Recoba the moon
I was 3-1 up on aggregate going into the second leg of the D2 Cup semi final against Spartak Moscow. Within 30 minutes of kickoff I was 2-0 up (5-1 on aggregate).
Both of my goals were scored by Recoba from medium-range in an utterly startling first-half performance. Most startling of all was that he was even on the pitch…
Recoba very rarely actually plays a game. He’s just never fit. Maybe one game in six, on average, he’ll be fit enough to play—but otherwise? Forget it.
He’s the most innately unfit player in the game. I have no idea what he’s like in real life, but in PES2008 he either has a grey form arrow or his stamina is so feeble as to make it not worth picking him. He was exactly the same in PES5, so I knew what I was letting myself in for.
Recoba’s brace made the score 5-1 to me on aggregate, and with two away goals to boot. This meant that Spartak would have to score five goals without reply to win the semi-final.
The remainder of the game was farcical. It was the usual thing. Missed tackles, stumbles, stray passes. My fastest and freshest players visibly being slowed down as I chased for loose balls that I would have easily got to if the score was 0-0. Micro-scripting, in all its anti-glory.
Spartak scored three goals in quick succession just after half time, making it 3-2 to them on the day, and 5-4 to me on aggregate. There were still twenty or so minutes of the game left for them to get the two goals they needed to win, and boy did they try. They didn’t get get them, and I went through to the Final, but I was still mightily annoyed.
For two thirds of the game, after scoring my two early goals, I hadn’t been allowed to play at all.
Some PES players dislike talk about scripting, either because they disbelieve in its existence or they simply regard it as a necessary evil. I’m in the latter camp, but I still like to talk (and complain, ad infinitum) about it. For me it’s one of the joys of being a PES fan.
Scripting sceptics contend that what we are seeing is, in fact, realistic. They say that the suddenly supercharged CPU teams are only reproducing the strenuous efforts that a real-life team will make to get back into a game when behind.
This argument would be persuasive to me, but for one thing: What about the strenuous efforts that the real-life winning team will make to protect its lead? I’ve never seen a slow pass to a defender in open space randomly bounce off his calf into the path of a striker, or a fresh, speedy winger suddenly lose the ability to run with the ball just because their team is winning.
The nearest parallel I can think of is from racing games like Gran Turismo, where if you are behind you can always catch up to the car(s) in front; and if you are ahead the cars behind can always catch up to you. The game is just coded that way. Ditto PES. Sometimes, of course, you can be too far ahead in both games for anyone to catch you. But the underlying ‘auto-catchup’ mechanic is there nevertheless.
Scripting is a reality in PES and has been very much in-your-face and blithely unashamed about it for the past couple of versions. And yet the denials keep coming from Konami Towers. Who do you think you are kidding, Mr Seabass? (That was going to be the title of today’s post, but in the end I went with the usual tabloid-style pun.)
—————————
Back in the League I took on Parma at home and then Benfica away. Parma turned me over 1-2. I had two players sent off—Gatti and Pjinatnigh—but gave myself hope late on with this goal from Caracciolo:
Against Benfica I ended up drawing 3-3 despite being 2-0 and 3-1 up at various stages. This time I felt that I was just sloppy in defence rather than the victim of any kind of scripting. Caracciolo got two of my goals, Altintop the third. Those two are a great partnership up front.
And then it was the eve of the D2 Cup Final. My opponents are Sampdoria. It’s the biggest game of my season and of my Singers FC career so far. There are points and prestige at stake. If I win I should get that team ranking up to ‘C’ and be able to sign some better players for next season’s big promotion push.
I was all set to play the match, but late in the game against Benfica I’d seen a pop-up system message from my PlayStation3.
My wireless controller is almost out of juice and must be recharged. The console is too far away from where I sit for me to comfortably plug in the charging cable and play on from my usual reclining position on the bed. I’d have to stand up and play in the middle of the room. I’m not going to do that, so… it’s a roll-over.
When I moved back to Kansas and started supporting the Wizards (Kansas...
Hi
After some time spent with PES 2008 I can advice you two things:
1. forget master league, and you will enjoy it
2. play against people, and you will LOVE IT
hi adam – I’ve spent some time with PES2008 and I see what you’re saying. It has struck me all this year that PES2008 is a game that seems to have been optimised for multiplayer. On the rare occasions I’ve had a playable game online, it’s been fast and fun a lot of the time.
But online is broken and will almost certainly never be fixed. And people online—90% of them—aren’t so much interested in playing PES as playing Barcelona and simply running at you with their star men. Don’t worry, I can cope with that ‘tactic’ (most of the time) but the kind of game that it typically becomes bores me to death.
I’ve been playing ISS/PES for 9 years now and Master League has gradually emerged for me as the most important game mode in the most important game franchise I’ve ever played. Despite its shortcomings this year I am still enjoying it. The House Rules have helped.
‘Greg’ I have no idea how you play but 22 red cards in 35 games and an average of more than 1 yellow a game is amazing.
I haven’t had 22 red cards in over a years worth of PES. (Granted I don’t play as many games you but still a good few seasons worth). Its quite worrying, maybe its a bonus because your players get to rest when they’d normally play another game but if I got so many red cards so often I’d be infuriated.
I’m not one to tell someone how to do anything but one too many moments of ‘passion’?
Paul – my red cards are usually a reflection of two things: what kinds of players I’ve got, and whether or not I’ve been playing PES2008 and *no other* football game.
When I have the Defaults, or mainly Defaults and a few good players, I’ll tend to try to defend as I would with a team of good players, which the Defaults can’t do. Lacking that extra yard of pace they can’t get properly into position to make the challenges that I still try to make, and draw yellows ad reds for.
With good players I can make those challenges and not get punished.
If I’ve been messing around with other football games, particularly FIFA08 with its more realistic bookings rules, I’ll try to play PES2008 the same way with disastrous results.
You also have to bear in mind that the refs in PES2008 (next-gen) are probably the fussiest, harshest refs we’ve ever seen in a PES game. They’re nothing like the PES6 refs (which were realistic and never auto-red-carded you for any kind of tackle from behind anywhere on the pitch).
My bookings and red cards are starting to come down now as I’ve started to play just PES2008 and nothing else, and as I’ve started to get good players. I always play with ‘passion’ but I don’t go around trying to clog everyone on the park when I haven’t got the ball. I think I get so anxious to get the ball back sometimes and it costs me.
Oddly, in the 30-or-so games I’ve played online I’ve never had a red card, but plenty of my opponents have. I play differently against humans. I stand off more and play a containing game. Against the CPU I think it’s my right to have the ball!
Ah, scripting.
It’s not only the heavy-handedness, but the scripting can appear in such random or meaningless ways.
Four games from the end of the season, you play a mid-table team with nothing to play for and it’s HAAAARD. Then, the last game of the season as you’re playing the #1 side *for the championship*, and they roll over with a puff and a whimper.
Le huh?
ck – I’ve had the time and opportunity in the past day or two to test out macro-scripting for myself. On the back of a few wins I started to sense that PES2008 would bring my run to a halt by force, so I started making separate saves in anticipation. Sure enough I played a ‘dodgy’ game, and went back to the old save to see if macro-scripting would show itself to me in all its glory. I’ll be posting about that sometime next week….
(NB: I used the old save, the one where I had lost the game, to continue with my ML once the experiment was over.)