formations, use wonder kid lists, use regens, stay within their comfort zone and so on. There are so many ways to increase the difficulty just like there are ways to make it easier. It's all a matter of perspective 

[Rich]

Forgot to mention in my post as well, I have friends and my brothers, who play the phone version and haven’t played the PC version. It took them a good while to get used to the game and there’s actually a depth to the game that maybe experienced players don’t notice as much, even tactics and things, if you haven’t played before it’s a lot to take in and I think the creators have the difficulty or whatever we want to call it right at the moment, obviously new features would maybe make things a bit harder, which I wouldn’t be against myself, would be a new thing for us alll to get used to.

[Del1Sketch]

While I agree that the PC version is much more in-depth and difficult than Mobile overall, there are still plenty of ways to make the mobile game more challenging or easy depending on your playstyle. While there are still some issues that need to be sorted out, mainly in the form of prize money, I think the overall challenge of the game can wildly vary from save to save, and of course, there is still depth to consider in the form of traits, personalities etc.

[George Traistă]

10 minutes ago, Del1Sketch said:

While I agree that the PC version is much more in-depth and difficult than Mobile overall, there are still plenty of ways to make the mobile game more challenging or easy depending on your playstyle. While there are still some issues that need to be sorted out, mainly in the form of prize money, I think the overall challenge of the game can wildly vary from save to save, and of course, there is still depth to consider in the form of traits, personalities etc.

I agree about the prize money, it's something that should be implemented. In fact, the finances part is way way too basic, just a switch from wages to transfers but not an annual budget which is totally off, it's way to easy to boost your transfer budget.

Egg. You sign a player for free and give him 50k in wages in one year and then you sell him for 10k, bam 10k for your wage/transfer budget, not minus -40k

[Ashez]

Prize money is in the game, it's just chucked in with your yearly budget instead of being in a menu showing where it came from etc. 

[George Traistă]

6 minutes ago, Ashez said:

Prize money is in the game, it's just chucked in with your yearly budget instead of being in a menu showing where it came from etc. 

Is stated somewhere? 

[Ashez]

4 minutes ago, George Traistă said:

Is stated somewhere? 

No not in detail but that's what makes your budgets. That's why the better you do the more money you get etc. 

[George Traistă]

1 minute ago, Ashez said:

No not in detail but that's what makes your budgets. That's why the better you do the more money you get etc. 

OK, makes sense. I was thinking that those are money from sponsors and owners for the new season and last year performances. 

[Scratch]

I agree completely with @Woody  😄

Actually I agree with most of what's been said. It's not 'easy' for people new to the game, but once you've been playing for a few years you're probably gonna think it's very easy.

I don't think SIGames can make it 'harder' in general, because as people above have said, that would alienate their main customer base. That said, I would like them to make it a little more difficult for people who know the game inside out, by closing some of those holes you can exploit. 

I'm talking about making regens truly impossible to recognise, killing the "move transfer budget to wages before End Season" thing, etc. Yes, you don't have to use those things, but once you know they are there it's hard to ignore them. Just take them out!

It should also be much harder to sign players. They do have the system in place where you can sign almost anyone at Barca, a lot fewer at Celtic, and not many at Partick Thistle for eg, but it could be a lot more solid than it is now. And really, if you sign 20 players in the off season (✋ guilty!), there should be some sort of penalty to team harmony - it doesn't have to be a complicated system, but there should be something to keep things realistic. Even if it was just the board stepping in and telling you that you can sign a max of X players per window.

We'll still try to find ways to score insane amounts of goals, but I think the game would be better if they changed some of those things and it shouldn't make it any harder for the average user.

[George Traistă]

36 minutes ago, Scratch said:

I agree completely with @Woody  😄

Actually I agree with most of what's been said. It's not 'easy' for people new to the game, but once you've been playing for a few years you're probably gonna think it's very easy.

I don't think SIGames can make it 'harder' in general, because as people above have said, that would alienate their main customer base. That said, I would like them to make it a little more difficult for people who know the game inside out, by closing some of those holes you can exploit. 

I'm talking about making regens truly impossible to recognise, killing the "move transfer budget to wages before End Season" thing, etc. Yes, you don't have to use those things, but once you know they are there it's hard to ignore them. Just take them out!

It should also be much harder to sign players. They do have the system in place where you can sign almost anyone at Barca, a lot fewer at Celtic, and not many at Partick Thistle for eg, but it could be a lot more solid than it is now. And really, if you sign 20 players in the off season (✋ guilty!), there should be some sort of penalty to team harmony - it doesn't have to be a complicated system, but there should be something to keep things realistic. Even if it was just the board stepping in and telling you that you can sign a max of X players per window.

We'll still try to find ways to score insane amounts of goals, but I think the game would be better if they changed some of those things and it shouldn't make it any harder for the average user.

Only 20 players?? In my first career, after I found that I can make a lot of money from flipping players I started to sign 50-80 players every summer 🤑 I had 40 players in the first team and 40 in the reserve, after I have sold few, went on to sign others 

I stopped doing it as it's not fun and it's too easy so I have restricted myself and now I take 10-15 players in the first season then max 5.

[Ian]

Am I the only one who doesn’t find that the game getting easier as the years go by on a save?

It probably goes back to the idea that we can all play the game how we want to though as I think I’m hindering myself. I’ve found from doing shorter goalscoring challenges that I do much better if I make sure the full squad are all peak aged, say between 24-32 and as soon as I add a few younger players to the mix, the results just aren’t there. I even prefer Milner to Trent in a first season Liverpool save as an example. I’ve been trying to adopt a similar method throughout longer careers and as I’ve usually been managing top teams recently, money is never a problem so should be doable surely. Trouble seems to come once I get about 7-10 years into the save as there just seems to be a lack of quality peak aged players available. You’d think that the quality young 16-18 year olds from the beginning of the save would have developed into quality peak aged players but doesn’t seem to be happening which I guess goes back to the poor a.i. argument as they are just not developing as they should.

I realise that I should probably get more younger players in earlier to develop but I still find it a bit strange that as say manager of Real, I’m putting filters in to look for a BBM in 2029 and all of the good options are 33-35. I suppose me going the peak aged route might mean I do better earlier on in saves so it’s a conundrum.

I get the occasional stupid stuff like we’ve mentioned before such as teams playing strikers in defence and stuff like that but I honestly can’t say I find the game getting any easier as the years go by. I’m certainly not scoring loads more team goals season upon season or conceding less but again, it could be the way I’m choosing to play that’s causing it.

[Del1Sketch]

15 hours ago, Ashez said:

Prize money is in the game, it's just chucked in with your yearly budget instead of being in a menu showing where it came from etc. 

That wasn't my point, my point was that prize money isn't realistic to the real world, especially as you venture into smaller leagues. Recieving 200k for finishing runners-up in the Welsh 2nd divison is simply ludicrous; especially when you consider Barry Town, who finished 3rd in the Welsh Prem last season and qualified for Europe, made "only" 250k! You tend to receive far more money than you should be receiving at that level, and it allows you to outspend the rest of the divison fairly easily.

[Kanegan]

I agree with most of the comments here and I fully agree with @Ian that once you are 8-10 years in the save, the players at the start of the save who thought will be developed into good well rounded guys but it doesn't happen. That can be frustrating and is the only reason I have not done many long term careers in this edition. 

Also as everybody mentioned, difficulty level is pretty relative to how you play. I have never played the PC version ever so when I first started playing the FMM in 2018, I had a horrid time due to not grasping the way tactics or roles or training works. But once I got the hang of it, things looked better and nowadays I can't think of playing without adding any challenges. 

[broodje kip]

Agreed with @Ian I really thought I’m the only person having the issue. I keep buying players looking good at young age but got his development stopped for no reason.

I don’t really feel much challenge nowadays but at the start of me playing this around FMM 2017 if I wasn’t mistaken was quite hard mainly due to me not having much understanding in using the roles, trainings and tactic setups

[George Traistă]

@Ian @Kanegan and @broodje kip for me is the other way around, it's a little bit difficult at the beginning but how the time goes by it get's easier and when I get to season 4, 5 or 6 I kind of have some of the best players in the game.

[broodje kip]

13 minutes ago, George Traistă said:

@Ian @Kanegan and @broodje kip for me is the other way around, it's a little bit difficult at the beginning but how the time goes by it get's easier and when I get to season 4, 5 or 6 I kind of have some of the best players in the game.

Yes I do have that but some players just doesn’t develop like how I expected so have to sell them after 2/3 seasons

[Ian]

20 minutes ago, George Traistă said:

@Ian @Kanegan and @broodje kip for me is the other way around, it's a little bit difficult at the beginning but how the time goes by it get's easier and when I get to season 4, 5 or 6 I kind of have some of the best players in the game.

Yeah I get that and I think it’s been my way of playing recently that’s caused me my issue as I’ve favoured peak aged players at all times and have in fairness been managing top teams so I could afford the best players right from the off. If I’d started with a lesser team, it would’ve been a case of gradually building the team up or if I’d started out at the top teams and gone with youngsters from the beginning to develop then same again I guess.

I do think there’s an issue with the database or something though where things aren’t overly great about 7-10 years in and it’s like you have to wait a bit for the next generation of talent to come through. Again though, I can’t work it out as if you look at the wonderkid list, there’s plenty of young talented starting players but I’m finding that they just aren’t developing well under the a.i.

15 minutes ago, broodje kip said:

Yes I do have that but some players just doesn’t develop like how I expected so have to sell them after 2/3 seasons

I’ve noticed a bit of that too and it’s strange as it’s not all of the time but just occasionally. I’ve had Zaniolo on a few saves and had to sell him as his attributes have just dropped at around 25 for no real reason yet on other saves he’s been fine. I’m sure plenty like this though as it’s like an element of randomness but I find it a bit frustrating in truth. 

[George Traistă]

29 minutes ago, broodje kip said:

Yes I do have that but some players just doesn’t develop like how I expected so have to sell them after 2/3 seasons

Yeah, there are cases of players that have a sharp progress then simply stop, I had few of those but some will recover if you stress them out. On some I've tried to retrain them on odd positions or to play them with low stamina and somehow they started to make progress again.

Edited September 16, 2020 by George Traistă

[Kanegan]

Randomness is ok with me as it adds a variety to every save but i can understand it being frustrating when you discover a player in your previous save tearing it out and then you bring him in your next save and he is absolutely shit. That can take away the fun. I have an example for this:

I signed Jamie Madison in Chelsea for one of the challenges i was doing but despite Intensive Training and surrounding myself with the right coaches and everything, he would just not go up in shooting while in other saves where i signed Madison just as a back-up player, he turned out to be a beast. So, ya it is frustrating but still bearable.

But what i find more frustrating is how very few regens actually turn out to be quality. I mean occasionally you may get a wonderkid or two but in general if you compare the regens coming in 7 or 8 years deep into the save, they are complete waste. 

What do you have to say to this guys?

[Aaron Thornton]

I think the games suffers largely due to the AI being useless at developing youngsters, this isn't the only reason but I find it to be the most prevelant reason in a long career for the overall lack of quality

Another point, the AI are useless at recruiting also, pretty much every top team after 10 years will have at least 2 or 3 players in their starting 11 or subs that is absolutely woeful, (like below non-league quality. 

If I was hope for anything on FMM 2021, it would be a bit more work put into the Artificial Intelligence's 'Intelligence'. 

I get this is not easy and I've next to no experience of game development and if nothing is done about this on next year's game I'm still going to buy the new version and support the developers as I'm quite frankly hooked on FMM and have been for 4/5 years. 

[MohitMax Roy]

What I never understand is how championship manager is better than fmm 20. I know they said mobile hardwares couldn't handle so many processes together but they are wrong. I played fm touch on my asus m2 pro and faced no issue whatsoever. Mobile games have so many giants nowadays like pubgm, codm and cod warzone is also coming soon to mobile including apex legends and yet every year we get the same game with some additional changes. 

 

I wish fmm21 would be worth the price but that's not going to happen, I will buy it again just to be dissappointed. 

[Ian]

Not sure if this fits into the difficulty category but it’s something that has annoyed me all year quite frankly.

I went a bit fanboy tonight and decided I’d buy Thiago for Liverpool to have a bit fart on. I bought him and to my utter disgust, a load of his attributes dropped. If someone can explain this to me in a way that will justify it then please do so as it’s got me quite stumped.

Before

After

[Rich]

2 minutes ago, Ian said:

Not sure if this fits into the difficulty category but it’s something that has annoyed me all year quite frankly.

I went a bit fanboy tonight and decided I’d buy Thiago for Liverpool to have a bit fart on. I bought him and to my utter disgust, a load of his attributes dropped. If someone can explain this to me in a way that will justify it then please do so as it’s got me quite stumped.

Before

After

This really frustrates me Ian, I’ve had it a lot this year, With my current PSG game I signed Jude Bellingham and his stats were great and once he signed they dropped off a significant amount, I tried for 2 season to get his stats up but they haven’t so I’ve ended up selling for a fraction of what I bought him for. Very frustrating.  

[Rob]

4 minutes ago, Ian said:

Not sure if this fits into the difficulty category but it’s something that has annoyed me all year quite frankly.

I went a bit fanboy tonight and decided I’d buy Thiago for Liverpool to have a bit fart on. I bought him and to my utter disgust, a load of his attributes dropped. If someone can explain this to me in a way that will justify it then please do so as it’s got me quite stumped.

Before

After

Assuming you’ve got top notch training and facilities, as well as training in advanced playmakers - all of which I’m 101% sure you have/are - then it’s bloody stupid and happens too much.

The ‘Zaniolo’ effect winds me up too.

Both things seem, IMO, as ways to level up the game in difficulty.

[Scratch]

On 17/09/2020 at 01:02, Kanegan said:

But what i find more frustrating is how very few regens actually turn out to be quality. I mean occasionally you may get a wonderkid or two but in general if you compare the regens coming in 7 or 8 years deep into the save, they are complete waste. 

I've never had problems with that. But there are few things:

1. You have to have to get good quality regens, which is a problem now as it's hard to spot who they are regens of. So I typically load as few leagues as possible, so there are less players in the game, so if you pick up a Spanish/Brazilian/Italian etc youngster, they are much more likely to be good (ie the good players will be in the game, so it's the bad players who aren't there when you have less players). But it has to be players Abroad, there are so many home nation players that it's hard to work out who's good.

2. But maybe you don't want the best regens after all. If you are playing at the top level, yes you want the best. But if you are playing in a league where the level is not quite as good, you probably don't want the Messi and Ronaldo regens because they may never reach full potential. So you actually might be better off with mid level regens who can max out and be top class rather than a 60% developed Messi.

3. Many of the the better regens come back with very low Work Rate - so you need to Warn them or Fine them after any performances of 6 or below, until that levels up. You have to do that carefully of course and you'll probably have to give them a new contract at some point (if you do, then maybe stop warning them for 6 months as if you upset them again you can't give them another contract). 

There could be a period after 7 or 8 years where there aren't many good players retiring, but I'm collecting good youngsters from day 1, so I haven't really noticed that. And when you collect youngsters and train them from day 1 with top staff and top facilities they turn out great! Unless of course you are in Spain or France or one of those leagues with second teams rather than reserves - that makes it much harder to develop them.

Edited September 18, 2020 by Scratch

[Scratch]

5 hours ago, Ian said:

Not sure if this fits into the difficulty category but it’s something that has annoyed me all year quite frankly.

I went a bit fanboy tonight and decided I’d buy Thiago for Liverpool to have a bit fart on. I bought him and to my utter disgust, a load of his attributes dropped. If someone can explain this to me in a way that will justify it then please do so as it’s got me quite stumped.

Before

After

I don't understand exactly WHY it happens, but it has something to do with a modifier for attributes that are stored with 0-255 values. You won't see a drop for the straight up 0-20 attributes (like Pace, Stamina, Strength). But the ones that are stored as 0-255 are converted to 0-20 values for display and when they are your players it does something to them. But like I say, not sure WHY! 

There do seem to be other modifiers for these value too, like the player's position. The same 0-255 value in the database for Crossing might show up slightly different for a WB than it does for TM. I don't understand that either.

But yeah it is incredibly frustrating...

Edit: Although... A key point is that the actual stored value for those attributes (in 0-255) is not changing, just the display value. So maybe it doesn't affect their performances at all... Not sure about that though.

Edited September 18, 2020 by Scratch

[Scratch]

5 hours ago, RichDave32 said:

This really frustrates me Ian, I’ve had it a lot this year, With my current PSG game I signed Jude Bellingham and his stats were great and once he signed they dropped off a significant amount, I tried for 2 season to get his stats up but they haven’t so I’ve ended up selling for a fraction of what I bought him for. Very frustrating.  

Haha, you are in France. A fun game to play there (or any league with second teams instead of reserves) is to demote your player to the second team and watch their attributes increase, then promote them to the first team and watch them decrease again. Hours of fun!