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Post by sonny615 on Mar 1, 2019 9:49:42 GMT
Disclamer: These are my initial thoughts and they may change once I play more of the Fire Promoter mode. Once done, I will also post my complete thoughts on the Steam forum. I love simulation games and I love drawing analogy between two of my favorite games, Fire Pro and Football Manager. Now, it is obviously not a 1:1 comparison. One is football (or soccer), the other one is wrestling. One is very well budgeted with a ton of scouts across the globe and constantly stars on the best selling games on Steam, the other one is a small budget, small team niche game for a niche genre. Still, there are quite a few similarities. Both simulate their sport very well. Both have in depth stats for players\wrestlers. Both are very customizable and in both games you can influence the players’ behavior. I think that with relatively little effort, the Fire Pro team can implement many aspect that make FM so successful and make the game much better. Through the in-depth customization and a good engine, Fire Pro emulates a match very well. This, in my eyes is similar to the team tactics customization in Football Manager. You put the players in positions and give them in depth instructions of how to behave in every situation. In both game you make the set-up and adjustment, then sit back and watch the match unfold. If something isn’t right, you make the needed changes and head into the next match, hoping for a better result.  Of course, Football Manager emulates the FULL experience of a team. Leagues & cup competitions, budgets, signing staff & players, training & youth development. While having a great match engine, Fire Pro was missing the ‘complete’ management aspect mentioned above. That’s where Fire Promoter stepped in. I have to mention that in my opinion, this is where players expectation and reality didn’t meet. Players were expecting a mode that will allow them to choose a fed, be it premade or not, and get a tool that will allow them to simulate the management of that fed within the game and within a customized universe. This is something that most players were doing anyway be it in Excel, text or in Fire Pro Forums. We did get some of that. However, the many limitations and restrictions push us into the same experience over and over again: start from scratch with a very small roster and very limited actions, then grow your fed slowly. In my eyes this is somewhat of a miss. I was expecting a Fire Promoter and instead got an Indy Promoter. I think the core player base wanted a flexible simulation tool rather than a game mode with simulation elements. Why can’t I choose to have any kind of roster size I want? Why can’t I start big? Why can’t I send 2 or 3 or 4 scouts to look for talent? Why can’t I sign as many players as my budget allows me to? In Football Manager you can choose a team from the 5th league in England but you can also choose Manchester United with a sick budget and world class players. You will still have to manage players, staff and finances. Random events will still happen, players will still get injured and upset over your decisions. Events will still happen. The great thing about Fire Pro has always been its great simulation and the freedom it gave us, players, in choosing our path and our way to play. While Promoter gives us a taste of managing a fed, I feel like the unnecessary restrictions and eventually forcing the players into a single scenario prevent this mode from being great and having longevity and replayability. I will add more thoughts later on! |
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Post by thefallguy on Mar 1, 2019 15:24:21 GMT
Really good post and I hope people realise that you’re not asking for Management Mode to be on the scale of fm, just that it take a few basic ideas and use them.
At this rate it will be back to Excel...
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Post by view619 on Mar 1, 2019 15:51:54 GMT
It's a difference in approach, Spike wanted Fire Promoter to be a game mode that forces players to overcome restrictions in order to win. Meanwhile, Football Manager allows players to develop their own rules and challenges.
It's just another example of Spike not understanding what their player base wants (an unrestricted game mode where you have control to set everything up as you wish).
Ironically, the early builds of Fire Promoter actually gave you full control of the season's set-up; I'm not sure why they decided to change that before release. Maybe members of the new development team found it boring, with no set goals or conditions to overcome?
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Post by Severla on Mar 1, 2019 16:39:07 GMT
Yeah, Fire Promoter is more of a challenge mode style game.
I think people were somehow expecting TEW-lite, which it isnt.
I do admit some of the choices are weird, though (like 6 people to start no matter what).
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Post by sonny615 on Mar 1, 2019 17:41:37 GMT
It's a difference in approach, Spike wanted Fire Promoter to be a game mode that forces players to overcome restrictions in order to win. Meanwhile, Football Manager allows players to develop their own rules and challenges. It's just another example of Spike not understanding what their player base wants (an unrestricted game mode where you have control to set everything up as you wish). Ironically, the early builds of Fire Promoter actually gave you full control of the season's set-up; I'm not sure why they decided to change that before release. Maybe members of the new development team found it boring, with no set goals or conditions to overcome? In FM you don't develop your own rules. Any team you choose will operate under the same rules & challenges of the league\competition. What you do choose is your starting point. Big club with budget, small club, large staff, etc. I agree with creating your own challenge part & the rest of the post. |
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Post by mur96 on Mar 1, 2019 17:53:38 GMT
The idea of overcoming obstacles and becoming the dominant promotiom with willpower and good management it's really attractive for a management sim.
The problem is, it could really benefit with a Free Mode, with no settled boundaries and no limitations. Put whatever you want!
I mean, I insist, it could be there's more to grasp but in a long-term, decades FP game. But it seems like Spike dodn't exploited the idea at its maximun capacity and just stayed with the basics.
The mode is cool and fun, and quite challenging. But they need to release quality of life patches for it, so it reaches full potential. At least a one-night event mode with some more tweaks and novelties, doubt it will happen tho.
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Post by sonny615 on Mar 1, 2019 19:12:38 GMT
Another thing that I think could be relatively easily adopted from FM is "regens".
Basically those are young players generated by the game as the years go by.
Most are really bad, some are good and only a few develop into wonderkids (with the right management).
Think about it, this would give the Promoter mode infinite value.
Of course, completely randomizing looks and stats can create chaotic results (hi Geese!) but a set of rules can be created with relative ease.
For example: create a new regen and randomize a fighting style for him. Let's say the result is Hardcore. If so, assign a set of [these particular moves] with, let's say, 85% probability. The other 15% can come from the rest of the moves (because there are hardcore american wrestlers and there are hardcore high flyers, etc.).
Same for logic; if a wrestler is Hardcore, give him 'Blood' with 60% probability.
These rules can be developed more and more. European wrestlers will have higher chance to be more technical while Mexican are likely to be more high flying and so on.
In any case, such algorithm can be developed in a few days work. Maybe even faster than it took to manually make all the fake wrestlers in Promoter Mode.
In FM there are also hidden stats like Potential, which don't exist in Fire Pro but let's say we develop ability through experience and training.
What do you think? Do I have a point here or am I completely unrealistic?
Another question is - can this be modded in by the community?
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Post by OrochiGeese on Mar 1, 2019 19:50:00 GMT
I like this thread a lot! It's really interesting to me 💡
I have no experience with Football Manager but I know it's highly respected. Using it as a comparison for Fire Promoter is interesting. Obviously there will be some differences in scale (FP as a DLC offered side mode vs. FM as a full game) but some really good points are made as to where FP fell short.
To me - the biggest issue is the way FP falls short of its own past exactly like Sonny says here:
I think this is a recurring theme of FPW at this point. Spike keeps trying to "game-ify" aspects of Fire Pro or focus a lot on those aspects that were intended and treated as customizable simulation. Fire Promoter falls into this mentality. I get that they want to give us a "challenge" to overcome but, to me, the true challenge is creating a mode that has both variability and replayability. The single scenario + 6 wrestler start shoehorns people into similar experiences for a challenge rather than allowing us to truly turn the mode into our own. I enjoy the mode but I would love the option to have BOTH modes: The 6-wrestler start but also a full control mode. The very idea of an option is Fire Pro. I don't know if they intend to build upon it (not counting bug fixes) in the future. I enjoy Fire Promoter and have had fun with it so far but I really feel like so much more can be done if they just allowed us to manage our full feds rather than play their "6 pack and beyond" challenge.
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Post by mur96 on Mar 1, 2019 20:40:32 GMT
Spike keeps trying to "game-ify" aspects of Fire Pro or focus a lot on those aspects that were intended and treated as customizable simulation. Fire Promoter falls into this mentality. Hmm... it seems like Spike are more like afraid to understand their most loyal fanbase. It's not like they don't want to, they are sobbing to do it. Company headquarters decision maybe? I mean it seems like they have all the ingredients but they prefer to stay sharp and basic with everything but the core game, they don't want to take real risks with their game. What could've been a really cool sandbox story mode ended up like a playable Wrestling light novel. What Fire Promoter promised in its conception and time of development became just what everyone expected: a management sim from years ago that needed some really engaging changes. It doesn't make it bad, it just makes them rather... skinless. |
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Post by OrochiGeese on Mar 1, 2019 20:49:23 GMT
Yeah, I think what we are both saying is related. Because corporate told them to maximize profits, the developers are trying to appeal to casual gamers by providing these very fixed "challenge" experiences. I also think that some of the people in the new development team just don't get the legacy of the series and the reason people keep coming back to it (and played FPR for as long as we did). Matsumoto gets some of it but he is getting lead by those who don't and is letting people make decisions without understanding the tools at their disposal (like the disastrous, sudden, and overcompensating tag changes that didn't need to be made like that but required an understanding of how FP tag matches work). The very fact that Spike says one of their next priorities is fixing "custom soundtracks" for the PS4 version rather than doing well...anything else, kind of suggests where their priorities are: and sadly it's not expanding actual priority logic as many of us asked them to. I understand that casual gamers and people knew to the FP experience would benefit from a "challenge" approach to Fire Promoter and I enjoy it as well. But as Sonny said, I'd love to have both approaches. And the very idea of having both approaches and allowing us to choose is as "Fire Pro" as it gets.
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Post by mur96 on Mar 1, 2019 21:14:51 GMT
I'm starting to think the whole PS4 and New Japan deal has been more detrimental than anything else.
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Post by OrochiGeese on Mar 1, 2019 21:44:26 GMT
That has been my thinking as well over the past month. The rush to get the game ready for PS4 is what led to the end of Early Access which was the best period of the game since they listened the most to us and, therefore, actually made the game better and fixed the bugs on a regular basis. Those twitch chats with them were legitimately useful in getting new features in the game and tweaking things that didn't work. They listened, they fixed, they focused on making the game better by working with the great potential of what they partially had ready rather than bringing new things in and splitting their attention and team.
Once they got New Japan involved, a lot of good things came from it, but I felt like they sacrificed the depth of Fire Pro to appeal to the types of things that a fans of other licensed-wrestling game would focus on.
I thought they left Early Access too early and wish we could get that level of interaction with them again. Had they spent a solid year in EA and then worked to get the game on PS4, everyone would have a better experience. PS4 players suffered from Spike rushing their version as well. Spike needed to slow down.
The whole "we're focusing on PS4 custom soundtracks next" tweet from them earlier this week took a lot of the wind out of my sails for expectations of Spike fixing some of what was already incomplete or broken (by them) or simply needed more work (lack of edit search in menus, more that could be done with priority logic, etc).
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Post by ligerbear on Mar 1, 2019 22:25:17 GMT
It's a difference in approach, Spike wanted Fire Promoter to be a game mode that forces players to overcome restrictions in order to win. Meanwhile, Football Manager allows players to develop their own rules and challenges. It's just another example of Spike not understanding what their player base wants (an unrestricted game mode where you have control to set everything up as you wish). Ironically, the early builds of Fire Promoter actually gave you full control of the season's set-up; I'm not sure why they decided to change that before release. Maybe members of the new development team found it boring, with no set goals or conditions to overcome? This sums up the situation excellently. Its like the team behind fire pro is from an old super nes era mindset of game design were all the modes are "game-ified." Thats fun and great and there is a place for that. However What the majority of the fan base wants is just a platform and tools that is open ended so the users can play with it any way it wants. There is room for both to be implemented. Dont think it would be that to allow a free mode that would remove all the restrictions. Hell even the gba version gave options to choose how many years the game woule last, and starting assets amount, and you could make your roster as big or small as u want from the get go. Really just feels like they are only allowed to work on the game during their free time or something with the amount of amateurish mistakes |
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Post by mur96 on Mar 1, 2019 23:52:27 GMT
I wonder what Japanese or light New Japan fans think about all of this... maybe they are actually very happy. Doesn't seem that way, a lot of pals have told me Spike hasn't sold a lot of FPWW... Maybe that's why it's not a priority for development anymore. What a shame.
I hope modders take cards on play.
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Post by FlashBurton on Mar 2, 2019 10:58:38 GMT
As a huge FM fan I had to pipe up. I've always seen TEW as the wrestling version FM just no where near as in-depth, polished and lacking the match engine
My ultimate dream would be the TEW gameplay with the Fire Pro simulation aspect, I dont think I'd ever leave the house
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