The expansion Football Stars will be available on November 12. In this post, I will write about all its changes, improvements and new mechanics.

GIFTEDNESS

• Now each footballer is also characterized by Giftedness (value from 0 to 5).
• Giftedness affects the experience footballers gain and skill potential in a match.
• Skill Potential is a new global mechanic that affects the performance of skills in a match. It also affects the Headers and the effectiveness of the wing defenders.
• Motivation increases the skill potential (in addition to increasing the attributes).
• Wherever the footballer’s level is displayed, the rate of gaining experience is also displayed (which depends on his current level and Giftedness).
• The Giftedness of the footballers who leave the Youth Academies depends on the rank of the country in which the team plays. This applies to both the player’s team and the AI ​​teams.

STATISTICS

• The Statistics button has been added to the Tournaments screen. When you click this button, the detailed statistics screen of the selected tournament opens. There you will find a wealth of information about the best clubs, the best footballer, the most interesting matches, etc. For continental tournaments, there are additional statistics about the participation of different countries.
• There is a button on the tournament statistics screen that opens the possibility to view the league standings for each season. Available for all leagues.
• When you enter your club screen, you will see two new global tabs with a huge amount of historical statistics for your club. There you will find information about your best footballers, the most interesting matches, the statistics of each of your footballers, including those who have already left the club, action zones in matches, penalties, wins and losses, cards, injuries, scoring methods used, etc.
• There you will also find detailed statistics on Money earned and spent, Glory and Fans. By clicking on the ‘i’ buttons for the current season, you can see more detailed statistics. For example, you can see current sponsors, footballers sold and bought, etc.
• Also some general statistics have been added to the screen of each AI club. So you can investigate how other clubs live.
• Now one best footballer of the match is selected for each match (previously the game selected the best player for each team). Also added a separate screen which shows the top-3 best footballers. At the end of the season, you can get Glory if your footballer is on this list.
• After each match, the journalists now make up the Team of the Round. It depends both on the effectiveness of a footballer in the match and on his strength as a whole. You get fans for every your footballer in this team. If you provided more footballers to this team than other clubs, you also earn Glory.
• At the end of the season, each tournament will have a Team of the Season. It consists of the footballers who were nominated to the Team of the Round most of the times.
• Now you can go to the Countries screen, select any country and open the standings for that country at any time.
• Also for each country, you can see the statistics of the teams that have earned the most trophies.
• Now you can see a list of all matches in the current season for any tournament and any country. To see this list, change the view of the Tournaments screen (arrows left and right at the bottom of the screen).
• Before the match, you can click the Head-to-Head button to see detailed statistics of all the times your club played against the next opponent.
• You can select any club in the standings or in the fixtures, and by clicking the Head-to-Head button, you can see the statistics of play against this club.
• On the match results screen, you can select any club, and by clicking the Head-to-Head button, you can see detailed statistics of the plays between the two clubs for which you are currently watching the match results. That is, for example, even if you play in the Amateur League, you can open the results of a European Cup match, find a match between Barcelona and Liverpool, select one of these clubs, and see the entire history of plays between Barcelona and Liverpool. Usually, after 5-10 seasons, interesting data accumulates. Moreover, you can even go to another country’s match results and see the history of plays between any pair of clubs in the selected country.
• At the end of the season, detailed statistics for all tournaments you have participated in that season are shown. Previously, such statistics were only displayed in the hot seat mode. Now we have expanded it significantly and added it to the single-player game.
• After each match, more statistics are now shown: interesting matches, footballers, etc. Also in a separate tab, you can see the statistics of the performance of your footballers in the last match.
• Redesigned the Career screen. More historical data is now shown (cards, injuries, etc.). It also now displays how much money the footballers was sold for.
• The Player’s Profile screen has been improved. More data added. Also, now you can separate the statistics for all time from the statistics for the time spent in your club.
• Added ability to sort league tables by all parameters (goals, wins, etc.).
• Added the ability to sort the country ranking table for each season separately.

TRANSFERS

• Now you can send scouts to other countries. The higher the country’s position in the ranking, the stronger (and more expensive) footballers play there.
• Now you can open the screen of any club, select a footballer and try to buy him. But the cost in Money and Glory will be significantly higher than if it was put on the transfers. Some footballers are very important to their clubs, so you will need to pay extra Glory just to get the club ready to discuss the sale of the footballer with you.
• Other clubs can study your footballers, find those they really need and ask you to sell them. Moreover, they will offer a higher price than the footballer is worth. You can ask for even more, and if you’re lucky, the cost of the footballer can triple (or get even higher).
• Now, when selling a footballer, in most cases, 3 options are shown (before, there was only one option). Moreover, club offers may vary. Some clubs can offer less Money but additionally give Glory. And some clubs can offer more Money but split the payment into two parts (the second part will come at the beginning of the next transfer window).
• Now, the more upgraded are your scouts, the cheaper are the footballers in the transfer lists. You can build a strategy through transfers and get quite cheap and good footballers from there.

INFRASTRUCTURE AND COACHES

• The mechanics of infrastructure and staff have been reworked. Now, in order to hire staff, you must have a corresponding building built. Each building gives the opportunity to make a different number of staff upgrades.
• New buildings: Medical Centre (each level gives 2 personnel upgrades), Scout Centre (each level gives 2 personnel upgrades), Training Grounds (each level gives 5 personnel upgrades)
• Added two youth coaches. One coach improves the attributes of the young footballers, the other one gives more experience to the young footballers after the matches.
• Added two medics. One medic reduces the duration of injuries, the second one reduces the likelihood of injury.
• Now the experience of a bench coach is not combined with that of a class coach. After the match, the footballer receives the experience of each of the coaches separately.
• The experience given by different coaches has been rebalanced.

CARDS AND SUSPENSIONS

• Now cards are issued separately for each tournament. In the footballer’s profile, you can see which tournaments the cards have been issued for.
• Receiving two yellow cards in different matches will result in a one-match suspension.
• At the beginning of a new season, all cards are reset.
• Single yellow cards are also reset after the quarterfinals of cup tournaments (including continental tournaments).

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

• Top clubs are now more intelligently looking for the footballers they need on transfers.
• Teams have learned to use more varied (and more complex) formations.
• The top clubs have learned how to select formations that work well against your tactics (provided the club has the right footballers).
• Teams have learned to make substitutions in the matches.
• Teams learned to change formation during the matches.
• AI is now much better at corners and also much better at defending during corners.

GAME MODES

• Added the Iron Manager mode. You cannot replay matches in this mode. If the player exits with Alt + F4, he will receive a technical defeat 3:0. An achievement is provided for using this mode.
• In the Hard mode, the skill’s potential more depends on Giftedness. Therefore, now the Hard mode has become more difficult not only economically, but also in gameplay (which I personally love very much).
• 25 new achievements.

CHANGES TO THE SPECIALIZATION TREE

• Added a new branch of specialization: ‘Stamina’. With this branch, you can increase the stamina recovery of a footballer, as well as reduce the likelihood of injuries and cards.
• Previously, when a footballer has learned the ‘Talent’ specialization group, the speed of training the next skill decreased by 2 months. Now, for learning this group, the footballer’s skill potential is increased by 1 (in Hard mode – by 2).
• Now the Fan Favorite gives additional Glory if a footballer is included in the Team of the Round (or Team of the Season) instead of additional fans (which led to their uncontrolled growth).

VISUAL

• Added animations of the celebrations when your team wins a tournament (or promotes to the higher stage of a cup tournament). Also, added the animations of regret when your team loses in a cup tournament.
• Now, you will be able to see the referee giving a card and footballers to be injured. Also, you will be able to see how footballers enter the pitch and leave it when you perform substitutions.
• Reworked the animation of the ball flying into the goal. Now the goals look more varied, interesting and realistic.

SOUND AND MUSIC

• Added 10 new musical tracks.
• Now, the crowd noise depends on the size of the stadium and on the number of the fans on the stands.
• On some biggest stadiums, the contextual fan reactions are added.

TUTORIALS

• Added new tests to the Coach license.
• The articles of Footballpedia have been updated and new ones have been added. Updated and new articles have a “New” or “Updated” icon.
• Added class icons to Footballpedia (to make it easier to find information about them).

QUALITY OF LIFE IMPROVEMENTS

Match

• Now you can simulate the started match to the end at any moment. This comes in handy when you are confidently winning or losing and want to save time.
• The post-match statistics screen has been improved. Now goals are better visible there, assistants and injury durations are displayed.
• Added the names of the kicker and goalkeeper during the penalties.

Out of the matches

• Before the match, next to the crests of the participating clubs, it is displayed whether any of these clubs is a current champion in any tournament. Icons are also displayed if one of the clubs is a bogey team/ easy rival /constant rival for the other club.
• Added information about the interest from other clubs for all footballers on the Contracts screen.
• On the Opponent’s screen before the match, the stars of the strength of your team and the opposing team are now displayed.
• The Opponent screen has been moved to the first tab. If there is no match that day, the screen looks like the Squad screen. If there is a match, then – like the Opponent screen.
• Now every time the game is saving, this process is displayed.

Other

• In the hot seat mode, we added a match statistics to the substitutions screen (same as already was made for the single-player campaign). 

BALANCE

We’ve reviewed every single element of the game’s actual balance and made adjustments to make the game more interesting. In the lists below, I will highlight only the most noticeable changes.

Match

• Precision Shot has become even more powerful, since now during its execution the defence of opponents is reduced not by 20, but by 40%. Previously, this action was rarely used, it was only suitable for certain tactics. Now it will be used much more often.
• If a footballer receives a red card, the attributes of all footballers of that team are reduced by 15%.
• Goalkeepers can now receive red cards.
• Now, when taking a penalty kick, the Accuracy attribute is used instead of Control.
• If a goalkeeper stays not on his zone, the penalty is increased from 50 to 85%.

Game modes

• The balance of the starting number of fans in the Sandbox has been changed. Earlier in the early game, the lower leagues had a huge fan base, so you didn’t have to worry when they left. Now the number is more in line with the position of the team in the league.
• In Hard mode, the age of the footballers at the start of the campaign has been increased. In addition, the balance of Giftedness in Hard mode is different from Normal, making the difference between different Giftedness levels more pronounced.
• Easy mode is made easier by lowering contract costs, lowering transfer costs, lowering infrastructure and staff costs, decreasing the age and increasing the Giftedness of the starting team.

Economics

• Earlier, the footballer’s transfer value was affected by the footballer’s level, age, skill levels and specialization. Now Giftedness additionally affects the value.
• Earlier, only the footballer’s level and the duration of the contract affected the cost of contracts. Now, the level and quantity of skills, the specialization level, and Giftedness also affect the cost.
• After cup qualification matches, the footballers earn less experience (than in the vanilla game). This is especially important in Hard Mode in the Amateur League, when you could get a lot of ‘free’ experience, which was not logical.
• The balance of earning experience in different leagues has been revised. Defeating a higher league match now gives almost the same experience as winning a lower league match. Therefore, promotion to a higher league now makes much more sense.
• The Glory balance has been completely redesigned. The most notable changes: less reward for defeating a strong opponent, more reward for success in the tournaments, the cost of the first staff upgrades has been reduced, and the cost of the later upgrades is increased.
• The balance of the getting/losing fans has been completely remade. The dynamics now look more realistic. In addition, it is now possible to get over 80,000 fans.
• Now sponsors give an additional cash bonus, the amount of which depends on the current number of fans.
• From now on, at least one sponsor will always offer two simple conditions (money per match / win / goals / home win). Therefore, if you do not want to risk, you can always choose a simpler condition.

Other

• In the Premier Leagues (of all countries), the disparity between the strongest and weakest clubs has increased. Therefore, there is now less chance that weak clubs will win often become champions or win continental cups.
• Added the ability for Central Midfielders to learn the class Wing Defender. And vice versa.
• Changed the balance of points given to countries for participating teams in continental tournaments. In general, the points are close to the real balance in European tournaments, but with minor changes due to the fact that the number of rounds in our game may differ from the real ones.
• Now footballers are not included in the top-10 lists based on the results of the qualifying stages of cup tournaments, as such footballers previously had an advantage in determining the best footballers of the season.

FIXED BUGS

We have fixed a lot of hard to notice bugs. Below, I will describe the most obvious fixed bugs.

Match

• When the goalkeeper took the penalty kick, he was wearing a field uniform.
• When performing a False Kick, the sound of the ball hitting was heard, although there was no hit. 

Balance

• Weak teams earned XP faster than strong teams. This led to the fact that over time they began to win continental tournaments. This was the result of a bug in the code that we fixed. 

Interface

• After renaming tournaments, default names were used on some screens.
• The game crashed if you drag a footballer on the specialization screen and drop it out of the list.
• On the specialization screen the class colors did not work consistently in some cases.
• Music disappeared when switching to Face Editor and Leagues Editor.
• The dark background under the names of the footballers in the team photo did not support a large number of lines.

New campaign

• If you change the rating of countries before the start of the campaign, then the strong countries remained strong, even if they were at the bottom of the rating. Fixed. Now the strength of the country at the beginning of the campaign depends on the rating set before the match. 

Hot Seat

• In the Hot Seat mode, the game didn’t use the strength of the teams set in the modifications. 

Texts

• Errors in some names of footballers have been fixed.
• Year-month-day characters were not displayed in the Contacts screen in Korean and Chinese.
• A lot of bugs have been fixed in localization for some languages ​​(many thanks to the players who took the initiative and reviewed all the texts !!!)
• In some places where the texts did not fit, the text fields were expanded.

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