Woodwork you believe it?
Right, where was I. Oh yes, I was playing Master League on PES2009 and loving it. That’s where I was, and that’s where I am again. Back where I belong.
I’d just won promotion from Division 2 with my COVENTRY CITY side. It was a slightly disappointing promotion in the end, if that makes any sense. I could and should have gone up as Champions, but I let it slip in the last few games and ‘only’ finished second. It still hurts slightly, even days later, with a chunk of regular daily life and some FIFA09 wedged in-between. But never mind. I’ve got a Division 1 campaign to think about now.
I’ve got 16000 salary points in the bank. My players’ salary will be around the 11000 mark. 5000 points to play with isn’t really great, but it’s not too shabby either. A few Unbelonging players, a trade-in or two, maybe another Youth player. That’ll do me.
First things first—changing my kits again. This is something I do after every season. It really makes every season feel individual. I’ve come to see that it’s crucial to the long-term playability of a career mode that it has a feeling of differentiation from game to game, and from season to season.
The next thing on the agenda was changing the difficulty level before my first pre-season friendly. I’ve played most of the past five seasons on Professional difficulty. I’m not proud of the fact—but I’m not ashamed either. PES2009 is different enough from all its predecessors to feel strangely tough at first, and it still feels tough now.
But I do have a persistent worry. I’ve called it paranoia over the past few weeks. The worry is that PES2009 will blow up in my face and turn out to be exactly what I most feared it would be: PES2008.5. That’s more or less what I thought it was in my first impressions. The past few weeks have shown me that those first impressions were false, but there’s no guarantee that they won’t become my final impressions of PES2009.
So I’m always on the lookout for signs that PES2009 is beginning to falter. That it’s beginning to morph into its idiot forebear, PES2008. I think one of those early signs would be consistent high-scoring games.
My first pre-season friendly was such a game. It ended 4-2 to me, and I thought it was a surprisingly open game for my first one on Top Player. I’ve remarked before that Professional is reputed to be harder, in some ways, than Top Player. It’s something to do with the AI sitting back more and being harder to penetrate. On Top Player, the AI flies upfield at you, leaving gaps at the back. This 4-2 pre-season friendly certainly had signs of that. I was worried.
My next friendly was against the World XI. I took a 1-0 lead with a nice goal from DAVIES. I tried to trade him for Prieto in the mid-season but I’m glad now I didn’t succeed. He’s quietly turning into an essential striker on the left side of my front 3. In this game I went on to hit the woodwork FOUR TIMES. I’ve had games on Professional where I hit the woodwork twice, but they were rare. Four times? Is this a Top Player thing, or a strange one-off? I’ll have to see.
The World XI scored a late, late heartbreaker to finish the game 1-1. I was oddly happy with that. If this game had been another high-scoring one I’d have been worried.
I only scheduled the two pre-season friendlies this time around. I don’t need the money, unlike in my last few pre-seasons. I’m impatient to get into Division 1 and see what it’s like.
My actual transfer activity was pretty muted. After renewing all my existing players’ contracts (pricey) I only had about 3000 points left to spend.
After a few efforts to get Prieto I abandoned the attempt. I tried signing a few others too—I badly need a left-sided AMF in particular—but the scout reports revealed something rather stupid: they were refusing to come to me because they didn’t want to come to Division 2…
Now is that just STUPID or what? I’ve just won promotion to Division 1, but the game still treats me as if I’m in Division 2. This is as infuriating as the old two-legged cup tie problem, where the CPU can be 3-0 up on aggregate but if you take a 1-0 lead in the second leg it’ll think it’s losing and slip into God Mode. Why do these fiddly, stupid things persist in PES, year after year?
So I ended the pre-season negotations with no new players. Unusually. There weren’t even any Youths I liked the look of. And I’ve already got enough of them anyway. I think I can play well enough with the squad I’ve got to make it to mid-season, where my #1 priority will be Prieto.
Welcome home!
I had a similar problem in the pre-season before division 1. I just couldn’t attract any players with ‘division 1 standard’ ability. There also wasn’t any decent Youths left, so I’ve had to limp into Division 1 with the same side, and hope I can pick up a few decent players in the window (I’m sure I will). Quite surprised you only played 2 pre-season games. I always play eight as they can be lucrative, especially at this stage of the master league. 5 wins and there’s a new player!
Also, what’s your policy for team training? Do you do team training every week? I do, but it’s hard to keep a fit team in pre-season. I miss the days of the training mini-games!
Grilled Seabass – I was just too impatient to get going in D1 to wait around and play pre-season games.
I miss the old ways too! PES2 wasn’t it, or PES3? Where you had to play a training session for a while until the message flashed up about ‘condition met’ or something. I remember often disliking it at the time because it took ages to load up and play it and go back again to the main menu. So maybe it wasn’t so great after all.
Nowadays I use Regulate Condition before every league game, but usually skip it if there’s a cup game in the same week.
Playing the pre-season friendlies is useful if you’re team needs to improve teamwork and to increase players’ stats too, besides the credits you earn (when you do win).
But for some players it’s much better to target-train. Especially slow players or those with very low body balance.
I still wonder whether players gain anything if you go to the team training thing, and do a little training with them. I tend to think they do improve, but I can’t prove it. Maybe I was the one who improved and I’m crediting it to the players, since I usually only practice shooting and free kicks.
I’ve experimented with the regulate condition thing, but my players get really tired, and there’s risk of injury.
Speaking of that, I’ve noticed the AI is pretty dodgy this year in that respect. When a player has an injury rating other than A, sometimes the AI will commit a vicious foul, and injure your player during a crucial game, like in the first leg of a semi.
It might seem like paranoia, but it’s happened twice to me so far, and with a key player. In one of the instances I even tried restarting, and the player was injured again when I played the same match!
Another annoyance that happens way too often is players getting “summoned to represent” in the middle of a play off.
Oh, if anyone out there is playing the PS2 version, have you noticed that sometimes when you have a throw-in deep in the opposition’s side none of your other players will approach to receive the ball?
I rarely regulate condition. Only when a player is on a big downer and I need them for a big game. I find the it tires them out too much.
I find team training really helpful though during pre-season. Players only get 2 stat points per pre-season match, whereas targeted team training boosts them 8 points per session. Over 8 weeks this is 64 points so well worth it in my opinion.
Summons to represent is really annoying. It does show on the calendar when these dates are but I never remember to check.
Adriano - I always remember you recommending the targeted training that’s possible in pre-season, but I never have actually gone ahead and done it.
As for training in the here and now, I never do it, although I will soon have to get on the training ground and finally learn how to score a proper free kick. I haven’t scored one yet, which is disgraceful. I haven’t had much success with free kicks since PES5 (!), which simply isn’t good enough.
Re. throw-ins, they’re slightly dodgy on the next-gen version too, with often just one player offering for the throw-in (and he’s often closely marked). Never had NO players coming for it though.
Grilled Seabass – Regulate condition works in your favour if you have a large enough squad. Being able to select and deselect the players you want to regulate helps, as you can nurse a few key players in advance of key games. I tend to just regulate ‘em all though…
I’m coming to realise how unsubtly I play this game in a number of ways. No pre-season friendlies, no targeted training, regulating conditions left right and centre…
if anyone is playing fifa on this site on the ps3,maybe we should start up a league ?
seems we all got something in common with the single player game,and dont like to venture on line much cos its generally poo.
dunno man,could be a laff.im online most nights after 1900 hours.
i;ll check back to see if anyone is up for it.
yehmate – I’m on PS3 and a FIFA09 league is definitely going to happen with a few people – but not till February or so, and then it’ll be all-Manual only!
You’ll be more than welcome to join up, as will anyone else reading this.
The reason it’s going to be February is that it’s then that the keenest Manual FIFA09 player, heraldo, gets back from work (he works really long shifts).
(And I’m going to ‘cheat’ and teach myself how to play all-Manual with the Pro camera by then. Pro is the best camera for Manual (for shooting especially) and using it will make me da best in the league. Sssssh…)