What have we been up to recently?

I think it's about time for another update on our recent progress on the new match simulator. Even though we still have far to go, work is progressing at a steady pace and the match simulator is getting more awesome every day.

Some of the latest developments in regards to player intelligence and movement include:

• The players are much better at receiving a pass than they were in the old match engine. The player who passes will aim the shot ahead of the receiver, who will then run forwards to intercept the ball. It looks great.
• We've now got a referee on the pitch. He doesn't do much at this point, but he tries to position himself near the ball without getting in the way. He doesn't always succeed at that ;)
• Players can now face a different direction than the direction they're moving. That might not sound very exciting, but the required math for this feature is pretty hairy and it was necessary to implement in order that the keeper, for instance, can move backwards and sideways while always keeping his eye on the ball. All of this wasn't necessary in the old match engine, since all the players were just a coloured circle without a facing.
• Curving the ball is now supported - at this point we have implemented the physics to support curving the ball, but the players still don't know when they should try it. Teaching them that will be a huge job in itself.
• The players still don't know that there's such a thing as a throw-in or any set pieces for that matter. One of our next job is to make the match simulator support interruptions in normal play for situations such as set pieces, players cheering goals, streakers on the pitch and the referee handing out red or yellow cards.

All of this advanced intelligence will require a lot more computational resources than the old match engine did. The old one was very limited by the fact that we needed to be able to simulate up to 700,000 matches every week on a single server. For the new match simulator we're determined to not let that limit our creativity this time around, even if it means we'll have to buy more servers.

We've also started work on the new tactics editor that is required in order to support all of the new tactics and line-up options in the new match simulator.

We're putting a lot of emphasis on providing precise control for managers who want to adjust their tactics to be just right for each match, while at the same time making the new editor easy and inviting for new users. Each tactic option from the old editor will be re-evaluated and some settings will be removed awhile new ones are added. The most important consideration for every decision we make is to achieve the most entertaining game play possible.
Of course, the new tactics editor will support mobile browsers out of the box, which has been sorely missed by many of you in the old editor.

I apologize if this post was a bit long and techie, but we're doing so much cool stuff right now that it's hard to limit yourself. Everybody here at the Virtual Manager office could talk for hours about the things each of us is working on, but we'll try to curb our enthusiasm a bit and release the information to you in measured doses in the time to come.