Starting today, Football, Tactics & Glory and all its expansions also support Japanese!
One of the sources of inspiration for FTG was the Japanese game Persona 3. Therefore, I am very pleased that Japanese players will now be able to appreciate our turn-based football game.
By the way, here, I'm talking about how I was influenced with Persona 3.
We are grateful to Gabanymous for the huge amount of work he did translating the game. Additionally, he pointed out how to correct various stylistic and cultural nuances to make the game feel more natural for Japanese players. Without him, we wouldn't have been able to achieve such high-quality localisation!
He also created a thread on the forum where you can leave your feedback regarding the translation: https://steamcommunity.com/app/375530/discussions/0/4343240481093521060/
If you have any technical or gameplay troubles, write on the Steam forum, and we will try our best to help.
We wish you an enjoyable game!
New options in the base game and all DLC
In the latest update, we have added a new element in the gear menu: "Additional Options" to the base game and all DLCs.
Clicking on this button will open a screen with new options:
Date Format - the ability to choose the order in which the day, month, and year are displayed. Previously, the default format was the one we are accustomed to in Europe. However, we know that in other regions (such as the USA or Japan), different formats are used. Now you have the option to choose a date display that is convenient for you.
Number Format - the ability to choose the symbol used to separate thousands in numbers. The default used to be a space. Now, commas and apostrophes have been added.
Team Photo - the game has the ability to save a photo of your team. This can be done either from the club attributes screen (all the club's players are photographed together) or when you win a tournament (photo with the cup). By default, when saving, a window would open where you could choose where to save the photo. However, if you were playing in fullscreen mode, on some computers switching between windows might not work correctly, which could lead to system freezes or other issues. Therefore, we added this option. It allows you to save a team photo using the Steam screenshot system. The photo is saved in the Steam folder, and this does not cause system issues.
Enjoy your game! P.S. If you haven't left a review on Steam yet, please do so. It will help our game become more visible to other players.
New scouting system in Football, Tactics & Glory: World
In the base game, you could open the profile of almost any footballer in the world and see nearly all the information about them, except for some details. This allowed you to directly buy a footballer from the club, bypassing transfers.
On one hand, access to such information provides great opportunities. On the other hand, we wanted scouting in the game to be more interesting and a bit closer to reality. Therefore, we have significantly redesigned it.
By default, footballers' profiles are hidden
Now you will fully "see" the profiles of the following footballers who do not belong to your club:
Those you are playing a match against today;
Those who are on the transfer lists (they are visible until the next transfer window opens);
Those who are on your watchlist (you can only add a footballer's profile to this list if it is already visible to you);
All footballers from the country where you are the national team coach.
Footballers whose profiles are not available to you are displayed with question marks. Such a footballer cannot be bought because you do not have enough information about them.
In the screenshot, I am viewing a foreign club. Before this, I sent my scouts to gather transfer lists in England, so I could see the profiles of those footballers who are up for transfers:
Scouts allow you to see footballers' profiles
You will also have access to the profiles of those footballers in your country whose Giftedness is equal to or less than the average level of your scouts. For example, if one of your scouts has a level of 3 stars and another has a level of 1 star, then the average level is 2 stars. Thus, you will see the profiles of all footballers with Giftedness of 0, 1, and 2.
Therefore, scouts will now be even more important, just as they are in real life.
For example, in the screenshot below, I am viewing a club from my country. Since the average level of my scouts is 3 stars, I do not see footballers with a Talent level above three stars:
You can hire agents
What should you do if you don't want or can't improve scouts, but still need to gather information about footballers? For this, we have introduced a new mechanic: the ability to hire agents for a certain period.
Now on the Club Improvements screen next to the Scout Centre, there is a button that allows you to open the agent hiring screen:
There you can select the level of Giftedness of the footballers you want to see and the duration for which you want to hire agents. This will cost money, but it might be a more affordable option than spending Glory on improving scouts:
Thus, you can completely avoid improving scouts by spending Glory on, for example, the Youth Academy. And when you need to find a footballer, hire agents for 1-2 months.
You can hire agents abroad
If you upgrade both scouts to 5 stars, you will see all the footballers playing in your country. However, you still won't see footballers in other countries.
In previous versions of the game, you could go to any foreign club of your continent playing in the Premier League and buy a footballer there. Now, by default, this option will be unavailable.
You can still send scouts to other countries and hope that the foreign transfer lists will include the footballers you need. But if you don't want to rely on luck, you can use the new mechanic: Establishing a foreign agent network. However, you will need to learn the corresponding coach skill. Without it, this option will be unavailable:
Next to the Scout Centre, there will be a button that opens the Foreign Agent Network screen. There you can hire agents abroad. However, the level of agents is limited by the average level of your scouts. So, if the average level of your scouts is 3 stars, then the maximum level of foreign agents can also only be 3 stars. This means that in the selected country, you will be able to see all footballers with a Giftedness level equal to or less than 3 stars.
Establishing a foreign agent network is not a cheap pleasure. But you will spend Money and Glory only once. You will not need to spend money constantly. And if, for example, you like a certain foreign football culture (e.g., you want to constantly buy technical footballers from Brazil), you can easily do this in any league of that country, not just in the top league as it was before:
Watchlist
Previously, it was just a list that improved game comfort. It did not affect the gameplay. However, now the Watchlist is a full-fledged element of the new scouting system.
Imagine a situation where you see an interesting footballer in one of the transfer lists. You will see their profile for another six months. In the next transfer window, if the club no longer lists them for transfer, their profile will be closed to you. You will not be able to buy them directly from the club.
However, footballers you have added to the Watchlist always have their profiles open. So, if you add an interesting footballer to the list when you first see them, you can buy them directly from the club even six months or a year later because the information about them will be available to you.
If you have a club without scouts, your list allows you to add only 3 footballers. With each scout improvement, the list increases by 1. So, you can increase it to 23 items. There is also a coach skill that increases the list by 3. This skill can be improved three times, so the total capacity of the list can be increased by another 9 items.
Importance of transfer lists
Despite the fact that the cost of footballers on the transfer lists was significantly lower than when you buy a footballer directly, many players did not use the extended transfer list. The first disadvantage is the cost of sending scouts to gather the list. The other disadvantage is that it is not often that you can find exactly the footballer you need there.
We have resolved the first disadvantage - the cost of sending scouts to gather information for the Extended List has been reduced by 5 times.
The second disadvantage still remains because this is the essence of transfer lists: you see who is available on the market and decide whether to use the available footballers or take the initiative and search for footballers elsewhere.
But if you have weak scouts, transfer lists are an important source of information about footballers. Even if you see someone interesting who you cannot buy, you can add them to the Watchlist so that the information about them remains available.
Footballer Search
And now we come to perhaps the most interesting part - the footballer search screen.
Previously, you could open the screen of any club, browse all the footballers, and buy the one that suited you. I liked this mechanic because you got to know the clubs and footballers better. But the problem was that if a player was focused on efficiency, they would sift through all available clubs to find the exact footballer they needed.
The search for a footballer was a routine process. However, we could not allow an automated search for footballers, as it would make transfers much less interesting.
One of the reasons we created the new scouting system is to prevent automated footballer searches from making the game less engaging.
So, now we give you the ability to search for a footballer according to various criteria: cost, level, age, Giftedness, presence of certain skills, attributes, class, etc. You can combine the necessary characteristics to find exactly the footballer you need:
But there is one catch. You can only search among those footballers whose profiles are available to you. This means that if you have undeveloped scouts and only have access to your personal transfer list, the Search screen will only look among all the footballers in your country with Giftedness 0 and those who are on the transfer list.
You will not see footballers from other countries. You will not see more gifted footballers. And in order for the Search to include as many footballers as possible, you need to develop scouts, establish a foreign agent network, gather transfer lists, etc.
Final Words
I like how all the new mechanics harmoniously interact with each other, creating a new, interesting scouting system. You can completely ignore scouting and develop your club through, for example, youth. But you can also create powerful foreign agent networks and find exactly the footballers you need. This adds a whole new layer of possibilities that allow you to find the footballers you need without breaking the game.
At first glance, it may seem very complicated, but the whole system was created comprehensively so that each element is logical and interacts well with other game mechanics.
How to follow the development progress?
First and foremost, visit the game's page and add it to your wishlist. This way, you will receive an email from Steam when the game goes into Early Access or Full Release.
Secondly, click "Follow" to be notified whenever we publish news on Steam.
The great place to get notified about news and discuss them is our Discord. Also, to follow our news, you can subscribe to our mailing list: Email subscription.
Penalty kick implementation for low-end laptops + fixed memory leak
Playing on Low-End Laptops
As specified in our system requirements, our game officially does not support laptops that only have integrated graphics card. The reason is that integrated graphics cards somehow fail to properly render our 3D scenes.
However, we strive to make the game playable if it does run, even though it might not be graphically appealing.
We recently released an update that allows matches to be played on low-end laptops. However, the game still crashed during penalty kicks.
So, we have made the following adjustment: during penalty kicks, the models of the shooter and the goalkeeper are hidden, allowing the weak laptop to render this scene. Of course, this is not visually appealing and may not be very clear how to perform penalties (if you are playing with enabled tutorial, the first time the penalty starts, the messages explain how to shoot and defend during penalties.), but it is a compromise we are willing to make to allow gameplay on devices we did not plan to support.
Please note, to make this possible, you need to: - Find and launch config.exe in the game folder - Click Troubleshooting - Check the "Simplified graphics" option
Memory Leak
We identified and fixed a part of the code that could lead to memory leaks under certain circumstances.
Enjoy the game!
Patch for running any version of the game on laptops
As indicated in the system requirements, our game does not support laptops that do not have a dedicated graphics card.
However, the game may still run on some integrated graphics cards. You will need to disable all "heavy" graphic settings for this. To do this, find and run config.exe in the game folder, click Troubleshooting, and check the "Simplified graphics" option.
It may be that you were playing on a laptop with only an integrated graphics card, and everything was working fine, but at some point, the graphics card somehow stopped coping. Since we don't change anything in the game, this is a problem with the computer, graphics card, or drivers. However, using the new option theoretically can help.
In any case, I remind you that we do not support laptops with only integrated graphics cards. However, we do everything we can to help as many players as possible.
New management tasks for club development in FTGW
In the Manager's Journey expansion, mechanics for transitioning between clubs and fulfilling management tasks have been added.
We've designed these mechanics so players can either build their career by moving between clubs or stay with one club, elevating it from the Amateur League to the pinnacle of world football. If you were part of this club, management couldn't fire you, even if you failed to meet the tasks set before you.
Furthermore, the ambitions of different club managements varied, affecting the difficulty of the tasks. If you developed your own club, management's ambition was low. Therefore, players could relax a bit more about failing tasks because the tasks themselves were not very ambitious.
However, we received feedback that when developing a single club, it would be nice if management occasionally set tasks specifically for club development, not just for advancing in the league table.
4 New Types of Tasks
When tasked with achieving a higher league position or escaping relegation, it's hard to focus on youth and development. So, we decided it made sense to add tasks that allow players to concentrate on long-term improvements to the club, without worrying about immediate results.
In FTGW, we added 4 new types of tasks:
Improve infrastructure and hire staff - you will earn management satisfaction points each time you upgrade the stadium, youth school, scout center, etc., and whenever you hire new coaches, medics, scouts.
Feature juniors in the starting lineup who were signed this or next season - you will earn management satisfaction points each time your junior takes to the field.
Purchase and field players aged 25 or younger with relatively high Talent for the club - you will earn management satisfaction points for buying the right player and for each game they play.
Develop the club as you see fit - you will earn points for actions taken from the previous three tasks.
League position still matters, so there will be minimal expectations, but often these will be very achievable, such as simply not getting relegated.
New tasks will be issued for 2-4 years depending on the difficulty level, type of task, and current situation at your club.
When These Tasks Are Issued
If you work with only one club, management will alternate between development tasks and result-oriented tasks. Essentially, you're a co-owner of the club, so your job is to achieve long-term success.
Other clubs will not often give development tasks. In most cases, clubs will try to improve their league standing. But occasionally, you'll find clubs willing to spend a few seasons improving infrastructure, developing youth, or finding a talented player and integrating them into the team.
How the New Mechanic Looks in Action
One of the most experienced FTG players is helping us test FTGW. He recently started streaming his gameplay on hard mode with some new options (which we haven't officially talked about yet).
If you're interested in FTG, I highly recommend subscribing to his channel to get notifications about new streams. And generally, it's worth watching his playthroughs, as he uses unconventional tactics and has a very deep understanding of the game.
Early Access Information
In our last update, we discussed possibly releasing the game in Early Access this summer at a higher price than the final game would cost. Thanks to everyone who left feedback approving or disapproving this step.
After careful consideration, we've decided to forgo this idea for now, primarily because we want to impress you with new graphics. While the core of the FTG series is its mechanics, we want the game to immerse you more in real football, and graphics are also very important for this. So, we've decided to delay Early Access until the new graphics are at least in a basic functional state. We want FTGW to be associated with a new look.
This is an ambitious task for our small team. First, we are rewriting the animation engine. We are embedding the possibility for future expansion, the ability to create beautiful replays, and the future possibility of creating women's teams (they won't be in FTGW, but the engine will allow us to add them later). And overall, we want to make more realistic players, more realistic stadiums, etc. And that involves a lot of work.
So, unfortunately, at least until autumn, you won't be able to try out the exciting new features that have been added to the game :(
How to follow the development progress?
First and foremost, visit the game's page and add it to your wishlist. This way, you will receive an email from Steam when the game goes into Early Access or Full Release.
Secondly, click "Follow" to be notified whenever we publish news on Steam.
The great place to get notified about news and discuss them is our Discord. Also, to follow our news, you can subscribe to our mailing list: Email subscription.
Виправлено декілька багів для Manager's Journey
Two bugs recently reported by players on the forum have been fixed:
In some season statistics sections, all-time statistics were being displayed. Fixed.
A club could issue a task to improve the Youth Academy or Stadium, even though these buildings were already at maximum level. Fixed.
Enjoy the game!
Managing a national team in FTGW
Earlier, I wrote about the introduction of national teams in the game. But besides the World Championship being added to the game, you'll also be able to participate in it by taking charge of a national team.
How to take charge of a national team?
As a manager, you earn Reputation points by completing club tasks. The higher your Reputation, the more prestigious clubs will send you job offers.
Similarly with national teams. Starting from a certain level of Reputation, you will begin to receive job offers from teams that have not achieved great success. Moreover, if you simulate countries on other continents, you will receive invitations from those countries as well. As your Reputation grows, more prestigious national teams will want you to take charge.
The management will expect you to achieve certain successes with the team. Weaker teams will expect you to get them to the final part of the tournament. Average teams will expect you to reach the semi-finals or at least get out of the group in the final stage. And strong teams, of course, will expect you to win the tournament.
At the beginning of development, we planned to make it so you could only take charge of one thing: either a club or a national team, as that would be realistic. But since national team matches are rare, and you cannot develop it the same way as a club, the gameplay in such a case would be boring. You would need to wait long periods to just play 1-2 qualification matches, while only once every 2 years there would be an interesting final stage of the World Championship or the European Championship (or Americas, or other continents).
Eventually, we decided that you would manage the national team alongside managing a club. We managed to create a convenient interface that allows you to easily navigate between two different line-ups.
Team selection
A few days before the match, you will need to invite 25 footballers to the national team's lineup.
On the left, you will see the list of players who were invited for the last match, and on the right - all the players of this nationality who play in the Premier Leagues and First Leagues.
If a footballer cannot be invited (for example, the club won't release him because it would lack players), an "Attention" icon will appear next to him. By hovering over it, you will find out why the player will not be able to play in the upcoming matches.
Managing the team
On the day of the national team match, the flags of the participating countries are displayed on the main screen. Preparation for the match is similar to club matches. That is, you see the opponent's team and choose a formation to counter it.
Unlike the club, there is no infrastructure to improve here. Also, there is no possibility to train players (because their development is the responsibility of the owning clubs). However, you have access to statistics, the ability to change the kit, and upload your own team logo.
When managing the national team, you won't have Money or Glory, as there's nothing to spend them on.
Reputation
Overall, when managing a national team, it's easier to lose Reputation than to gain it. Firstly, to accept an invitation to a national team, you need to spend a large amount of Reputation. It can only pay off if you successfully lead the team for at least 2 seasons in a row.
Furthermore, to motivate footballers, you will have to use your Reputation, not Glory as in club football.
On the other hand, successfully managing a national team for several seasons in a row will earn you an extraordinarily large amount of Reputation.
Statistics
I've already written here about statistics. It's worth adding that you can view statistical data for each national tournament just as you view statistics for club tournaments. Moreover, statistics for the qualifying rounds and final stages will be collected separately.
Endgame content
We spent a tremendous amount of time implementing national tournaments and the mechanics of managing national teams. But when you start a new campaign, you won't immediately see all these mechanics. It might seem like not much has been added to the game. Because this is largely endgame content.
You start the game in the Amateur League, living the adventure life of a manager overcoming difficulties on the way to the Premier League. And only after earning enough Reputation, when you've made a name for yourself as a good manager, will you get access to a large part of the new content.
Of course, you can follow national tournaments without managing a team. You can watch national team matches, follow the World Championship, and view statistics. But managing a national team will only be available when you reach the top leagues.
And if you want to start the game managing a national team right away, you can do that. You'll need to "issue" yourself a large amount of Reputation when creating a campaign. After accepting an invitation from a club, you will also receive an invitation to take charge of a national team.
Game Release Date
Unfortunately, due to significant technical difficulties, we are unable to release the game in June as planned. Most of the new mechanics are working. However, we decided to rewrite the graphics engine, which turned out to be an exceptionally complex and laborious task. If we succeed in what we have planned, it should impress you.
Therefore, we are currently considering the idea of releasing the game in limited Early Access in June. We will temporarily increase the price of the game to limit the number of players who get access to the game. Those who want to support us will be able to buy the game, play it, and provide feedback on various mechanics. At the same time, most players will see the game in its final form at launch with a reduced price.
How to follow the development progress?
First and foremost, visit the game's page and add it to your wishlist. This way, you will receive an email from Steam when the game goes into Early Access or Full Release.
Secondly, click "Follow" to be notified whenever we publish news on Steam.
The great place to get notified about news and discuss them is our Discord. Also, to follow our news, you can subscribe to our mailing list: Email subscription.
Difficulty increasing options in Football, Tactics & Glory: World
When a player begins to understand how the game mechanics work, the Normal difficulty level starts to feel quite easy (though it remains strategic and interesting). Those players who want to "just beat the game," meaning to win all possible trophies, will do so and find enjoyment.
For those who now seek more challenges, there was a High difficulty level in the game. It allowed players to look at the mechanics from a new angle, realize their depth, and enjoy the struggle for survival in the lower leagues.
Those who have been following the game for a long time know that as a game designer, I dislike giving AI unfair advantages. Therefore, High difficulty does not affect the opponents' chances to score a goal or take the ball away. The difficulty is created naturally: through tougher initial conditions and higher prices for various upgrades. Such fair difficulty has its pros and cons.
Pros - the sense of game fairness and the value of your tactical and strategic skills in achieving your team's successes.
Cons - it's hard to make the game even more difficult while still maintaining the authenticity of the game world.
Still, in FTGW, we've prepared a few surprises for players who would like the game to be even harder (especially in the later stages of the game).
New option "Giftedness affects the skill potential"
In the "Football Stars" DLC, a new mechanic was introduced: Giftedness, which is expressed in the number of stars a footballer has. The higher the Giftedness, the higher the footballer's skill potential in a match.
Assuming a footballer with zero Giftedness has a skill potential of 5, then
a footballer with Talent 1 would have a potential of 6;
a footballer with Talent 2 would have a potential of 7;
a footballer with Talent 3 would have a potential of 8;
etc.
For example, a footballer with Giftedness 3 could perform a Cannon Shot with a potential of 8. If the goalkeeper had Giftedness 5, he would attempt to intercept a shot with a potential of 10. Such a small difference in skill potentials made Talent an important characteristic, while also giving chances for less talented footballers to outplay more talented ones.
On High difficulty, with each level of Giftedness, the skill potential increased by 2. This made Talent a more important characteristic. And since the player starts the campaign with a team of untalented old footballers, climbing to the higher leagues became even more difficult. The screenshot shows a similar situation, but with High difficulty:
In FTGW, we decided to make the dependence of skill potential on Giftedness adjustable in the campaign settings. You can change this dependence within a range from +1 to +5. Choosing +3 or higher, you start to appreciate gifted footballers significantly more. Here's a screenshot of a similar situation but with the setting +5:
This setting also affects other mechanics related to skill potential. For example, if the setting +5 is chosen, when a footballer receives motivation, his potential temporarily increases by 5. When a footballer fully learns the "Talent" skill tree, his potential increases by 5. Pressuring an opponent, the footballer reduces his potential by 5.
Previously, if an experienced player in the First Division built a strong team, this team almost automatically became competitive in the Premier League. This was somewhat disappointing because, on High difficulty, you want more of a challenge.
However, setting this to +5, first, the path to the higher leagues will be longer, and second, the top teams of the Premier League will still pose a challenge for several seasons with their gifted footballers. And this is precisely what the game lacked - the difficulty slightly increases, and at the same time, the game world remains fair.
An additional plus of this setting is that you can use it on other difficulty levels. For example, if you like the economy of Normal difficulty, but you want Giftedness to have a stronger effect on the game, you can set this setting, for instance, to +3 and choose Normal difficulty.
New type of randomness "Reduced+"
The problem with the difficulty of strategic games lies in their very nature. A game feels strategic when a player can use planning, cleverness, and the ability to use the situation to their advantage to win against stronger opponents, having a weaker army or football team.
If the game allows winning against stronger opponents thanks to your intellect, there are three ways to make such a game harder:
Give AI opponents unfair advantages (stronger unit attacks, the opponent sees what the player does not, skewed randomness in favour of the opponent);
Worsen the player's starting conditions;
Reduce the influence of the player's intellect on the situation (i.e., make the outcome of the battle/match more dependent on the strength of the army/team than on the player's tactics).
Obviously, we will never use the first option, although it is used in many games (for example, in Civilization). Still, for us, it's important that the game world is perceived as authentic and fair.
Most current difficulties are the second point, i.e., various variations of worsening the player's starting conditions.
The new randomness option is the third variant. It reduces the effect of luck and increases the role of Giftedness of the footballers. The goal of this option is to make stronger footballers even stronger.
The game already has several RNG types. But personally, as a player, I do not like changing them. I enjoy the random nature of ordinary randomness. It can sometimes create completely wild stories, as happens in real football.
However, the new type of randomness "Reduced+" brings something interesting into the game. Before explaining its working principle, I will first describe how the "Reduced" RNG works:
In default randomness, when performing an action, a random number from 1 to the footballer's potential is chosen. Thus, the lower boundary of the roll is always 1.
In "Reduced" randomness, the lower boundary of the random number will always be 30% of the footballer's potential.
So, if a footballer with Defence 60 tries to take the ball from an opponent with Control 45, the defender will roll a random number in the range of 20-60, and the opponent - in the range of 15-45.
This type of randomness does well in making strong footballers feel even stronger. And accordingly, as long as your team is weaker, it will be harder to play.
The new "Reduced+" randomness, in turn, makes more talented footballers even stronger. It works like this:
A footballer with Giftedness 0 has a lower boundary of 1;
A footballer with Giftedness 1 has a lower boundary of 10%;
A footballer with Giftedness 2 has a lower boundary of 20%;
A footballer with Giftedness 3 has a lower boundary of 30%;
A footballer with Giftedness 4 has a lower boundary of 40%;
A footballer with Giftedness 5 has a lower boundary of 60%;
If you've been paying attention, you'll see that with each step of Giftedness, the lower boundary increases by 10%, but for footballers with Giftedness 5, the lower boundary jumps by 20%.
Thus, the most gifted footballers will always roll high values, and it will be harder to play against them. Choosing this option, the player reduces the effect of their tactical and strategic decisions because the strength of the footballers and their Giftedness will have a significant impact on the team's results. Your ability to play will be tested because you will have to find ways to win against teams that have more talented footballers in their ranks.
Using these options together
These two settings were created to work in tandem. Thus, choosing "Reduced+" randomness and the dependency of skill potential on Giftedness +5 increases the game's difficulty, especially noticeable in the Premier League and games against stronger opponents.
However, at some point, you will still build a strong team, and the game will again become less challenging. But this moment will come much later than now.
In one of my latest test campaigns, I led an average Ukrainian team to the top of world football, playing on High difficulty, activating "Reduced+" randomness, and setting the dependency of skill potential on Giftedness to +5.
Playing became harder (and more interesting). When you first enter the European Cup, you physically feel how powerful the teams there are. Playing against them, you cannot expect random goals. If you score, it's only after a carefully thought-out tactic.
The greater effect of these settings was created in the national team games. When I took over the Ukrainian national team, where most footballers had Giftedness 3-4, playing against teams like France or Germany (Giftedness 4-5) was incredibly hard. Managing a draw felt like luck, and a victory felt like something incredible. Playing is possible, but you must understand the game mechanics at a very high level. The downside is that you will never win against an opponent who has an average Giftedness higher than yours on 2 or more. But it's a part of what makes these settings to be harder.
On the other hand, not everyone may like that the possibility of winning against stronger opponents is limited. So, you can ignore these settings. They are made for those who need extra difficulty.
Summary
For experienced players who want to make the game more challenging, we've created two new options that allow increasing the difficulty. One of these options increases the dependency of skills on Talent, and the other links Talent to the lower boundary of random numbers.
Regardless of the type of randomness you play with, we believe the first option (Dependency of skill potential on Talent) is very interesting. It's worth trying different values and seeing what you prefer. The game feels completely different with a setting of +1 compared to a setting of +3, and even more so with a setting of +5. None of the options is better - each may suit some players and not others. In any case, you have more opportunities to customize the game to your tastes.
How to follow the development progress?
First and foremost, visit the game's page and add it to your wishlist. This way, you will receive an email from Steam when the game goes into Early Access or Full Release.
Secondly, click "Follow" to be notified whenever we publish news on Steam.
The great place to get notified about news and discuss them is our Discord. Also, to follow our news, you can subscribe to our mailing list: Email subscription.
Football cultures in Football, Tactics & Glory: World
The main new feature in FTGW will be football cultures. In this post, I'll explain what they are and how they will work.
What are football cultures?
Historically, it has been customary in England to fight for every ball, while in Brazil, showing good ball handling technique is appreciated. These differences are determined by the history of football development in the country and national culture. Thus, these football peculiarities can be called the football cultures of countries.
How will football cultures work in FTGW?
In modern football, there are no longer such stark differences in how footballers play in different countries. But we still watch the World Cup to see how each national team expresses its uniqueness.
Besides, some (or all?) football fans notice that the Spanish La Liga is perceived quite differently from the German Bundesliga.
So, differences in playing style exist, it's just hard to articulate them.
We decided that football cultures will be certain game mechanics that are only available to footballers of a specific nationality. These should be mechanics that are easy to understand and use in a match.
Here's a list of some football cultures currently implemented in our development version and which we are actively testing:
England (fighting for the ball) - all footballers additionally have a first-level Slide Tackle skill. If a footballer already has Slide Tackle, then the potential of their skills increases.
Germany (ball possession) - when a footballer uses the Hold action, the Control attribute increases by 30, not 20. Also increases the skill potential (making it harder to take the ball away with a Slide Tackle).
Spain (tiki-taka) - all footballers additionally have a first-level Layoff Pass skill. If a footballer already has Layoff Pass, then the potential of their skills increases.
Italy (defence through preventing penetrating passes) - all footballers additionally have a first-level Interception talent (which blocks Long Pass and Layoff Pass). If a footballer already has this talent, then the potential of their skills increases.
France (strong special classes) - all footballers of special classes have increased skill potential.
Netherlands (universal football) - all footballers of universal classes (except goalkeepers) have their attributes increased by 30%.
Belgium (fighting for the ball) - when performing the Tackle action, the footballer's Defense attribute increases by 30%.
Ukraine (playing through the flanks) - when performing an action from the flank, the footballer's attributes increase by 25%.
Austria (playing through Lofted passes) - when performing Lofted pass, distance coefficients are reduced, making Lofted passes easier (standard values 25, 35, 60, 110, Austrian values: 15, 25, 50, 95).
Switzerland (total pressing) - when performing the Pressing action, the opponent's Control is reduced by 25 (instead of 15), and the potential of defence from the skill (Slide Tackle) is reduced twice as much.
Portugal (long passes) - all footballers additionally have a first-level Long Pass skill. If a footballer already has this skill, then the potential of their skills increases.
Brazil (all footballers love to feint) - all footballers additionally have a first-level Rainbow Feint skill. If a footballer already has this skill, then the potential of their skills increases.
Argentina (all footballers love to feint with speed) - all footballers additionally have a first-level Nutmeg skill. If a footballer already has this skill, then the potential of their skills increases.
This screenshot shows which countries currently have football cultures in the development version (countries with the "i" icon). The tooltip for Germany's football culture is shown at the top. Additionally, the screenshot reveals some additional new features that I haven't officially announced yet ;)
These football cultures may still change before the game's release; they are currently in the testing process. But I like the vast majority of them.
We have ideas for other countries that are still waiting their turn. But if you have any ideas for specific countries, we would love to hear them. We are especially interested in less well-known football countries.
I'm not sure if all countries will have their own football cultures in the final version of the game. Possibly, several countries might share one common culture. And some, the least popular in terms of football, might not have their own culture at all. However, the majority of countries will still have something to delight players with.
How do football cultures feel in the game?
Football cultures change the game in three important aspects:
They diversify the game in each country.
They make transfers more interesting.
They diversify the game with national teams.
1. Playing in different countries
In the original game, the difference between Ukraine and England was only felt in that teams in Ukraine's Premier League were a bit weaker. And in England, rainy weather was more common. If you started the game in the Amateur League, there was no difference between England and Ukraine.
Later in the expansions, we added dependency of the cost and Giftedness of footballers on the country's rating. Also, the strength of teams in different countries became even more dependent on the rating. So in the higher leagues, a player could feel they were playing in a weaker country. But overall, there was no difference in gameplay between different countries. If you, as a coach, moved to work in another country, the scenery changed, but the approach to matches remained the same.
Now, starting the game in a particular country, you will feel a completely different gameplay. In England, the game will be fast-paced because everyone has Slide Tackle skill, so it's impossible to keep the ball. In Germany, on the other hand, progress to the enemy's goal will be built through ball control. In Spain, thanks to Layoff Pass, the ball will quickly move to different areas of the field. And in Brazil, even a defender will be able to slightly improve their position by dribbling past an opponent.
Even such a situational bonus as in Ukraine (+25% to all attributes if a footballer is on the flank) significantly affects the gameplay. Especially in the lower leagues. Because now you think about whether to try to take the ball directly or move one square, get a boost to attributes and try to tackle from there. I was personally pleasantly surprised by how this variety feels.
This screenshot shows Ukraine's football culture in an Amateur League match. The footballer in the yellow shirt is tackling from the flank. Pressing the Ctrl key will bring up a tooltip that shows the effects influencing the footballer's attributes.
For experienced players, it might be interesting to try to raise a team from the Amateur League, starting the game in hard mode. You are guaranteed to have a new exciting experience in each country.
Moreover, players who change clubs every season, moving to work in other countries, are guaranteed an interesting experience.
2. More interesting transfers
Previously, a footballer's nationality did not matter. If you needed a midfielder with a third-level Long Pass, it didn't matter what country they were from.
Now you will think twice before sending a scout to another country. Because now you have an interesting choice.
For example, in the same situation with a midfielder with a Long Pass. If you find such a footballer in Portugal, he will be more effective in giving Long Passes. If you find one in Spain, in addition to the Long Pass, he will also have a Layoff Pass. If you find one in Austria, in addition, he will be more effective in performing Lofted Passes.
The number of interesting combinations and possibilities in team building has significantly increased.
In my team (on the left) - many footballers are from other countries. Some footballers I bought just for their Giftedness, attributes, age, and skills. But some I bought because, in addition to their characteristics, their football culture suited me. For example, I have CD Croux from Belgium. He gets +30% when performing the Tackling action. RD Bushell from England already knows Sliding Tackle, so his skill potential is increased. In this campaign, I play with yet-to-be-announced new settings that increase the difficulty of the game for experienced players. With these settings, increasing skill potential is critically important.
3. National Teams
When we first implemented the management of national teams, it was somewhat interesting, but there was a slight disappointment that, for example, the Ukrainian team was different from the English team in terms of footballer levels and the number of 5-star talents. Overall, if you relied on tactics like Long Passes and runs into the penalty area, there wasn't much difference between the teams.
However, when we introduced the first iteration of football cultures, the differences between the teams became much more noticeable and interesting. For instance, Portugal would be more effective in using Long Pass tactics. But Italy would fairly counter this strategy, so against this country, you would have to use a different approach.
Playing against each national team, you can prepare differently for the match. Additionally, football cultures can be used situationally, at unexpected moments, sometimes leading to the creation of your own unique football stories that happened only in your game. This makes the World Cup and Continental Championships (Europe, America, etc.) an intriguing spectacle.
We hope to add the ability to watch matches of national teams. So you will not only manage but also watch how the teams use their strengths.
Summary
Football cultures fundamentally change FTGW. It will still be the good old FTG, but much more diverse and with enormous additional depth created by each individual culture.
If you get tired of playing in England, you can always start playing, for example, in Spain or Ukraine, and get a completely new gaming experience. If you could easily play 1000+ hours before, now the game becomes even more variable and interesting.
We are open to ideas for football cultures that could be added to teams from Asia, Africa, America, and the lower part of the European ranking. We have our own ideas, but if someone suggests something better than what we have, we would be happy to listen.
How to follow the development progress?
First and foremost, visit the game's page and add it to your wishlist. This way, you will receive an email from Steam when the game goes into Early Access or Full Release.
Secondly, click "Follow" to be notified whenever we publish news on Steam.
The great place to get notified about news and discuss them is our Discord. Also, to follow our news, you can subscribe to our mailing list: Email subscription.
