CM 03/04 Released

[Scholes]

Over at the SI forums, where the norm lately has been to bash new things to bits, spirits are up and people have good things to say about the new release.

Anyone here pre-order? I did a few days ago from gogamer. I must say, I chose CM over FOF... for now.

[Honolulu_Blue]

I pre-ordered it off of Amazon.co.uk. Should arrive sometime early to mid next week. I took the plunge and bought both. I am really enjoying my FOF2004 career right now. I reckon CM 03/04 will sit for a bit. I will wait for it to get patched up once or twice and then take the mighty plunge.

Definitely excited by it.

[Calis]

Ughh, too many games out right now or coming out.

I hate to say it, but I think CM will have to wait, I feel dirty for saying that.

[ice4277]

Originally posted by Calis
Ughh, too many games out right now or coming out.

I hate to say it, but I think CM will have to wait, I feel dirty for saying that.

Agreed, this is the first time in about four years I have not pre-ordered a copy of a new CM. I think it looks absolutely superb, but, there are a bunch of other games I want to play, and I don't have a ton of time to play them. CM would eat into that time so much that I am putting it on the back burner for the time being.

[FrogMan]

Before any announcement of FOF2004, I was really looking forward to buy CM03/04 as my first version of CM ever. Now that I have FOF, trying to find time to play it and every little minute I get is so fun, I find myself pushing back my buying of CM... Sorry Marc...

FM

[rufusjonz]

where to order it online that ships to the US?

[rufusjonz]

dola, gogamer.com is showing out of stock -- anywhere else?

[bamcgee]

I got mine from gameplay.co.uk.

[cartman]

If folks in the US are having trouble ordering it, let me know. I'm flying back on Dec. 20th, and can bring back a few copies. Think of it as a nice Christmas present for yourself... :D

[Godzilla Blitz]

Gogamer most likely just hasn't gotten CM in yet. They sell the European imported version, so it's got to get to them first. I believe their website said available from the 25th.

For those that have waded through the SI boards, have the problems with CM4 been addressed (the lack of stadium expansion, the positioning bug, etc.)? Have any new show stoppers arisen?

[ice4277]

www.reserve.co.uk

I've ordered from here four times and have been happy with the service each time. Highly recommended. Oh and whatever you do stay away from Gameplay.

[Chief Rum]

I have been following along with CM03/04, as I have been doing, but I stand by what I said when I got burned by CM4.

I am not buying this until I know it's working and in quality shape.

So I will be earnestly looking forward to anyone's reviews and watching for what kind of bugs need to be squashed.

I am also going to be wathing for any of the mod or database hackers over there who might be willing to change the Ecuadoran league to the MLS or whatever. :)

Or at the very least get American players into the game. Ugh. Stupid Eidos.

CR

[Karim]

Here, here, Chief. I'm really patient on the latest games. I'll wait for a FOF2004 patch or two, TPF being released and dissected, and a thorough analysis of CM03/04.

The only game that I'll buy sight unseen will be EHM:FE.

[samifan24]

Originally posted by Karim
The only game that I'll buy sight unseen will be EHM:FE.

Me too. :D

[Icy]

I have been a CM fan since CM Italia 94, the last version was a big dissapoint to me, and couldn't get into any long career because the big amount of patches released. I bought FOF2k4 the relase day and have been playing it, but now that i have tested the new CM, seems FOF is going to be left for some time, only will play it on the online league i joined. This year CM, with the recent patch released the same game release day seems the sim that CM4 should have been. Time to play it now as my single player long career sim for some months i hope if not any new big bug appears.

[Godzilla Blitz]

Originally posted by Chief Rum

I am not buying this until I know it's working and in quality shape.

CR

I second that. I bought CM4 right after EP5 came out, when the initial reports were glowing. After people got a few years into their games, the problems started appearing. I wish I would have waited.

Things look good for 03/04 right now, but I am waiting to see how things look a week from now. The situation should be much clearer then.

I'm also waiting on FOF2004 as well. I want to see how the passing issue works out before buying.

I may give Fast Break College Basketball demo a try tonight while the situations with these two games clear up. That looks like a solid game: good AI, no bugs left, and a deep simulation.

[RPI-Fan]

I may give Fast Break College Basketball demo a try tonight while the situations with these two games clears up. That looks like a solid game: good AI, no bugs left, and a deep simulation.

Good play. FBCB is the most fundamentally sound game out there; there is nothing flashy about it, but it pretty much does NOTHING wrong.

[RPI-Fan]

And HR is by far the most responsive developer, bar-none.

Jim's customer service (as good as it may be) is nothing compared to HR's.

[endfanboymode]

[Godzilla Blitz]

Originally posted by RPI-Fan
Good play. FBCB is the most fundamentally sound game out there; there is nothing flashy about it, but it pretty much does NOTHING wrong.

The only thing is that I know next to nothing about basketball, and most of what I do know comes from watching the pro game. I've seen a couple of dozen games in my whole life. No clue on the details of the game. Could make for a challenge.

[RPI-Fan]

Also give FBB (the pro version) a try. It's a little more intuitive.

[John Galt]

Originally posted by Godzilla Blitz
The only thing is that I know next to nothing about basketball, and most of what I do know comes from watching the pro game. I've seen a couple of dozen games in my whole life. No clue on the details of the game. Could make for a challenge.

I second the recommendation of FBCB. It is a solid game and is challenging (read Marmel's dynasties for evidence). It could use a little more depth in places for a fuller game, but it is a straight-forward, solid engine that makes for a fun experience.

[John Galt]

Originally posted by RPI-Fan
Also give FBB (the pro version) a try. It's a little more intuitive.

I think FBB is a bit weaker (and I admit I haven't played it in a while), because the financial engine is much weaker than the recruiting engine in terms of AI difficulty.

[RPI-Fan]

I agree. I had to make some pretty harsh house rules (but I didn't disable any facets of the game, and they were easily enforced). For a beginner to basketball, though, I think FBB might be a better introduction.

[Dargone]

My copy of CM-03/04 shipped a couple of days ago so I should get it sometime next week. I'm pretty excited, although there are a lot of games out right now that I'm dying to play.

[Godzilla Blitz]

Originally posted by RPI-Fan
I agree. I had to make some pretty harsh house rules (but I didn't disable any facets of the game, and they were easily enforced). For a beginner to basketball, though, I think FBB might be a better introduction.

I actually found a used copy of the pro game at EB Games for $5.00 a while back. I think, though, that the college game interests me more at this point. I've just never really been able to get excited about pro hoops.

Didn't mean to derail the thread entirely, so...

I'd be interested to hear any impressions from people who have picked up CM 03/04.

[BreizhManu]

Should get my free copy soon (today maybe ?), don't know when SI shipped it, but since I've been testing the beta for nearly 2 months, I'm not that anxious.

[Fonzie]

Bump.

Like others, I won't be buying CM 03/04 til I'm confident it works properly, so I'm very curious as to the initial impressions folks have of this game. I'd be especially interested in hearing about the longer-term issues that plagued CM4 (the positioning bug, the stadium bug, etc.).

Thanks.

[Godzilla Blitz]

I've been wondering the same thing, and have just come back from looking over the bug boards at SI Games. From what I can tell, there are two issues at the moment that are drawing attention:

1. There are quite a few reports of player records getting messed up after the first season.

2. Lots of lowball transfer offers from the AI.

The first one concerns me and has me waiting. The second one I can live with.

I'm still going to wait a couple of weeks to see what happens when gamers get a few more years into their games. The problems with CM4 EP5 didn't show up until people had played quite a few years. So far, though, I'd have to say that things are looking very good.

By the way, GoGamer (US) has the game in stock for $40.

[Godzilla Blitz]

Dola...

Was thinking about buying CM03/04, so I spent some time over at the SI Games board tonight and ran into some big threads about speed problems with CM03/04. For many gamers, it seems to be running 2 to 3 times slower than CM4. To be fair, some gamers report no problems at all, but there appears to be quite an uproar about the speed issue. Quite a few users report that the game runs "unplayably" slow on high-end machines. Most of these users are trying to run a large database, and the standard reply is to drop down to medium. However, it does seem clear that there is a signficant drop in speed between CM03/04 as it stands now and CM4 running EP5, regardless of database size. It's hard to sort everything out, but there are quite a few people saying things like, "I ran CM4 fine with 15 leagues on a full database, and I can barely run 9 leagues on CM03/04 with the medium database." A lot of unhappy campers over there.

Apparently SI Games is working on a patch to reduce the database size and acclerate some of the processing at bottlenecks.

Below is a link to the most comprehensive thread on the topic. It goes on and on, but is probably worth a look if you are thinking about buying this year's copy.

As an aside, there are some hardcore gamers over there. One guy ran an extensive test of loadup times, complete with little graphs and tables.

Thread on Game Speed in CM03/04 (http://community.sigames.com/6/ubb.x?a=tpc&s=21019056&f=39919517&m=323104501)

Also, there is an analysis of the database of players after the game has run about 40 years. It's just one look, and it's just one league, but the results seem to suggest that this will need attention in a patch for CM03/04 to have a reliable database of players in the long term. The results of the test are on the third page (the post with all the emoticons).

Analysis of 40-year out Database of Players in CM03/04 (http://community.sigames.com/6/ubb.x?q=Y&a=tpc&s=21019056&f=39919517&m=909108501&p=1)

Bottom line: I'm going to wait a bit more. The upcoming Eidos/SI split has me wondering how much time SI will get to make it all work well.

[Ragone]

I love cm.. but what are the newest features in 03/04 as i lost track and can't seem to find info on their forum

[Fonzie]

Thanks for the information, GB. It looks like I'll be joining you on the sideline for a bit longer.

And by the way, I'm impressed that you spent enough time over there to read up on the speed situation. I go over there a fair amount, but can only tolerate reading for a few minutes at a time. That forum gives me headaches. ;)

[QuikSand]

I'm with Godzilla Blitz. Still recovering from my CM4 burn marks... I'm sitting this one out for a while.

[Godzilla Blitz]

Originally posted by Fonzie
Thanks for the information, GB. It looks like I'll be joining you on the sideline for a bit longer.

And by the way, I'm impressed that you spent enough time over there to read up on the speed situation. I go over there a fair amount, but can only tolerate reading for a few minutes at a time. That forum gives me headaches. ;)

Had too much coffee last night. Couldn't sleep. Read everything here and at Gone Gold. Needed something to do. It's not a bad board with lots of caffeine in you.

I wish I didn't find the information that I did. I like Marc Vaughn a lot and respect all that he's done for FOF and all the professionalism he brings to the job. I'm hoping they can get everything worked out.

There are a lot of people that are loving the game, and there are a lot of people for whom the problems don't matter. For me, I have a new, fast computer and want to run a bunch of leagues with all the players and have a simulation that will hold up over time. The question marks that are raised are enough to make me wait. CM01/02 is a wonderful game, and I'd rather go back to that than take a chance on the new one at the moment.

I'll probably check back over there every once in a while, and will post here if I find something new.

[Godzilla Blitz]

As a quick update...

It sounds like Marc Vaughn is aware of the issues with the regenerated players and has corrected the problem for an upcoming patch. Supposedly the game speed issue has been addressed as well.

Although there appear to be a lot of little issues with the game, the game speed and regenerated players issues look to be the only two big problems out there at this point. If both are addressed in the next patch, this might be enough for me to jump in.

No update on when the next patch will be out, but I think I read somewhere over there that it will be this month.

[Fonzie]

Good to hear, GB. And thanks again for serving as our SI Forums Liason. :)

[3ric]

Originally posted by Ragone
I love cm.. but what are the newest features in 03/04 as i lost track and can't seem to find info on their forum

<ul><li>Improved 2D graphics (weather effects, different kind of turf, offside flags)
<li>better training system, can see effects of training for every individual player (green/red arrows on attributes). Coaches rate training performance. Loading/saving of schedules.
<li>In-game printing
<li>Past meetings history
<li>Live cup draws
<li>More varied match commentary and 2D play
<li>Better scout/coach reports
<li>The keyboard shortcuts has been changed for the worse
<li>Transfer market a lot livelier
<li>More media stories
<li>Goal of the month award
<li>Can't say much about any long-term issues though
</ul>

[rufusjonz]

I'm playing CM3/4 with SMALL database size, and only 1 country running full detail, 3 others in background, and the speed is FLYING compared to other CMs, it seems.

That's been one of my biggest complaints with the series is its been getting slower processing wise, even on high end computers.

This version ROCKS so far. Darlington, Div 3, 3rd place.

[Godzilla Blitz]

Originally posted by rufusjonz
I'm playing CM3/4 with SMALL database size, and only 1 country running full detail, 3 others in background, and the speed is FLYING compared to other CMs, it seems.

That's been one of my biggest complaints with the series is its been getting slower processing wise, even on high end computers.

This version ROCKS so far. Darlington, Div 3, 3rd place.

You aren't the only one to report speed improvements. There are a number of similar posts over at SI Games. The vast majority of posts seems to be complaining about the opposite, though.

[Marc Vaughan]

The speed issue is largely down to us (possibly foolishly?) having increased the number of players loaded in 'large database' - if you run below that then the game is considerably faster.

We're further optimising the game for patch 2 to eek a bit more speed out of it.