Rugby 2012 - Kicking Improvement Suggestions

[best_fullback]

This is another aspect of the game of Rugby that is different enough from Defence and Attack that I believe it warrants its own thread.

In modern rugby there is now a lot of emphasis on the kicking game due to the recent rule changes that have taken place.

How do you feel about the current kicking system in Rugby 08? Like? Dislike?

Are there any additions you would make to the current system, or possibly remove aspects to make it simpler?

How do you feel about the goalkicking in Rugby 08?

Please if you have any suggestions please speak up!

My personal suggestions:

At the moment I feel the Rugby 05/06/08 out of hand kicking system is too easy.

Firstly punts: The kicking arrow shows the whole flight of the ball so you can easily just pop it out of touch on the opponents 22 from your tryline with someone like Carter or Wilkinson. Too unrealistic.

Not for the first time I want to see the return of a JLR feature in the way of the kicking arrow. This arrow only extended a few meters away from the kicker (slightly more if a better kicker) so it made judgement of kicks that much trickier and sometimes you wouldn't find touch because if it; much more akin to real life. Then I wouldn't mind a power bar for punts or the JLR system of the arrow extending the longer you held down kick.

Another possible addition to this could be the possibility to do spiral and end-over-end punt kicks. Many kickers vary between the two for accuracy (end-over-end) and more distance (spiral). A simple modifier button such as L2 could be used. E.g. for a normal end over end punt just use X and you will have a straight kicking arrow. By holding L2 and X it will produce a slightly curved arrow to indicate the direction of the spiral. The obvious advantage of the spiral is that if you judge it correctly it will bend and follow the touchline to gain extra meters.

Wind should be taken into account more so that kicks will move in the air accordingly.

Up and Unders: This is becoming an increasingly more frequently used in the modern game when recieving a kick and running back into traffic or trying to pin the opponent back in their 22 to force and error or possibly get possession. The sign of a good up and under is one that hangs in the air long enough and with the right amount of distance so that supporting players can compete for it.

The Rugby 05/06/08 system I thought was ok but you couldn't really change the distance on the kick very easily meaning the kick never went far enough and sort of missed the point of what an up and under is meant to acheive.

I wouldn't mind a similar small kicking arrow as I have suggested above for up and unders so the whole flight isn't shown and then just an X on the area where it is going to come down. This X I feel should start at a medium size and gradually get smaller as the ball moves in the air and comes down at its exact location. This would add the uncertainty element that there is when using up and unders.

For crossfield kicks the up and under system should just be used but (given that you will be able to control the distance better as I have suggested) you just extend the distance as to how you see fit.

There should also be a good jumping/competing implemented in the use of kicks as when playing against the CPU they never jumped and you could easily just steal possession every time. Also the jumping animation was wierd because the player just jumped up with both hands above their head. How often do you see that? I think when you jump the player should jump with their arms out infront of them to take into their chest, as in real life.

Again, wind should be taken into account more so that kicks will move in the air accordingly.

Grubbers/Chips: Grubbers were ok in the previous games but again far too ineffective, trys were hardly ever scored off of them. Again a small arrow should be used but because it is a grubber the execution of the kick needs to happen a lot quicker. Fly halves can usually do a grubber in a blink of an eye and you should be able to do the same if you see an opening behind the defensive line.

As for chips (which have been completely neglected) I think by double tapping the punt button would work well so if you see a gap behind the defence a quick double tap will perform a small chip over the heads of the defence. The same arrow should be used as before but obviously smaller. After the second tap holding down would increase power.

Drop Goals: Please, please, please HB do away with the 08 'stop the bar on the green bit' system. It was so bad. Again I think it just needs a standard small arrow so that you can aim for the posts but the size will make it trickier to land them.

Again, wind should be taken into account more so that kicks will move in the air accordingly.

Goal Kicking: At the moment I think this is ok, and I wouldn't be too bothered if it didn't change. However I feel, like with drop goals a lot of emphasis is placed on stopping the line on the orange line when the bar is coming down really fast and if you don't you pretty much always miss.

I like the system used on kicking kings on the BBC website here. The important difference is you do accuracy first, and its a lot easier. Then power after. This means you can pretty much always get kicks going where you want them but then the 3rd aspect of wind is taken into account so you have to judge accordingly. I think the wind on 08 for goal kicking was fine and its pretty much the same on kicking kings.


That is pretty much my 2 cents on kicking. I feel as well as these changes the two most important mechanics that should be taken into account are wind and the speed it takes to complete the kick. In the previous games grubbers would take ages so you would get tackled and knock on far too much when doing them. Short quick kicks like chips and grubbers should take the same time (maybe a little longer) that it would to operate a normal pass. Distance kicks on the other hand will take longer as the kicker will usually take a run up into the kick.

What are your thoughts?

 

[lynam1104]

good ideads but i wouldn't be suprised if this thread gets moved into the suggestions thread

 

[Duckdee]

Looks good to me, especially using a double-tap to change the kick. Football games used to have arrows for free kicks, but now don't, so perhaps they should be dropped from goal kicking.

 

[Versus]

The big thing for me is the chip kick, a quicker release of the grubber kick (ever tried to grubber it been smashed, because it takes AGES). The other is balancing the kicking.... Seriously. You vs a team in 08 with Carter, O'Gara, Latham, Henson, Percy or Wilko and you will spend most of the game in your 22. Just balance it out, it is also very easy vsing teams with a bad kicker, which is about 95% of them. They just thump them from the 22 about 10 metres.

So yeah, HB studios, just get the balancing of the kicking, most players can kick 60m unlike with rugby 08 where opposition can kick maybe 20m max unless it is one of the players mentioned above. Make the A.I smarter with its kicking, please.

 

[sambãd5]

What about like real life, the chances of the ball going off the side of the boot? now like EA games seem to do, is make things happen too often, but if someone whos a bad kicker, or form is down, etc, you have a 10%chance of it going sideways?

 

[Hamez]

I always hear people talking about how the likes of percy, johnny and carter are too overpowered. But I think they are just right the other kickers are under powered. Considering I can kick around 50m on the full sometimes more, sometimes less. I think accuracy should play more of a part than distance, most kickers kick as far as me, but they are generally more accurate. Perhaps a landing radius should be put in, i like how you get the full arrow showing you wear the ball will go, but how about making accuracy affect it, the lower the accuracy the fatter the arrow? and add a circle radius to wear the ball is intended to go the less accurate the kicker bigger the circle. rather than have random things like off the side of the boot, you will know roughly wear the ball will go so you can attempt to allow for bad kicking. I much prefer to rely on skill of the player than having random acts that are out of my control happen.

 

[TRF C A Iversen]

I always hear people talking about how the likes of percy, johnny and carter are too overpowered. But I think they are just right the other kickers are under powered. Considering I can kick around 50m on the full sometimes more, sometimes less. I think accuracy should play more of a part than distance, most kickers kick as far as me, but they are generally more accurate. Perhaps a landing radius should be put in, i like how you get the full arrow showing you wear the ball will go, but how about making accuracy affect it, the lower the accuracy the fatter the arrow? and add a circle radius to wear the ball is intended to go the less accurate the kicker bigger the circle. rather than have random things like off the side of the boot, you will know roughly wear the ball will go so you can attempt to allow for bad kicking. I much prefer to rely on skill of the player than having random acts that are out of my control happen.

I have to applaud your first point. You are 100% right about distance! If all kicking distance is lowered to meet the pathetic standards of the average guys then who's going to want to play any sort of kicking game! Still I'd say that maybe I'd lower the kicking distance of these super boots by a mere 2-5% and raise the average kickers by 5-7%, thus closing the gap.

As for the rest of the point I do agree some fattening of the arrow to make accuracy/inaccuracy happen is probably a good idea too.

 

[McCracka_09]

i think the bounce off the ball needs to change. its always predictable and i kan always get to the ball. so maybe have the option of taking the ball tracker off when kicks happen to make it harder.

for goal kicking maybe introduce the choice of kicking tee??
eg. ball facing foward would give better distance bt not as good accuracy.
ball facing up-right would give better accuracy but not as good distance

 

[Jaymzw]

In my opinion Carter/Wilkinson are overpowered. This should probably be fixed.
Also the amount of time to take grubbers is too long. You are always tackled.
Drop goals/up & unders are too short. Steyn can kick from 60m in real life, others 40m easy.

Now my idea for goal kicking which i think is quite unique. Has anyone played a recent Tiger Woods game? The way the analog stick is used to hit the ball (eg power effected by timing of back-forward motion, also spin can be put on the ball aswell as slice/pulling shots). All these things happen when goal kicking and would work well if implemented properly. Better kickers would have more leniency and be able to strike the ball better as well as apply spin to naturally hook the ball around. They would also be able to kick from further out.

Thoughts on this?

 

[TRF C A Iversen]

In my opinion Carter/Wilkinson are overpowered. This should probably be fixed.
Also the amount of time to take grubbers is too long. You are always tackled.
Drop goals/up & unders are too short. Steyn can kick from 60m in real life, others 40m easy.

Now my idea for goal kicking which i think is quite unique. Has anyone played a recent Tiger Woods game? The way the analog stick is used to hit the ball (eg power effected by timing of back-forward motion, also spin can be put on the ball aswell as slice/pulling shots). All these things happen when goal kicking and would work well if implemented properly. Better kickers would have more leniency and be able to strike the ball better as well as apply spin to naturally hook the ball around. They would also be able to kick from further out.

Thoughts on this?

I think the idea is fine for those who play the end on end view, but not for the side on view players.

I think the side-on view players realise that their are a lot of end-on view players, but end-on view players seem to have no idea how many play from side-on. I say that because there seems to be a lot of suggestions from these end-on view players that are pretty useless to a side-on view player.

 

[Jaymzw]

I think the idea is fine for those who play the end on end view, but not for the side on view players.

I think the side-on view players realise that their are a lot of end-on view players, but end-on view players seem to have no idea how many play from side-on. I say that because there seems to be a lot of suggestions from these end-on view players that are pretty useless to a side-on view player.

You can goal kick from side on?

 

[TRF C A Iversen]

You can goal kick from side on?

Goal kicking is the same front on view for everyone. Drop Goals are in the middle of the action. With the the existing ('06 was best) method I could bag drop goals pretty well in the side-on view.

 

[ranger]

I think the idea is fine for those who play the end on end view, but not for the side on view players.

I think the side-on view players realise that their are a lot of end-on view players, but end-on view players seem to have no idea how many play from side-on. I say that because there seems to be a lot of suggestions from these end-on view players that are pretty useless to a side-on view player.

At the risk of sounding arrogant, what is the use of side-on view? Honestly. I can understand the control difference (L1 and R1 vs X and B) as being a matter of preference, some people are used to other methods.
But the side-on view just seems plain wrong. An unfortunate side-effect of using the fifa engine.

Everyone, including me has been calling out for the defensive AI to be improved so the D is smarter and the gaps are more subtle and harder to find. Good luck spotting the 2nd five half a step too close to the centre from side on. On attack also, how are you supposed to run a cut properly when you have no real idea of the angles the players are running relative to defensive line. The whole system of holding left to run forward and pressing R1 to pass up the screen just seems twisted.

I can understand the need for a side-on view in football, you need to be able to see gaps the length of the field. In rugby, the need to see the length of the field is outweighed by the need to see whats right in front of you. A side on view just isnt as relevant in rugby.

There have been a lot of great suggestions that only work in end-on mode and not in side-on. To me this doesn't mean abandon all of these ideas, it means abandon side-on mode!

We can draw alot of parallels with the american football games. Some of the early versions were played in side-on mode, some people wanted to be able to see just how far their reciever was downfield. At some point though, the decision was made that it was more important to see what was going on width-wise and with the line of scrimmage. No doubt some people would have been hesitant, but when you weighed the advantages and disadvantages together it was the right decision.

Thats where we are now. Some people might be used to side-on now, but for rugby gaming to move forward, they need to get rid of it and focus on end-on. It doesnt make sense to turn down these ideas because you want to carry both perspectives.

 

[V99ish]

Some excellent points made in this thread - I agree for just about everything.
I think HB Studios should also take into fact that the ball goes also go further in most South African cities due to Altitude.

I think that needs to be taken into effective - and Frans Steyn super boot of 60 meters and 60 meter drop goals too !

Also the one kick which is missing from Rugby 08 was the quick kick over the player in front of you and catch again or it bounces straight into your hands.

You see it quite a lot in Rugby - and Jeff Wilson used it all the time.

 

[McCracka_09]

what about ahving curves in goal kicks like they do in league. the kicking meter shouldnt change it is good the way it is.

press x= normal kick

press o= curves ball around to the left

press square= curves ball around to the right.

johnathan thurston is a prime example of curving the ball when goal kicking

 

[Hamez]

At the risk of sounding arrogant, what is the use of side-on view? Honestly. I can understand the control difference (L1 and R1 vs X and B) as being a matter of preference, some people are used to other methods.
But the side-on view just seems plain wrong. An unfortunate side-effect of using the fifa engine.

Everyone, including me has been calling out for the defensive AI to be improved so the D is smarter and the gaps are more subtle and harder to find. Good luck spotting the 2nd five half a step too close to the centre from side on. On attack also, how are you supposed to run a cut properly when you have no real idea of the angles the players are running relative to defensive line. The whole system of holding left to run forward and pressing R1 to pass up the screen just seems twisted.

I can understand the need for a side-on view in football, you need to be able to see gaps the length of the field. In rugby, the need to see the length of the field is outweighed by the need to see whats right in front of you. A side on view just isnt as relevant in rugby.

There have been a lot of great suggestions that only work in end-on mode and not in side-on. To me this doesn't mean abandon all of these ideas, it means abandon side-on mode!

We can draw alot of parallels with the american football games. Some of the early versions were played in side-on mode, some people wanted to be able to see just how far their reciever was downfield. At some point though, the decision was made that it was more important to see what was going on width-wise and with the line of scrimmage. No doubt some people would have been hesitant, but when you weighed the advantages and disadvantages together it was the right decision.

Thats where we are now. Some people might be used to side-on now, but for rugby gaming to move forward, they need to get rid of it and focus on end-on. It doesnt make sense to turn down these ideas because you want to carry both perspectives.

The only way this would work is if you bring in slow-mo kicking like in the Rugby League games other wise you wont get a chance to judge depth. And the game would have to stop everytime you change possesion so offline multiplayer works.

 

[ranger]

The only way this would work is if you bring in slow-mo kicking like in the Rugby League games other wise you wont get a chance to judge depth. And the game would have to stop everytime you change possesion so offline multiplayer works.

Not at all.

Have you ever played madden? they use an end-on system and they manage to judge depth without slo-mo. Their is a momentary lapse in the game while the possession changes also, but just like it is in madden, its not a huge deal.

More importantly, they aren't blazing new territories by using end-on. It already exists in the rugby games its just not the default. The kicking system exists and works in its present form and the possession changes are virtually seamless. Trust me there are no logistical problems with it

 

[TRF C A Iversen]

At the risk of sounding arrogant, what is the use of side-on view? Honestly. I can understand the control difference (L1 and R1 vs X and B) as being a matter of preference, some people are used to other methods.
But the side-on view just seems plain wrong. An unfortunate side-effect of using the fifa engine.

Everyone, including me has been calling out for the defensive AI to be improved so the D is smarter and the gaps are more subtle and harder to find. Good luck spotting the 2nd five half a step too close to the centre from side on. On attack also, how are you supposed to run a cut properly when you have no real idea of the angles the players are running relative to defensive line. The whole system of holding left to run forward and pressing R1 to pass up the screen just seems twisted.

I can understand the need for a side-on view in football, you need to be able to see gaps the length of the field. In rugby, the need to see the length of the field is outweighed by the need to see whats right in front of you. A side on view just isnt as relevant in rugby.

There have been a lot of great suggestions that only work in end-on mode and not in side-on. To me this doesn't mean abandon all of these ideas, it means abandon side-on mode!

We can draw alot of parallels with the american football games. Some of the early versions were played in side-on mode, some people wanted to be able to see just how far their reciever was downfield. At some point though, the decision was made that it was more important to see what was going on width-wise and with the line of scrimmage. No doubt some people would have been hesitant, but when you weighed the advantages and disadvantages together it was the right decision.

Thats where we are now. Some people might be used to side-on now, but for rugby gaming to move forward, they need to get rid of it and focus on end-on. It doesnt make sense to turn down these ideas because you want to carry both perspectives.

Well, honestly you'd be surprised how easy it is to read exactly where everyone is on side-on view. A certain number of people must agree with me on that, as it was chosen as the default view on Jonah Lomu Rugby, Rugby '05, '06 & '08 and World Championship Rugby. I'm not sure about Rugby Challenge '06, but might boot that up later to have a look again.

After a short amount of time it becomes very easy to tell how deep each player is in the view of the field. Seriously I'm watching one of my friends play in the Super 14 we've set-up and are playing through. We have absolutely no problem playing the view at all. He's up 21-0 against the Brumbies with the Cats going into the half time break on Elite. We organised a tournament for TRF members in Wellington which people travelled from different parts of the country to play in and the view EVERYONE played was side-on.

Seriously I do think that some people do have a problem with their depth perception in this kind of game and must therefore need end-on view.

That's fine though I'm certainly not saying they should get rid of end-on. It's obviously some peoples choice, but I'm not arrogant enough to feel that it's not as over the years I've seen hundreds of people talking about it on here and I can plainly tell there's a pretty even split of people who play each view.

 

[TRF C A Iversen]

Double post, but only so that I can say that a poll regarding the two most common views has been added to the Attack Improvements thread.

 

[Hamez]

Not at all.

Have you ever played madden? they use an end-on system and they manage to judge depth without slo-mo. Their is a momentary lapse in the game while the possession changes also, but just like it is in madden, its not a huge deal.

More importantly, they aren't blazing new territories by using end-on. It already exists in the rugby games its just not the default. The kicking system exists and works in its present form and the possession changes are virtually seamless. Trust me there are no logistical problems with it

Gridiron isnt a face paced game that can constantly change possesion. It wouldnt be a problem in single player, but playing offline multiplayer would be a *****.