alf
Registered User
So I’ve been playing BAL mode quite a bit and becoming more and more irritated by the niggles that plague the game. Konami have been making PES/ISS for many years but this still seem to get the basics wrong, and when I say basics, I mean the basics of football. This left me wondering if anyone at Konami had ever actually played the beautiful game? I’m no professional player but I’ve played in my fair share of amateur leagues and so think I’ve a decent understanding of the game. So, I decide to write down the niggles when they occurred...I got bored, and ran out of paper, quite quickly. I placed them in two groups; Game flaws and Mode flaws. Here’s what I came up with.
Game flaws:
1) Goal keepers never distribute the ball quickly, even when there’s an obvious counter attack on and it’s your strategy. ‘Wake up!’
2) Keepers rarely tip the ball over or wide of the cross bar. They bundle back into the middle for a tap in.
3) Keepers hardly ever come for crosses, they seem routed to the spot for corners. Players like Cech should command their box and Fabianski should come flapping.
4) A really annoying one that happens every time is when the ball is clearly going out for a throw for your team; one of your players tries to control it and knocks it out. Every time I scream at the TV, ‘You can’t control a toffee apple mate, leave it alone!’
5) When the AI is near the touchline they seem intent on turning inside and into trouble instead of ‘safety first’ and pumping it down the line. Even a pass back to the Keeper for him to kick it would do but no. I can’t say I’ve seen too many dog cack defenders trying to turn back inside and dribble past Messi? ‘Just boot it!’
6) Another annoying flaw is when you play a pass to a certain player but it ends up going closer to a different team mate but he seems completely uninterested in the ball and stands a watches like it’s some kind of drug induced hallucination, leaving the opposition to casually walk over and intercept. ‘Oh, for flips sake!’
7) Throw-ins get my goat too. You force the defender to make a clearance into touch, which they do on weird occasions when a clearance up field is easier, and you think ‘great, we’ll box them in’. No, your team mates stand 20 yards off them and let them toss the ball to feet and pass their way out.
8) This is similar to the goal kicks. Forwards retreat to the half way line allowing the Keeper to roll it out to the defender.
9) When the Keeper kicks the ball up field you have to run to the half way line and make sure you let the defender get goal side or you’ve no chance of winning the header. If you wait a nanosecond after the kick, your player becomes super glued to the pitch and lets the defender walk in front and head it clear. ‘I want to jostle damn you!’
10) Free kicks are for the most part rubbish. Worst still are free kicks that central and too far out to shoot. Your team mate believes you are the fastest man in the world and if he plays it into a position 20 yards behind the last man you will be able to stay onside and catch it before it sails 40 yards wide of the far post. ‘Dream on!’
11) When you call for the ball your team mate will look to pass to you...always, even when he’s taken 10 touches and your now marked by two burly centre backs. An interception is now inevitable.
12) When a team mate finally gets to the by-line you get yourself into a great position for the square ball tap in but he seems content in staying out there...maybe he’s flirting with someone in the crowd? He eventually passes the ball back and forth and is ready to deliver but then decides to shoot into the near post. ‘You ball greedy...!’
13) A cleared corner lands at the feet of your midfield dynamo, what will he do? Knock it back out wide the corner taker who is now wide open? Help it back in so your defenders can battle for it? No, he tries some kind of crazy scissor kick and balloons it into orbit. ‘Next time I’m sure he’ll learn and pass it wide...oh. no he’s done it again.’
14) When you get a split second chance to just toe pock it in, my player decides to take a touch as he thinks he’s got all the time in the world, and so he gets tackled and the chance is gone. ‘Muppet’.
15) Does anyone know the offside rule? Konami don’t or is that the assistants in PES don’t. I was flattened and was taking my usual nap in the box rather than jumping back up. The ball was played to my team mate who had found himself in space but then I was flagged offside? Surely I wasn’t interfering with play as I was nowhere near the play.
16) I know referees get decisions wrong but ever tackle results in a foul even when the ball is clearly played. The commentator then shows his disgust at the filthy challenge while we watch the replay of the textbook sliding tackle.
17) Staying on tackles, it seems if you’re good at tackling you get booked but if you’re really bad at tackling and floor the opponent, a good 10 seconds after the ball has gone, you get nothing but a good feeling in your stomach that you’ve just got away with assault.
18) One thing that really annoys me is when you’re attacking and your midfielders charge forward, pass you and stand beside the back four. As the sole striker, you know have nowhere to go; there’s no space and when your team mates lose possession, there’s no midfield to win it back. ‘Do all midfielders secretly want to play up front’.
19) So I’m the lone striker, I’m 175cm tall and we are defending a corner. The manager/game decides I should track back and stand on the edge of my own box, leaving no one near the opposition half? If we were defending a one goal lead then maybe this would be acceptable but when we’re losing? ‘Come on Konami, please pick up a book on tactics or something’.
20) There’s a lack of urgency when chasing a goal. Defenders seem happy to pass the ball about when surely they should be launching forward...in fact they should get themselves up front!
21) When a player takes a tumble he seems happy to take a breather rather than jumping up and trying to win the ball back. Players should try and make a tackle even when on the deck; a bit of battling wouldn’t go a miss.
22) Sometimes a player gets himself between the opposition and the ball but somehow doesn’t retain possession. The opposition player still has the ball despite appearing to lose it. ‘This just leaves me baffled?’
23) It seems to me that almost every player in the game is happy to play the same way and play the same balls. No matter who they are they knock the ball about with confidence and try and dribble anywhere on the pitch. I want to see average players playing percentage balls down the line and into the corners. I’ll expand this gripe by saying that there is little to none individuality in the game with the exception of the big players like Messi, who will dribble a lot. Players like Gattuso through to Cattermole should pick up yellow cards for fun. Ronaldo should fall over when you breathe on him and so on.
Mode flaws:
1) My first gripe in this section; every game plays the same way. It doesn’t seem to matter who you’re playing, with the exception of a few. The defenders knock the ball about with confidence and every team seems to play a possession game, no matter what the strategy. Stoke should knock the ball long, Arsenal should pass the ball for fun. There’s not enough chances in the games; very rarely see high scoring games and end to end attacking. ‘It’s just not fun to play the same game over and over’.
2) Big games should see more red and yellow cars and injuries are pretty much none existent. How many teams have no injuries throughout the whole season? ‘I think Konami have the best physio’s in the world?’
3) The different leagues should play differently. Premiership should be fast and frantic, Italian should be slow and tactical and Spanish should have flair and diving.
4) Tactics play a major part of football but Konami’s managers are a bit dense when it comes to this. When winning he’ll reshuffle and throw on another striker. He’ll tell you before a game that we’re playing a long ball tactic but the defenders never send it long.
5) The managers love rotation in PES. Why does he insist on changing at least 3 players every game, even when winning the previous match...not because of injuries because there aren’t any and not because of suspensions because no one gets booked. Keepers are randomly dropped and the back four changes every game. Players are played out of position for no reason. A typical example is when I was at Sunderland as a striker and we needed a goal. I was our top scorer and playing quite well. He brought on Berg to partner me but he dragged me off after 70 minutes and brought on Anton Ferdinand to play up front? He’d already played as an attacking midfielder earlier in the season. ‘I think there are bribes going on?’
6) Subs always happened after 60 minutes and usually again after 70.
7) The manager will set out his tactics, like so an so being the key player to target and then 90 seconds into the game he will change then?
8) All matches take place on the same day.
9) Cup games are played on neutral grounds which you should be able to change and I played the FA cup final during midweek and in March. ‘Come on Konami, surely you could just google the FA cup to see it’s the end of season game?’
10) Qualifying matches for the international tournaments all take place in the same month and in small 4 team groups, despite playing about 10 needless international friendlies during the season. Why so few international teams too? I want to see some smaller nations in the qualifying.
11) Divisions need 2nd tiers. In BAL, there are no desperate relegation games and it would be good to sign for a big club and be loaned out to a lower league team for match experience.
12) International teams rarely change; Scholes is playing for England, as is Cole, Lampard, Gerrard, Terry and few others who are now well into their 30’s. There are no new faces at all except me.
13) Regenerated players with familiar names is just stupid. I don’t want to see a 17 year old midfielder named Giggs, surely they can install a random name generator or an option to change it yourself.
14) Transfers are barmy, here are few examples I’ve noticed. Barcelona sold Xavi and Iniesta. Julio Cesar went to Bolton and teams sell all their forwards and have 10 centre midfielders. ‘It’s just bananas’.
15) Finally I’ll leave you with the story of my first 2 seasons in BAL. I started as a 17 year old striker and signed for a team in the Pes League. I got my chance after a few weeks and by the end of the season I was top scorer and made my England debut. I stayed with the same team and won the league the following season finishing top scorer again. I won the European Championships with England, scoring in every game and being named as the most valuable player, top scorer and in the team of the tournament. The offers came in from the likes of Getafe, Willem II and Sunderland. ‘Hang on...18 year old wins everything at international tournament and the best offer is Sunderland?’ What’s worse is Sunderland only gave me a 40% chance of playing!
Please, please Konami, read a book about football and make some changes.
Game flaws:
1) Goal keepers never distribute the ball quickly, even when there’s an obvious counter attack on and it’s your strategy. ‘Wake up!’
2) Keepers rarely tip the ball over or wide of the cross bar. They bundle back into the middle for a tap in.
3) Keepers hardly ever come for crosses, they seem routed to the spot for corners. Players like Cech should command their box and Fabianski should come flapping.
4) A really annoying one that happens every time is when the ball is clearly going out for a throw for your team; one of your players tries to control it and knocks it out. Every time I scream at the TV, ‘You can’t control a toffee apple mate, leave it alone!’
5) When the AI is near the touchline they seem intent on turning inside and into trouble instead of ‘safety first’ and pumping it down the line. Even a pass back to the Keeper for him to kick it would do but no. I can’t say I’ve seen too many dog cack defenders trying to turn back inside and dribble past Messi? ‘Just boot it!’
6) Another annoying flaw is when you play a pass to a certain player but it ends up going closer to a different team mate but he seems completely uninterested in the ball and stands a watches like it’s some kind of drug induced hallucination, leaving the opposition to casually walk over and intercept. ‘Oh, for flips sake!’
7) Throw-ins get my goat too. You force the defender to make a clearance into touch, which they do on weird occasions when a clearance up field is easier, and you think ‘great, we’ll box them in’. No, your team mates stand 20 yards off them and let them toss the ball to feet and pass their way out.
8) This is similar to the goal kicks. Forwards retreat to the half way line allowing the Keeper to roll it out to the defender.
9) When the Keeper kicks the ball up field you have to run to the half way line and make sure you let the defender get goal side or you’ve no chance of winning the header. If you wait a nanosecond after the kick, your player becomes super glued to the pitch and lets the defender walk in front and head it clear. ‘I want to jostle damn you!’
10) Free kicks are for the most part rubbish. Worst still are free kicks that central and too far out to shoot. Your team mate believes you are the fastest man in the world and if he plays it into a position 20 yards behind the last man you will be able to stay onside and catch it before it sails 40 yards wide of the far post. ‘Dream on!’
11) When you call for the ball your team mate will look to pass to you...always, even when he’s taken 10 touches and your now marked by two burly centre backs. An interception is now inevitable.
12) When a team mate finally gets to the by-line you get yourself into a great position for the square ball tap in but he seems content in staying out there...maybe he’s flirting with someone in the crowd? He eventually passes the ball back and forth and is ready to deliver but then decides to shoot into the near post. ‘You ball greedy...!’
13) A cleared corner lands at the feet of your midfield dynamo, what will he do? Knock it back out wide the corner taker who is now wide open? Help it back in so your defenders can battle for it? No, he tries some kind of crazy scissor kick and balloons it into orbit. ‘Next time I’m sure he’ll learn and pass it wide...oh. no he’s done it again.’
14) When you get a split second chance to just toe pock it in, my player decides to take a touch as he thinks he’s got all the time in the world, and so he gets tackled and the chance is gone. ‘Muppet’.
15) Does anyone know the offside rule? Konami don’t or is that the assistants in PES don’t. I was flattened and was taking my usual nap in the box rather than jumping back up. The ball was played to my team mate who had found himself in space but then I was flagged offside? Surely I wasn’t interfering with play as I was nowhere near the play.
16) I know referees get decisions wrong but ever tackle results in a foul even when the ball is clearly played. The commentator then shows his disgust at the filthy challenge while we watch the replay of the textbook sliding tackle.
17) Staying on tackles, it seems if you’re good at tackling you get booked but if you’re really bad at tackling and floor the opponent, a good 10 seconds after the ball has gone, you get nothing but a good feeling in your stomach that you’ve just got away with assault.
18) One thing that really annoys me is when you’re attacking and your midfielders charge forward, pass you and stand beside the back four. As the sole striker, you know have nowhere to go; there’s no space and when your team mates lose possession, there’s no midfield to win it back. ‘Do all midfielders secretly want to play up front’.
19) So I’m the lone striker, I’m 175cm tall and we are defending a corner. The manager/game decides I should track back and stand on the edge of my own box, leaving no one near the opposition half? If we were defending a one goal lead then maybe this would be acceptable but when we’re losing? ‘Come on Konami, please pick up a book on tactics or something’.
20) There’s a lack of urgency when chasing a goal. Defenders seem happy to pass the ball about when surely they should be launching forward...in fact they should get themselves up front!
21) When a player takes a tumble he seems happy to take a breather rather than jumping up and trying to win the ball back. Players should try and make a tackle even when on the deck; a bit of battling wouldn’t go a miss.
22) Sometimes a player gets himself between the opposition and the ball but somehow doesn’t retain possession. The opposition player still has the ball despite appearing to lose it. ‘This just leaves me baffled?’
23) It seems to me that almost every player in the game is happy to play the same way and play the same balls. No matter who they are they knock the ball about with confidence and try and dribble anywhere on the pitch. I want to see average players playing percentage balls down the line and into the corners. I’ll expand this gripe by saying that there is little to none individuality in the game with the exception of the big players like Messi, who will dribble a lot. Players like Gattuso through to Cattermole should pick up yellow cards for fun. Ronaldo should fall over when you breathe on him and so on.
Mode flaws:
1) My first gripe in this section; every game plays the same way. It doesn’t seem to matter who you’re playing, with the exception of a few. The defenders knock the ball about with confidence and every team seems to play a possession game, no matter what the strategy. Stoke should knock the ball long, Arsenal should pass the ball for fun. There’s not enough chances in the games; very rarely see high scoring games and end to end attacking. ‘It’s just not fun to play the same game over and over’.
2) Big games should see more red and yellow cars and injuries are pretty much none existent. How many teams have no injuries throughout the whole season? ‘I think Konami have the best physio’s in the world?’
3) The different leagues should play differently. Premiership should be fast and frantic, Italian should be slow and tactical and Spanish should have flair and diving.
4) Tactics play a major part of football but Konami’s managers are a bit dense when it comes to this. When winning he’ll reshuffle and throw on another striker. He’ll tell you before a game that we’re playing a long ball tactic but the defenders never send it long.
5) The managers love rotation in PES. Why does he insist on changing at least 3 players every game, even when winning the previous match...not because of injuries because there aren’t any and not because of suspensions because no one gets booked. Keepers are randomly dropped and the back four changes every game. Players are played out of position for no reason. A typical example is when I was at Sunderland as a striker and we needed a goal. I was our top scorer and playing quite well. He brought on Berg to partner me but he dragged me off after 70 minutes and brought on Anton Ferdinand to play up front? He’d already played as an attacking midfielder earlier in the season. ‘I think there are bribes going on?’
6) Subs always happened after 60 minutes and usually again after 70.
7) The manager will set out his tactics, like so an so being the key player to target and then 90 seconds into the game he will change then?
8) All matches take place on the same day.
9) Cup games are played on neutral grounds which you should be able to change and I played the FA cup final during midweek and in March. ‘Come on Konami, surely you could just google the FA cup to see it’s the end of season game?’
10) Qualifying matches for the international tournaments all take place in the same month and in small 4 team groups, despite playing about 10 needless international friendlies during the season. Why so few international teams too? I want to see some smaller nations in the qualifying.
11) Divisions need 2nd tiers. In BAL, there are no desperate relegation games and it would be good to sign for a big club and be loaned out to a lower league team for match experience.
12) International teams rarely change; Scholes is playing for England, as is Cole, Lampard, Gerrard, Terry and few others who are now well into their 30’s. There are no new faces at all except me.
13) Regenerated players with familiar names is just stupid. I don’t want to see a 17 year old midfielder named Giggs, surely they can install a random name generator or an option to change it yourself.
14) Transfers are barmy, here are few examples I’ve noticed. Barcelona sold Xavi and Iniesta. Julio Cesar went to Bolton and teams sell all their forwards and have 10 centre midfielders. ‘It’s just bananas’.
15) Finally I’ll leave you with the story of my first 2 seasons in BAL. I started as a 17 year old striker and signed for a team in the Pes League. I got my chance after a few weeks and by the end of the season I was top scorer and made my England debut. I stayed with the same team and won the league the following season finishing top scorer again. I won the European Championships with England, scoring in every game and being named as the most valuable player, top scorer and in the team of the tournament. The offers came in from the likes of Getafe, Willem II and Sunderland. ‘Hang on...18 year old wins everything at international tournament and the best offer is Sunderland?’ What’s worse is Sunderland only gave me a 40% chance of playing!
Please, please Konami, read a book about football and make some changes.
