Appsolutely Mayhem

This article isn’t about the basics of the Web App failure, if you don’t know anything about the Fifa 12 Ultimate Team Web App, you may as well not read the rest of this. Firstly, I want to put this in a positive light so I’ll start with a negative first, better to end on a positive, isn’t it?

After being a loyal customer for all these years now, I’m going to defend EA as I can honestly I’ve overall had an enjoyable experience playing EA Sports games, there may have been moments where I didn’t enjoy it but I can honestly say I’ve never said the words “EA IS JUST S***.” (Something a few of the community love to say.)

The only negative I will point out is the irony on how the EA Servers will be reliable this year. We all know there have been problems but with the lack of new features for the online modes, and first impressions indicate that the servers won’t be in tip-top shape, doubts are creeping in. I’m not a server expert but surely the game servers are different to the ones on the app, I’m sure someone will correct me on that and can elaborate on the server issue. A positive from this is that the Fifa community is clearly growing as well as the amount of people working on the game.

You may say people are doing a bad job but put yourself in their shoes, can you do what they do? No, I don’t think the majority can. Without them, Fifa wouldn’t be what it is today (waits for sarcastic comments about how “S***” it is,) the awards Fifa get speaks for itself and to doubt the staff, the people who work for your entertainment is just idiotic. If you can prove that you can do better, hand in your CV to them and see how far it gets you.

I’ve been seeking many more questions than answers so I found myself using the EA forums again. The only answer I got was the average age of a Fifa player must be about 9. This takes me back to the Fifa community is clearly growing, well I don’t necessarily see that being solely being from the game being as good as it is. I’m not going to name names but I am going to blame some of the Youtube Stars for this. You know who they are, who do that type of thing, some are great and have a great understanding, and the others are simply jumping on the bandwagon, bringing their clueless, immature subscribers with them.

Now I move onto how we can fix the predicament we’re in. Firstly, I think bringing some of the more mature Fifa community (some of the bloggers like FifaSoccerBlog etc) more control. Not necessarily saying they should make the game but I feel they could bring a whole new dimension to Fifa as they know what we want. I know some of them are “gamechangers” but they could do more if allowed?

Secondly, I wouldn’t give a release day to the app. Sounds strange I know but the problem was the amount of people that tried to get on the app, so why don’t they just make sure it is 100% complete before release? Gamechangers could get exclusive access and give their feedback, increasing the chances of an app being released on time. The initial rush of people on there won’t be as high but the news the app being open would spread like wildfire, just a suggestion.

Lastly, to complete the trinity of renovations, I would also charge. This may sound again stupid but to get rid of the idiots, charge a small sum. If you have the season ticket then you can get it for free, it’s just another way to get rid of the immaturity and probably a fair bit of the scams that involve UT. I’m not going to mention how I’d improve the app anymore; you’re probably thinking “what an idiot.”

I now move onto on what I’d do in the next few days before release. Starting with the daily gifts, I’d scrap the bid tokens. All web app users should be given 100 bid tokens from the start; the gifts should be the mini packs or a small amount of coins, nothing major but a nice addition. Talking about packs, I’d also reduce the price of them until release. This is only due to the amount of players on the market and also, it is another incentive to use the app.

Putting both together, I know it is a free app and the moaning is completely idiotic but it would nice if we could get maybe a bit of a prize for being patient about the delay. I’m going to suggest an extra free players pack but take away the free daily gifts. My initial thoughts is that would be a good idea but again, someone will probably correct me.

Overall, I’m honestly not fussed on the state of the web app; I’m more bothered about the community. I actually hate using the word community but you kind of have to in this situation. I hope you’ve enjoyed my suggestions as well as a positive way of looking at things.

 

Thanks for reading,

Brad Harper.

Reflecting - Deadline Day.

The window may be shut but there’s still time to reflect on yesterday’s events. Don’t expect this to be the usual stereotypical blog, there will be grammatical errors, this is me reflecting on yesterday and to do that, I don’t want to ‘fine tune’ the article afterwards, so, lets begin with the start of the day.

As a Manchester United fan, I’m going to start off with my own particular club, if you don’t want to read about Sneijder, skip the next few paragraphs. The word I’d use on the possibility of the deal for me was optimistic. The twitter rumour mill was in full flow with mainly, a split opinion. Some say the deal was on, and others said it was off, as simple as that. With the deal being “dead” I was surprised when Sky Sports News (who I’ll get onto later) said they had “exciting news for Manchester United fans.”

Twitter went into turmoil, we were all on the edge of our seats, and even the neutrals were slightly excited. SSN are usually very good when it comes to transfers, knowing deals and normally confirming the deals on the programme.  This has changed this year. Twitter has simply ruined SSN, even though the confirmation and the reliability of SSN is so much greater than twitter, they narrow down the good from the crap, but this year, SSN fell for the crap.

Now, time to rant. Why the hell are you giving us this “exciting news” if you don’t even know it yourself? It took you 3 hours just say “there’s nothing new on Wesley Sneijder” Why? Why did it take that long, that’s pathetic. You gave so many false hope yesterday, including me, for what? I later found out it was the “excitable presenters fault” erm, no it wasn’t. You fell for a twitter rumour, you announced it to the viewers, you built it up “will Wesley Sneijder come to Manchester United, or not coming up next.” Those were the words of Hayley McQueen, one of the presenters. I’m not blaming her, someone should of told them that they’re not 100% sure that this is concrete information, she was in the loop as much as anyone.

I can fully accept you got it wrong, it happens, you even fell for a fake Stewart Downing twitter account over James Milner, and again, nothing happened after that. Surely, if you’ve given false (quite major) information, you should apologise, live on TV. No, they didn’t do that, they just kept badgering on about Cameron Jerome to Stoke, which they announced about an hour earlier.  I, as well as others, were pissed off and quite frankly have received quite a lame excuse back, an apology would be nice.

Sneijder didn’t come but they were other signings and I don’t want to bother you about the saga anymore, that’s the last of it from me, I promise. Now, I don’t want to talk in a very analytical view on each clubs signings, so, I’ll just mention a few. Firstly, Arsenal.

Speaking to fans before, and after the deadline, it seems a flash of realism has struck them. Losing such key figureheads in their previous side has seriously dampened the mood at Arsenal, and everyone knew they’d be busy. For me, they didn’t sign enough, they never were as Wenger left it too late. Arsenal haven’t got a top 4 squad anymore, replacing Fabregas and Nasri was always going to be hard but Arteta can’t fill both players roles, they struggled for goals before he arrived, now, it’ll be even harder. They may have more experienced leaders on the pitch but with these players, a new philosophy of play is in order. Mertesacker is a great signing, he’ll deal with the physical side of the Premier League, standing at 6ft 6, and it’ll be key how he and Vermaelen link together, and they could be a fantastic defensive partnership. Also, they brought in Santos, a left back who similarly to Clichy, is a bit suspect at the back. I think Arsenal fans shouldn’t expect an immediate good performance from the player but in time, he could be a great addition to the side, especially going forward.

Staying with the major clubs, we move onto Chelsea. I seem to get a lot of flak from their support so I’ll keep this short, why do I get flack? I just say it how it is, they aren’t as good as they once were, will struggle this year to beat the Manchester clubs. Meireles, really, that it? Mata is going to be a fantastic player, and in time, will bring out the best of Torres once again but only Meireles, they needed more, especially at the back, where they’ve looked suspect for several games now. They key to Chelsea is that they’ve got lucky, they’ve got 7 points in 3 games and they need to take that as a positive. A problem they will face is that teams will now feel they can take something from Stamford Bridge, they won’t just sit 11 behind the ball; I expect their home record not to be as great as it once was.

Moving onto to Stoke, one of the big spenders on deadline day. Personally, now, I feel they could do some real damage in the Premier League. The acquisition of Wilson Palacios is one of the signings of the summer, they’ve also strengthened at the back, increasing their strength in depth, something Arsenal, who I spoke about earlier, haven’t done. Stoke haven’t necessarily replaced players, they’ve just strengthen the side, in different areas. As well as Palacios and Jerome, they also brought Peter Crouch. The England international’s career has been on hold for a while, with Peter trying to revive his England career, I’m sure he’ll get plenty of chance at Stoke, expecting some big things from him this year.

Finally, I move onto new boys QPR. After a recent takeover, the signing of Joey Barton was the sign of things to come and deadline day didn’t disappoint the QPR faithful. Shaun Wright-Phillips was hotly tipped to join the London club and was again, one of the signings of the summer. As well as the tricky winger, they’ve also reassured the back four with the additions of Luke Young and Anton Ferdinand. The signings they’ve made may take them away from relegation but what will be interesting is how the ego’s of the club cope with the manager, if they clash, there’s always the risk of a backlash.

The last few days may of set the future for your clubs season but you can’t forget there’s still another chance in January to finalise your squad. The key from now to then is to keep players fit, it could be an even longer few months if your captain or key player gets injured, as well as that, winning games normally helps, doesn’t it?

 Signing of the Summer: Shay Given
Biggest Winner: Stoke
Biggest Loser: Everton
Biggest Disappointment: Tottenham
Biggest Twat: Owen Hargreaves

 

Thanks for reading the blog and also following me over the course of the summer, I, for one, will be staying on twitter and finally I can talk about football again. For me, I started Twitter with literally no “inside knowledge” of the game, just a passion and a decent understanding of Football. Over the last few weeks, I’ve spoken to some journalist and agents etc which has really helped. I want to become a Sports Journalist and this blog has slowly helped me along the way. I’m not ITK and never claimed to be so, if you followed me thinking I was going to give you some big exclusive, you followed the wrong guy.

Maybe in January, if I’m still talking to the right people as well as getting to know even more, I might have a few bits of information for you, but that’s the beauty of twitter, isn’t it?

Expect plenty of blogs in the future and I hope you’ve taken the time to read through this one, I’ve been “thefootylad” and I hope you’ve had a great summer.

Thanks for reading,

TFL.