Soccer as Taught by the CM4 2d Engine

[JPhillips]

I'm not really a soccer guy, but CM4 is so damned fun that it has me hooked. I hae never played a sim so detailed and complete. This is the first sim where I feel like it isn't a game version of the sport, but is the sport.

That being said, the 2d engine is simply maddening. The way the players react is often inexplicable. While I haven't ever played organized soccer, I can't help but wonder why the players do the things they do. Imagine if I tried to coach soccer based on the 2d engine.

1 Goal kicks should often be sent to an unmarked opposition player.

2 Throw ins can occasionally be given to an opposition player, but only when they are free to attack.

3 Some banana shots can curve almost 180 degrees.

4 You should stand where you think the ball will lad even if the opposition makes it clear that it will land in a much different location.

5 You should be willing to leave your man alone if you want to mark a man far from the play.

6 Keepers shouldn't grab the ball if it is really close and an attacker is charging. Its better to let the attacker get the ball and shoot.

7 If a play has been very contested ad you suddenly find yourself free with the ball, kick the ball into the stands.

(Feel free to add your own)

[BreizhManu]

LOL

[illinifan999]

8. Your team never will win a header. No matter who you are.

9. Goalies are quite possibly the stupidest people on earth.

10. The rest of the soccer team are quite possibly the second most stupid people on earth.

11. It is much better to shoot from 30 yards out then try to get around the keeper and practically walk the ball into the net.

[Critch]

12. If you are a central defender, sometimes the opposition forward is just meant to get the ball even if you're much closer to it. In those situations, slow down or turn and run the opposite direction.

[illinifan999]

13. When you are a keeper it is often best to get halfway to the midfield line pass the ball to the closest opponent and watch as he lobs it into the goal.

[WussGawd]

Originally posted by illinifan999
13. When you are a keeper it is often best to get halfway to the midfield line pass the ball to the closest opponent and watch as he lobs it into the goal.

I've got a better one. Saturday I was playing my latest game (I'm managing Peterhead, a Scottish Third Division team). We've been doing well. We're top of the table in the Third Division despite having much lower expectations, and we'd used a defensive counter-attacking style off of a 4-3-3 base formation (my team is heavy on good strikers, light on midfielders). to upset a few Second and First divisions to reach the Challenge Cup Final. It's 0-0 late in the first half. Arbroath has been dominating the action, but haven't been able to put it past my goalie Mathers.

Anyway, Arbroath have a fast right winger coming down into my end unmarked. my full backs are coming back and marking the other attackers, so I'm not too concerned in the immediate. Anyway, this right winger, who's about 40 yards out realizes that his linemates are running out of real estate and tries a lobbing cross toward the left side of the penalty area. Suddenly Mathers starts to run out of the goal, I guess to field the thing at the top right of the penalty area.

Trouble is, the ball is still low enough to present a dangerous opportunity to head, and Mathers has basically left the goal unguarded. Sure enough, one of their forwards heads the ball for the easiest goal I've ever seen. Mathers sits there agape, way out at the right corner of the penalty area as the ball crosses the endline into the empty goal.

Fortunately for Mathers, Arbroath got a second goal a little later, because if we'd lost 1-0, I'd have probably benched him on the spot.

[illinifan999]

Yeah that happens to me at least once a game. Sometimes the post is a better goalie than my current one. And he has 3 for eccentricity which the manual says willingness to come out of goal or something. Needless to say I need to score about 3 goals if I want a chance at winning. There must be a hidden IQ rating in this game. I just wish I could find some cheap rocks. Smarter than my current bunch.

[Katon]

15. If you are clean through on goal, you shall consider what to do while the defence catches up and the keeper grabs the ball off your foot.

[GoldenEagle]

16. If you ae clean through the goal, you will turn around and hit the ball backwards to another player, who is marked.

[SirFozzie]

17. If you're a goalie, and you come out of the box.. you will attempt to cross the ball all the way across the field and BACKWARDS, thereby putting your own goal at risk. (infact in this case, it DID go in.. the first ever own goal by a goalie I've seen!)

[JPhillips]

Sirfozzie: I actually had an own goal where the keeper caught the rebound off the post a good ten meters out and then held for a sec and finally chucked the ball into the net in despair. "F^%$ it, they'll just win anyway!"

[GoldenEagle]

That has actually happened in real life before JPhillps. I think it was in the Mexican league.

[illinifan999]

18. When you are down 2-0, proceed to get as many red cards as possible.

Playing as the Fire, Thorton gets a red card. Bocanegra then gets a red card. Then Armas dislocates his shoulder and gets a red card on the same play. And finally Faria decides he wants in on the action gets one. 2 of them came after the That didn't look like a foul! message.

Then even better, I signed a guy named Ismael Addo. This what the play looked like. This is the same game. I'm down 4 guys.

Addo receives a beutifal cross from Beasley.
Addo runs with it.
Addo makes a move into the penalty area.
Pope brings Addo down with a two-footed challenge.
Kovalenko is furious with the refferee.
Kovalenko is shown a yellow card.
Kovalenko Scores!

I still wish I coulda complained about that ref.

[GoldenEagle]

The 2d Pitch still sucks. I get frustarted because i know a player would never do something like they just did, not even in MLS.

[Marc Vaughan]

LOL

We're still constantly working on tweaking and tuning the match engine, it might never be 'perfect' - but we'll do our best to get damn close to it

[Havok]

19. Noone on the field is allowed to score expect the strikers. If a midfielder or winger have the ball in the box with an open goal he must pass to the closest "Marked" striker.

[QuikSand]

Gee, now I'm really tempted to go start playing CM4. Sounds great.

[Katon]

Well, it isn't really THAT bad. Most of the time, the players are fairly intelligent; it's just occasionally that they play like complete morons.

[JPhillips]

The problem is that the 2d engine chases the commentary. To make the commentary correct, the guys will move in unexpected and sometimes illogical ways. If you read the commentary everything works fine, but if you view the 2d engine you see some really crazy soccer.

[TroyF]

I've really gotten lucky with the striker scoring thing. I watch all of the "key" plays in 2D and do not have a problem with midfielders and the occasional defensive player scoring goals.

Some things in 2D do get kind of strange sometimes.

TroyF

[Easy Mac]

Originally posted by TroyF
Some things in 2D do get kind of strange sometimes.

TroyF

Like sex? I know I tried it in 2D, but it really only works in 3D, sometimes 4D, depending on how adventerous she is.

[Havok]

in my last season my number 1 striker Wael Reyad scored 39 goals, my number 2 striker Chrystinao scored 31 goals and my next highest scorer was a midfielder who at 6 goals. But the only reason he had 6 goals was because he was my penalty shot taker.

I scored 83 goals the whole season.

[illinifan999]

20. Even though I know you love the other team's jerseys, it's no excuse to keep passing them the ball. Sheesh!

[Havok]

21. Each team must get no less then 3 yellow cards a game and must argue with the ref at least 3 times a game.

[SirFozzie]

22. Just when your team is doing great, you'll run into a long term break (between seasons or a Winter break) and magically, all your players will forget how to play

[Mac Howard]

By far the most difficult feature to include in an smg is a visible match engine. That's why so many designers for so long have stuck with text commentaries - these hide a multitude of sins in the match engine.

There are two major difficulties. The one you're experiencing - players' movement and the consequent match progress not corresponding to the "rules" of soccer match movement. The second is the compression of the 90 minute real-world game into a more reasonable timescale for the computer game (around 10 minutes or so depending on the quality of the match display) without losing too much of the information on player and team performance.

I've played CM4 for a few weeks now and I believe that Marc and his team have done a very good job on the design. It isn't perfect but it's better than anything else I've seen so far (I exclude SaaP of course from the comparison ).

Any major step like this, and it's certainly true the smg was beginning to stagnate prior to this, will inevitably have weaknesses while the software techniques are developed. Producing a display where twenty two players move in accordance with the rules of movement of each position, reflecting the tactical decisions of the managers and responding to the movement of all the other players is an enormous design problem. Smg users will, I think, have to be tolerant of failings for a while but it'll be worth it in the long run. An smg with a match display that is genuinely informative of the performances of players and even exciting to watch is there somewhere in the future.

[cthomer5000]

I applaud the effort, realizing it will take a while to iron things out.

The 2d engine is a huge step. You've gone from simulating the results of the game with text commentary, to actually simulating the game - breaking down all player movement, and step-by-step how 22 players played during the game. It's a huge difference.