Category Archives: league table

The Queen Is Red

  By not-Greg | May 17, 2013 - 12:00 | , ,
23 Comments

PESJP2013 menu

I’ve played another few matches in my maiden Master League season as Anderlecht in Serie B in the Dutch Eredivisie in the patched PES2013 known as PESJP using Jenkeys patch with the ball-weight adjusted up by 10% and referee strictness raised by the same amount. Come on, keep up.

It’s pretty good. I’m waiting for it to seem not-good. To semi-proudly denounce it and football gaming and run screaming back to my strategy games and my books.

Hasn’t happened so far.

PESJP2013 picking up reds

The big change is the referee strictness. It really forces you to play properly and not just go sliding around and double-X-tapping with gleeful abandon. I haven’t finished a single match so far with 11 men. Most of them I have finished with 10 men. I’ve finished one with 9 men. And I finished one match with 8 men—was very pleased to get a draw out of that one.

Here’s some random footage from a few games in action. The main point of interest here is the camera I’m using. It’s a modified Sideline camera with more of an angle on the goal, and slightly pulled back too. The slight chance I make on the breakaway right at the end showcases the heavier ball mechanics, I think. It is harder now to dig the ball out from feet and get that extra ‘whip’ on it.

Thumbs up all round for PESJP2013. This one’s going to last. The referee strictness setting will see to that if nothing else. Playing every game with at least one fewer player than the CPU is another layer of difficulty in its own right.

PESJP2013 after 4

Why is it always Sparta Praha

  By not-Greg | May 15, 2013 - 12:00 | , ,
47 Comments

PESJP2013 ML screen

I’ve begun Master League in PESJP2013. New post-match screen above. That was a Training match on Professional, just to ease myself in. Why is the pre-season opponent always Sparta Praha?

This will be a very text-light and picture-heavy post. I played this morning, and played a few more games than anticipated.

PESJP2013, with my custom settings and custom camera (as seen below), is just so damned good.

PESJP2013-camera

I have started as Anderlecht, original squad, in the Eredivisie. The Italian Serie B is the Division 2. I cannot be arsed with realism. Give me a fantasy world of my own any day. As the great Homer Simpson put it: Every day, the real world just gets fainter and fainter.

First order of business is winnowing the squad down to manageable levels. I hate having a squad of too many.

PESJP2013 before the game

Player development is ON. I’m using a different stats database—the Matrix one, which I believe is more realistic. Yes, that contradicts my anti-realist crowing just above. And?!

PESJP2013-BBC

The various tweaks and nudges of the PESJP patch continue to delight. The novelty is a long way from wearing off.

My ball-weight and referee-strictness adjustments continue to impress me too. It’s not a wildly different game from vanilla PES2013 that I’m playing here, but it’s just different enough to make it intriguing. Not being able to slide-tackle with carefree abandon changes everything fundamentally.

Reggina were my first opponents in the league season proper. I put it up to Top Player for this game. Went behind early and thought, uh-oh. But soon stormed back to a 3-1 victory. And got a player sent off for a tackle that wouldn’t even have been a yellow on vanilla.

The current table:

PESJP2013 ML after 1

With one thing and another, my footy gaming levels are still criminally low. No time.

But for the first time in months, I want to play more than I can. This is frustrating, because I simply can’t find the time—but it’s also reassuring. The old passion hasn’t gone away for good after all.

Six and the Tenacity

  By not-Greg | May 3, 2013 - 12:00 | , , ,
37 Comments

PES5 after 9 2013

Six matches of PES5(PC) this morning constituted my longest single session of footy gaming for many weeks. On the way back? Possibly.

It’s been about a month since the PS3 was even switched on.  I don’t miss it. It’s got one of those perfect layers of dust on it now that’s like a layer of fresh-fallen snow on a pavement. It’d almost be a shame to spoil it.

I beat Blackburn 2-0. Then I thumped Arsenal 3-0, with some well-worked goals finished stylishly by my front two of Aquilani and Schwarz. Camacho got a scrambled late third.

I followed this up with a 2-2 draw at Spurs. Next was a scruffy 1-0 win over Bolton, complete with this goal from the timeless, peerless Mathieu:

That shows tenacity from the legend, typical of him—and also the trademark PES5 ‘chop’ finish across the keeper and in off the post. OK, it’s in plenty of other PES editions too, but the ‘chop’ finish is almost the quintessence of PES5 to me.

After that I met Liverpool in the first leg of the D1 Cup—a dour 0-0. Then Everton back in the League—another dour 0-0. I felt the hand of PES here, putting a dampener on things. Nothing I tried really worked.

Civ V May 2013

Breaking Bad season 3 is slow to get going. In Civilization V I’m playing as Japan on a real-Earth map in South America. I tried playing Crusader Kings 2 again and walked right into a succession crisis. I don’t understand this game. Need to read the manual.

Life is… all right, really. I’ll get back on the horse when I’m good and ready to. If that point never returns, so be it.

3am shadow

  By not-Greg | April 29, 2013 - 12:00 | ,
57 Comments

PES5 after 7

I was up until 3am last night watching the gripping end of season 2 of Breaking Bad. I’m reading a book this morning, from which I’ve just broken off to write today’s post. Football gaming is quite a way down on the to-do list these days.

Fortunately for the blog, I played a couple of matches of PES5(PC) yesterday morning.

As ever, ’twas a pleasure. PES5 has aged, no question, but it weirdly stands up. Its integrity as a game—as a solid, reputable, fully credentialled game of computer football—stands the test of time. Others have come close, but for me PES5′s status as The Best Ever is unimpeachable.

Perhaps if I was still playing for hours every day I might come to a different view, who knows.

This more casual approach is suiting me fine. I’m still fascinated by what feels like a process of disengagement from gaming in general. I doubt I’ll ever play an FPS again.

Last time, I was fretting about my 4-2-2-2 formation, adapted from PES2012/13, not really working out in PES5.

I finally pushed my deep-lying twosome further forward. Mathieu and Camacho now sit on the halfway line, calling the shots. Suddenly I’m much more potent up front, and there’s little difference to defending.

Won 1-0. Lost 0-1. The table is at the top.

This week, I will at some point fully install PES2013(PC) with the latest super-duper custom patch from Jenkey, and give it a play.

I’m more than a little reluctant, as I’m on a cushy routine with PES5 and don’t want to break the spell. But my curiosity is outweighing my reluctance. I might have done this in time for Wednesday’s post, but if not, Friday for sure.