patch notes
0.45.0

Gameplay:

New Implementation:

• Introduced a ball roll skill move, which can be performed by holding the right stick at a 90-degree angle to the player's facing direction.
• Physical Tackles on the (A) button which will pull the dribbler when behind and try to overtake, or shoulder barge when executed from the side or front to dispossess dribblers.
• Implemented ball relative right stick player switch option.
• New Gameplay Cameras: Low Angle & Tele Broadcast
• Based on the through pass stat, players can now play through passes a certain distance further ahead when contextually appropriate.
• Ground passes are now played slightly more in the movement direction of the receiver, unless an opponent covers that area.

AI:

Introduced AI Run Speed:

• Speed range determined by the agent's aggression stat. The speed range is higher than the jog, but lower than sprint speed, so walk < jog < run < sprint.
• This change reduces the perceived intensity of movements and reserves actual sprinting only for AI attacking- and user-triggered-runs as well as for tracking runs as a defender.

Introduced New Decision Making System:

• This is a necessary step to prepare the AI for full anti-cheat protection.
• Way more reliable than the old one.

Attacking Triangle Improvements:

• Reduce agents crossing the ball holder's path.
• Prevent from forwards dropping too far back to support you.

Formation Line Improvements:

• Wide players (WM's, WAM's and WF's) provide more goal danger in the final 3rd by tucking in more when required.
• Default Full Backs don't push as high up the pitch and one of the full backs stays further back when the other one pushes up.
• Defensive Line drops off in a more structured manner resembling a mid block as opposed to dropping off solely based on ball depth.
• The forward line drops off more when the ball depth gets very low.

Adjustments & Improvements:

• Agents will now strafe up to run their speed.
• Attacking triangle improvements to:
• Prevent from forwards dropping too far back to support you.
• Improved offensive AI runs to account better for spaces and enabled runners to do harsher turns.
• Runners perform much better in terms of finding optimal positions, creating more attack opportunities.
• Improved in-box positioning for while on attack.
• Improved positioning of Penalty Camera.
• Updated the zones in which a cross is considered over a lofted pass to give more variety in crosses
• Improved goalie positioning from corners.
• Heavy touch can now only be activated when sprinting.
• Improve keeper behaviour when saving slow penalties.
• Implemented improved targeting of shots so players will automatically aim down the middle of the goal when it is open (keeper is not in the goal) to avoid misses in these scenarios.
• Pass selection now considers offside players slightly less favourably than onside ones.
• Raise Bots stats to 70 across the board.

Animations:

• Adjustment for strikers not dropping too deep in the build up phase.
• Lowered the amount of crossing over between players whilst in an attacking state.
• Improved the precision and frequency of runs.
• Ensured that midfielders don't push as far forward when the ball depth is really high.
• General animation improvements.
• Better ball contact for actions.

Design Adjustments:

• Made the optimal charge time (for max power) 90% from all distances for power shot/finesse, and 95% for driven/driven finesse.
• Adjusted shooting dispersion vs charge time for all shot types and stats.
• Increased min.
• shot power multiplier based on charge from 0.3 to 0.5
• Max slide speed reduced from 1200cm/s to 800cm/s.
• Adjusted downwards height deviation based on charge level to ensure power shot/finesse doesn't hug the ground too much for low charge levels.
• Tweaked offensive zones for the WM position to give them more area to operate in.
• Slightly adjusted Attacking Midfield Line distance to enemy opponent midfield line for all 5 formations.
• Adjustment for strikers not dropping too deep in the build up phase.
• Lowered the amount of crossing over between players whilst in an attacking state.
• Improved the precision and frequency of runs.
• Ensured that midfielders don't push as far forward when the ball depth is really high.
• General animation improvements.
• Better ball contact for actions.
• Lowered max & min shot power for all shot types.
• Lowered min. (99-rated) keeper reaction time.

UI/UX/Audio & Quality of Life:

HUD UI:

• Revamped the way of presenting player cards.

Full visual overhaul for the Pause/Halftime/Fulltime screens.

• Added intro/outro animations to match state widget.
• The match state widget now properly reflects the active game mode.
• Red cards are now reflected in the match state widget.
• Updated pause request visual.
• Unique game mode icons now appear in the HUD wipe and game mode widget for each game mode.
• Ignore player pause requests during replays.

Audio:

Added UI SFX for:

• Pause Menu Countdown.
• HUD UI when a goal is scored.

Art:

The AMP Arena Improvements:

• Added Crowds.
• Added Props.
• Tweaks to Lighting & Materials.

Core:

• Unreal 5.5.2 Upgrade.
• Shadow optimization.
• XeSS temporarly turned off due to Unreal 5.5.2 upgrade

Companion App:

• Added Swaps: Players can now submit 10 player cards to earn rewards.
• Added Challenges: Challenges rewards can be retrieved from the companion app.

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed a bug where the Persistent Connection failed to perform the connection cycle.
• Fixed a bug where pause requests disrupted the penalty sequence.
• Fixed a bug where delayed actions occurred.
• Fixed a bug where the ball would sometimes go through the player performing a slide tackle.
• Fixed a bug where the player rotated to face away from the ball during an animation.
• Fixed a bug where arms remained stuck facing down and skating after a tackle.
• Fixed a bug where the player leaned too much to the side when strafing.
• Fixed a bug where the dribble sprint to 180° turn resulted in strange rotation.
• Fixed a bug where dribbling cadence timings were irregular.
• Fixed a bug where the goal kick animation played twice during a goal kick.
• Fixed a bug where the corner kick animation was broken.
• Fixed a bug where jockeying caused a stutter animation.
• Fixed a bug where the player performed a 180° turn before executing a pass.
• Fixed a bug where the player did a 180° turn and took a backward touch when dribbling.
• Fixed a bug where headers were sometimes executed without using arms.
• Fixed a bug where an action animation was not aborted due to an interruption.
• Fixed a bug where 180° turns were executed rapidly or instantly.
• Fixed a bug where the goalkeeper played a second get-up animation when attempting to reposition.
• Fixed a bug where the player appeared to skate during movement.
• Fixed a bug where the player performed a weird bobble animation after an auto-tackle.
• Fixed a bug where the goalkeeper moved unnaturally before playing a pass.
• Fixed a bug where the slide tackle animation did not play.
• Fixed a bug where ERROR_CHARACTER_NOT_OWNED was not correctly propagated in DiscardCharacters.
• Fixed a fatal error occurring when discarding multiple players.
• Fixed a bug where the 'Something went wrong' notification messages did not get dismissed.
• Fixed a bug where the player started sliding when holding the second player press.
• Fixed a bug where rotation matching failed to align the player at the start of a 180° animation when triggered in quick sequence.
• Fixed a bug where the goalkeeper aggressively locked onto the ball outside the box.
• Fixed slide tackle detection as fouls.
• Fixed a case where goalie saves wouldn't trigger.