Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

[BL8001]

So sayeth the words of nick channon.

Question posed to him in the latest oxm:
You said the emotions are an aesthetic that won't affect gameplay. What's the thinking behind that?

His response:
What's really important to us is the connection you have with the game and the team. If the players don't react as they would in the real world, you don't get that same connection. We didn't want to change the gameplay, because that could lead to exploits or become frustrating. Anytime you start changing gameplay you have to be careful, and we didn't want to do that with this feature this year. We are also limiting the reactions you will see. You'll see reactions in the real world that you're not going to see here.


So this means you can miss 5 sitters in the first half and your team mate will shake his head in disbelief and nothing happens. You can also slide tackle the CPU all game long and they will get pissy but nothing happens.

Hearing all the words he has said I know 2 things for sure about fifa 15.

1. The CPU will park the bus, expect this to happen way too often.
2. Messi will only use his left foot.

Why do they keep saying these two things over and over again.

[Blue12]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

I was really hoping it would have at least a tempory impact on players ratings. I thought this would be a good way to make each match feel different and unique. I do understand the reasoning though, because messing with the gameplay too much can throw everything out of place. I think if they tuned this properly, it would go a long way in making each match feel different, further affect stragety, and increase the overall replay value of the game.

[orion523]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

I'm actually glad they used their heads with this and didn't go overboard like they do with some new features. I've heard several interviews with Nick and he was quite forthright on the issue, saying that the dev team didn't feel that having emotion affect ratings was the way to go this year because they couldn't find a meaningful way to balance it. And quite frankly, the crying that would go on by those penalized by the emotion engine would be incessant. So as it stands the emotion engine adds a bit of drama/immersion to the game without intruding on gameplay, I'm OK with that.

[Hutton]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

I wish the new (highly touted) "Emotion" engine had some type of impact on the game other than simply aesthetic.

It could have been as simple as an On/Off option, or a slider to control how much effect is applied to ratings/momentum/aggression etc. Yes, it's very cool that we get a more visually realistic experience, but I was just hoping for so much more.

[Cardot]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

I wish the new (highly touted) "Emotion" engine had some type of impact on the game other than simply aesthetic.

Personally, I have never been a fan of sports video games tyring to capture intangibles such as emotion, momentum, chemistry, hot/cold streaks etc.

How would you measure it in real life? To my knowledge, statistics are not kept for each player, split based upon thier emotional state. And if you can't measure it, how do you apply an alogarithim to it?

[Hutton]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

Personally, I have never been a fan of sports video games tyring to capture intangibles such as emotion, momentum, chemistry, hot/cold streaks etc.

How would you measure it in real life? To my knowledge, statistics are not kept for each player, split based upon thier emotional state. And if you can't measure it, how do you apply an alogarithim to it?

That's the beauty of "emotion" in a sporting event, since it's not a tangible effect that can be measured makes it something that you could implement into a video game with some subtle behind the scenes effects.

I believe Konami was able to achieve this effect via their "Heart" system. Also many games have implemented a "chemistry" system.

[Cardot]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

That's the beauty of "emotion" in a sporting event, since it's not a tangible effect that can be measured makes it something that you could implement into a video game with some subtle behind the scenes effects.

I believe Konami was able to achieve this effect via their "Heart" system. Also many games have implemented a "chemistry" system.

But to program it into a video game, you DO need a measurable value that you can put into a mathematical equation. So then we need a developer to calculate all the situations that would make a player frustrated. And players have different tempraments, so we need a rating for that. And how much do ratings decline when frustrated? It is complicated.

I have never liked these features in sports games. In my experience, they have either been unnoticable, or they behave oddly as they take certain things into consideration but not others.

[KG]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

Personally, I have never been a fan of sports video games tyring to capture intangibles such as emotion, momentum, chemistry, hot/cold streaks etc.

How would you measure it in real life? To my knowledge, statistics are not kept for each player, split based upon thier emotional state. And if you can't measure it, how do you apply an alogarithim to it?

Not even form?

I like the idea of form being replicated in a video game because it adds incentive to not just playing the better rated player(s). Now that form needs to be based on performance. Some might find this tedious but I feel like as a manager of a club you should be able to set individual performance goals.

[Cardot]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

Not even form?

I like the idea of form being replicated in a video game because it adds incentive to not just playing the better rated player(s). Now that form needs to be based on performance. Some might find this tedious but I feel like as a manager of a club you should be able to set individual performance goals.

How do you define "Form"? Is it purely level fatigue? If so, then that is something that can be calculated by the CPU. And obviously that should be in the game. I am more sketchy about scenarios like "Player xyz just squandered a great opportunity, so now he must be frustated so drop his ratings by 20%"

[KG]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

How do you define "Form"? Is it purely level fatigue? If so, then that is something that can be calculated by the CPU. And obviously that should be in the game. I am more sketchy about scenarios like "Player xyz just squandered a great opportunity, so now he must be frustated so drop his ratings by 20%"

IMO Form is strictly performance based. PES Be a Legend used to have objectives that changed every match, "support the attackers", "track back on defense", etc... FIFA's Be a Pro has season-long objectives, "Score X amount of goals", "Create X amount of chances", etc...

Both games also have match ratings which should (and might in FIFA's case) influence form but in-game form, as you mention, is a lot harder to digest for people, especially in a game like soccer where it's harder to notice certain positions are struggling unlike bball where you can see a SG is struggling with his shot or in football where a QB is having an off day accuracy-wise.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that overall player form should be in there and it somehow needs to fit into a model that reflects team chemistry.

[BL8001]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

Form or emotion or whatever we want to call it already exists in the game. It's called difficulty level.

If you play on am your players are eusebio, pele, puskas, etc.

As you go up diff levels your team become more and more sluggish, unresponsive and idiotic.

It's one of the worst difficulty systems in sports video games.

So why not turn it into a positive? Instead of how it is currently where your whole team are brilliant or rubes, use the end of game rating to dictate how each player will behave.

Now individuals would stand out in a sport that has a lot to do with individual effort.

The CPU would benefit from this greatly, maybe with this system they would actually target players who were in form meaning those who should be threats on the field would be threats on the field.

Every team would now have a unique feel to them and there would be less struggling with the minnows just because ea felt like borking your superior team for the hell of it.

A whole bunch of things would be better than the way they are now in FiFa.

[Scrollbar]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

Did people believe this would have any impact? And if so why? It's a cosmetic improvement designed to improve the games atmosphere and create a new layer of immersion. Maybe some tweaks can be made next year but I'm thrilled with this new addition.

[Zac]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

Did people believe this would have any impact? And if so why? It's a cosmetic improvement designed to improve the games atmosphere and create a new layer of immersion. Maybe some tweaks can be made next year but I'm thrilled with this new addition.

That is now how they originally pitched it and touted it. They made it seem like it would have an impact on the game.

http://www.operationsports.com/forum...intensity.html

^ They talk about how if a player gets tackled hard it changes how he responds to that player. And if a guy is shooting poorly his teams mates get frustrated with him. Well what good is all that if its just some stupid extra animation thing I have to hit the button to skip all the time because its interrupting the flow the game and wasting my time. Also if its not actually affecting the game in anyway, why even put it in at all. Its will be cool for the first two matches you play. Then its just skip, skip, skip, skip. If all it is, is an extra animation its pointless fluff.

[Hutton]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

It would be pretty neat to see the CPU AI evolve their tactic if for instance a striker scores an unexpected goal, and they begin to mold their attack around the player, looking to him more as a focal point in their attack.

But this of course assumes that EA has any type of "focal point" of attack implemented into the game, i.e. Barca actively looking to feed the ball to Messi outside the box, or Real Madrid targeting Bale on the wing. This IMO has always been lacking from FIFA titles, and the new emotion engine could have been a nice way to string together some sort of focused CPU AI tactics.

[Scrollbar]

Re: Fifa 15 emotion means nothing

That is now how they originally pitched it and touted it. They made it seem like it would have an impact on the game.

http://www.operationsports.com/forum...intensity.html

^ They talk about how if a player gets tackled hard it changes how he responds to that player. And if a guy is shooting poorly his teams mates get frustrated with him. Well what good is all that if its just some stupid extra animation thing I have to hit the button to skip all the time because its interrupting the flow the game and wasting my time. Also if its not actually affecting the game in anyway, why even put it in at all. Its will be cool for the first two matches you play. Then its just skip, skip, skip, skip. If all it is, is an extra animation its pointless fluff.

I watched that trailer and at no point did I consider it as selling a change in how the game plays. It's cosmetic and adds a much needed layer of depth and realism.