Guide to realistic football experience in FIFA 09!

[bluchampblogger]

I love this game. As I get better I realise that very often the scoring happens to be from a throughball that results in on one-on-one situation, which you can finish with a finesse shot. Nowadays, it is happening too very often. This is what people complain as 'route one football' of FIFA 09. This is not a bug or a glitch. I'll explain you why this happens and I'll also suggest you a solution which would make your game lot more tactical and lateral. If you haven't experienced this one-on-one thingy, you are not spoilt yet.

See this game plays so beautifully that you can almost score a goal anyway you want. You can build up to the goal to your heart's content. When there is an easy way out, you can exploit it. You don't want to exploit that because you want realism and simulation as much as possible. When you're playing a league or a cup competition, when you badly need a goal, you'd get it cheaply but wouldn't really enjoy it. Am I right? This "throughball + one on one" happens to be one such quick way of scoring. I don't want route one football and I don't need a readymade way of scoring a goal.

Lot of people have written and said that this game rewards only route one football and does not reward or even facilitate patient build up football with lateral movement. That's primarily because of the number of one-on-ones that people have seen so far in the game. When you keep zipping throughballs to the centre one-on-ones, it's not fun. You are unchallenged. You have one quick way to get out of jail. It subconsciously restricts your creative thinking in building the game up and does not encourage you to play enterprising football. So why does this happen? I'll break the suspense upfront. It's all because of the custom tactics set up of your opponent teams.

I was playing against Real Madrid the other night. Throughball right through the centre, one-on-one to Drogba, goal! I was thinking how this could happen. It can't be that I'm too good at this game. I ruled that out. In reality, they would have floored Drogba instead of watching sprint through 30 yards. The defenders didn't even make a decent attempt to stop Drogba.So I went about investigating further. If you see the custom tactics set up of Real Madrid, you'll understand.

Go to the defence numbers in custom tactics for Real Madrid. Pressure is 65. Aggression is 35. Team width is 65. What does this mean? The 65 for pressure means that the Real Madrid players would start pressurising you quite high on the pitch. When they pressurise, with the kind of responsiveness in FIFA 09, you can quickly exploit the gap created by the pressure with a quick throughpass and boom. But why don't their defenders jockey, tackle and give Drogba a hard time? Because the aggression is set at 35. This means they won't really pounce on you. They would try to contain you but won't tackle you hard. At least they must be blocking Drogba in numbers right? No they won't because the team width is set at 65. That shows that the defence will not narrow down at the back. They would in fact be quite wide and spread, and in case of a quick attack, their full backs will not be able to come to rescue. Goodness me, they also have the defender line as offside trap - good movement or bad movement, they're in it together, the back four.

So now, what settings for Real Madrid here would have challenged Drogba? Pressure is not quite effective without aggression. And I don't want the defender to be activated so high on the pitch. I'd put the pressure in the region of 30-35. Aggression should be between 70 and 80. This way, you won't have it easy. It would be a massive challenge to get through. AI will tackle you, would even foul you and might double the pressure by asking one more defender to help stop you. Your route one football would be effectively over here. The more your 'striker runs' are intercepted by the opposition defence, you'll start thinking of how else to play, build up and score.

So what have I done here. For certain top teams, I have gone and edited the custom tactics set up so that they don't play like absolute idiots. And then I have created certain standard set ups. For instance, relegation battlers. They all mostly play very similarly. So I have personally edited their custom tactics to reflect their deep defending, hard tackling, long balling etc. But I did not want to do this for all of them individually. I started with Stoke City. Edited the custom tactics for them. And then for the similar teams, I just pointed their custom tactics to this saved custom tactics of Stoke City. So simple.

As per the original set up, Stoke had a fast build up play. The players are not as fast as Chelsea players. So when they play fast build up and lose the possession high up on the pitch, they won't even tackle because of the original defence set up in custom tactics and they can't even catch up a monster like Didier Drogba. If they lose the ball in my half, it could be a matter of two or three passes, before you see another one of those Didier Drogba goals. Not anymore. Now they will tackle me, challenge me, double up on me and even crowd in the centre. Lovely isn't it? That's no guarantee for Stoke City that they won't concede, it only improves their defence. Remember, we're not trying to boost any statistics here. If that Stoke defender is rated only 55 in tackling, when you set the their team aggression to 75 or 80, this 55-rated defender would do as much as possible in the framework of his own capabilities.

Apart from the unique tactics I'd like to customise and keep for the champions league teams, I would create more such generalised customised custom tactics for groups like relegation battlers, mid-tablers, euro-aspirants etc. My special concern would be on editing the defence set ups. I'm already half way through this. I love my games now. AI gives me a tough fight through the centre forcing me to come up with new ideas to break it up. With the gameplay of FIFA 09 at my disposal, I love this challenge!

Finally, if you're fine with the game as it is, no worries. Don't tweak anything. Just enjoy your game. Also if you're finding the game already difficult enough, good for you. Keep trying. But just keep checking if your goals are from everywhere and if your goals are produced from varied types of attacks. The moment you realise that all that you do is one-on-ones, use this little tutorial. But remember, one-on-ones are not bad. They are in real football so they must be in FIFA 09 as well. I'm just saying that the proportion should also stay true.

If you think that you're unable to control the game as much as you'd like to, set the passing in chance creation in custom tactics to somewhere around 30 which means safe passing. If you do this alongwith 30 or 40 for passing in build up, there will always be players around you to pass the ball and you can slowly build up and play your game. Having made these tweaks, I'm enjoying this game so much. The quality of my football has really improved and I'm truly enjoying the way I play. Now I have multiple options in mind, I'm trying out new things. Heck, I've strarted to use crossing as a weapon and even putting corners to good use! Let's use the game to its fullest potential!

P.S: (a) I'm referring only to the offline games. (b) I play in 'professional' difficulty. (c) I use 'assisted' for pass, cross and through. 'semi' for shots and 'manual' for lob pass.

[Jimmyboy34]

another great post but just out of curiosity why didnt you up the level to world class not sure the through ball is as easy in that level

[bluchampblogger]

By the way, my above post could be a response to the thread by WabeWalker1 - 'An Utter Disgrace'. I wish all those involved in the discussion in that thread read my above post. It would add something to the discussion, I hope.

[Sammy369]

Thats a really great post mate. Would help a tonne of the fifa new comers around the forums a lot in terms of defending and setting up tactics........5* thread

[bluchampblogger]

Originally Posted by Jimmyboy34

another great post but just out of curiosity why didnt you up the level to world class not sure the through ball is as easy in that level

Thanks Jimmyboy! If I had upped it to world class, AI would have got better all around. I thought that the AI's attack and midfield in 'professional' difficulty was just good enough for me whereas AI's defence alone had to be tweaked to make it complete.

[s33k3rGR197]

Very good post mate.Really educating. Keep them coming people.

[bluchampblogger]

Thanks a lot guys! Please try that out for one opponent and let us all know how it works for you.

And, please keep bumping ;-)

[ImperialGendarme]

Well in online this might turns out differently. If you play against superhuman teams online, they might pressure you in defence with high speed players and ruin your build up play. So quick through balls are like the only way to score against these teams.

[supersi83]

Just tried this and I must say that it makes the game a whole lot harder. I play the game on pro myself and started to find it a bit easy to score.

I played two games with these settings, the first i actually lost 2-1 against Madrid (I was Arsenal) and the second I won 1-0. In the end I was relieved when I scored. You have to actually play football rather than scoring the same type of goals.

If possible could you post the settings you used for lower teams e.g. Stoke and carry on the great work, Thank You

[bluchampblogger]

Originally Posted by ImperialGendarme

Well in online this might turns out differently. If you play against superhuman teams online, they might pressure you in defence with high speed players and ruin your build up play. So quick through balls are like the only way to score against these teams.

See, online no longer gives you an enjoyable experience unless you play your friends or trustworthy chaps. I would rate a game based on how it plays offline. In online, pretty much any game can be abused by the geek-gamers.

[lungfull]

can we get a breakdown of the setting for each of these

"relegation battlers, mid-tablers, euro-aspirants etc."

and some sort of list of what the big clubs in the game should really be set at...

really like the idea of getting the already great game playing as realistic as pos....

cheers!

also are we saying that EA dont have a clue about how the tactic system should be set up?...have they dropped the ball?

[spaghetticat]

Hey Blu - isn't there some way this year that you can upload all these custom tactics you've worked so hard at for us to share?...I know I've read somewhere that I think it's possible, you put em in your online locker or something - anybody else offer a little help here? Maybe we can all much more easily reap the benefits of Blu's discovery.

[EastbourneBoroFC]

Brilliant post bluchampblogger, thanks for this!
But will this do anything in online games, as I get annoyed how you can play a nice passing game of football, making loads of clever chances, yet you are playing some boring, "must win or I will cry" idiot, who does nothing but through ball it to the likes of Christiano Ronaldo or Anelka, who are able to sprint past my defenders like a bullet train! Presumably tweaking my own defence to roughly how you suggested, (e.g having pressure in the region of 30-35 and the agression in the region of about 70-80 etc) would make my defence not quite so easy to get past? Or am i mistaken? Thanks!

[bluchampblogger]

The below setting is what I use for the relegation battlers:

Build Up

Speed: 40 (the pace of the build up, not the players)
Passing: 85 (this means lots and lots of long ball)
Positioning: Organised

Chance Creation

Passing: 30 (they would play only safe passes, no risky passes at all)
Crossing: 80 (would keep trying for opportunities to cross)
Shooting: 55 (normal, sometimes they shoot, sometimes they pass)
Positioning: Organised

Defence

Pressure: 35 (won't go looking for the ball)
Aggression: 75 (they'll break your ankles and get sent off)
Team width: 20 (you won't find too much space or gap between the defenders)
Defender Line: Cover (only useful when it uses a defender in midfield or further but it wont)

Set it up this way, play the game and let us all know.

[bluchampblogger]

Originally Posted by EastbourneBoroFC

Brilliant post bluchampblogger, thanks for this!
But will this do anything in online games, as I get annoyed how you can play a nice passing game of football, making loads of clever chances, yet you are playing some boring, "must win or I will cry" idiot, who does nothing but through ball it to the likes of Christiano Ronaldo or Anelka, who are able to sprint past my defenders like a bullet train! Presumably tweaking my own defence to roughly how you suggested, (e.g having pressure in the region of 30-35 and the agression in the region of about 70-80 etc) would make my defence not quite so easy to get past? Or am i mistaken? Thanks!

Sorry mate, this would work only in offline. In online, the defenders are all controlled by the humans only. So they will be prone to those human sluggishness in defending. Try it offline. It could work like a charm.

[bluchampblogger]

Originally Posted by supersi83

Just tried this and I must say that it makes the game a whole lot harder. I play the game on pro myself and started to find it a bit easy to score.

I played two games with these settings, the first i actually lost 2-1 against Madrid (I was Arsenal) and the second I won 1-0. In the end I was relieved when I scored. You have to actually play football rather than scoring the same type of goals.

If possible could you post the settings you used for lower teams e.g. Stoke and carry on the great work, Thank You

Thanks for the feedback mate! It's good that it works for you! I've put my custom tactics settings for relegation battlers. Just apply them for Stoke for instance, and please tell us if they play like Stoke!

[Nick0211]

Originally Posted by bluchampblogger

Aggression: 75 (they'll break your ankles and get sent off)

lalalala!!!

Hey mate, great post! 5*

I will play with this when i get home from Work!

[lungfull]

ca we get some settings for the other typs of team man....dont know if your settings for passing and crossing could be a little high...as all teams big and small have it in them to play nice football.....maybe some middle ground is needed...it ****es me off that EA havent got this right from the off....or at least incuded it in live season or something like that.....grrrr

[DirtyTurk]

probably like most of us, I have just been upping the difficultly once i start winning too many in a row. I have noticed the frequent one on ones, but my tactic has been to start removing the assistances.

for example, turn off shot assistance and see how many drogba slots home on the one on ones. turn off through ball assistance and see how many perfect passes lampard will make
etc
etc

in my opinion the manual passing and through ball are a bit too much as the controller sensitivity isn't exactly 360 degrees, plus the camera angle, plus the controller's angle to the tv.. evertyhing makes it a bit too much

so back to my piont: i hav eonly started now to see the benefits of tactics. I feel myself always scoring in similar plays and always getting scored on in similar ways so I have started tweaking tactics and have really seen a difference.

now, tweaking the opponents is a great idea and im going to try that out asap so that the end result is legendary, semi-assistance and solid tactics for everyone...

[lungfull]

Originally Posted by DirtyTurk

probably like most of us, I have just been upping the difficultly once i start winning too many in a row. I have noticed the frequent one on ones, but my tactic has been to start removing the assistances.

for example, turn off shot assistance and see how many drogba slots home on the one on ones. turn off through ball assistance and see how many perfect passes lampard will make
etc
etc

in my opinion the manual passing and through ball are a bit too much as the controller sensitivity isn't exactly 360 degrees, plus the camera angle, plus the controller's angle to the tv.. evertyhing makes it a bit too much

never thought to ask about what other settings are been used with these changes...good point....

i have passing on semi and the rest on manual....

[Interzone11]

this is a huge help. i'm going to try this out tomorrow. I really appreciate the time you took to write and post this. keep them coming.

[Palimferreira]

THIS IS ONE OF THE BEST POSTS I'VE EVER SEEN. Great job dude.

[ToNaKa07]

Great post man. It's good to see someone who fully understands the custom tactics & can explain it in an understandable way.

Also, a fantastic idea to edit teams' custom tactics so that they play more like they do in reality.

[bluchampblogger]

Thanks all. I'm all too keen to know how this worked for you.

[bluchampblogger]

Guys! I have now thoroughly tested this with the relegation battlers in premier league. It works brilliantly well!