What’s up, Maximum Football gang. We have a brand new update for you, and this one includes a feature that’s been requested since before we launched back in November – Coach Mode! But that’s not all. Here’s a look at some of the biggest changes you’ll notice in this update.
Coach Mode
Don the headset or the old Lombardi fedora and outstrategize your opponent with coach mode. Available in exhibition and Dynasty Mode, Coach Mode puts the clip board in your hands, allowing you to call the plays while the CPU handles the rest. Watch your team execute your gameplan as you attempt to dominate the Xs and Os from the sidelines.
To activate Coach Mode, simply enter an exhibition or dynasty game and from the team select screen, press the menu key or V. You will see coach mode activated over your team name. Now, start your game and call your plays. You will have the ability to toggle the spectator cameras during the game as you coach.
Sandbox Progression
We know that an XP based progression system in Dynasty isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, so we are introducing Sandbox Progression in this week’s patch. This allows players to bypass the current XP system and freely change the individual ratings for players on their rosters and the rosters of other teams however they want! You can toggle this option from the settings menu in Dynasty mode.
Improve Running Animations and Locomotions
We are currently in the middle of a massive locomotion overhaul in Maximum Football, and this update is the first step of a few over the never few patches to reword player movement in the game. You will notice some new running animations including a more aggressive sprint where a ball carrier puts his head down running with the ball. Player movement is also improved in both fluidity and responsiveness.
Sportsmanship in MPL
We want to ensure the online experience is enjoyable for players who commit their time to competing against others in MPL. To that end, we have made some changes to the way sportsmanship impacts matchmaking. Now, the game is going to attempt to matchmake players with similar sportsmanship scores against one another online.
There is plenty more in this update. You can check out the full patch notes below.
Full Patch Notes
Gameplay
- Implemented the Coach Mode
- Fixed the kick returner not going for the ball on the ground on onside kicks
- Camera fix: Incorrect camera angle on next kick if the previous was blocked during the field goal practice
- Set 2-point scenarios back to 1 point PAT
- "Signature" celebration camera fix: The camera is too zoomed in during the "Signature" celebration
- Tackling punter in his own end zone should correctly result in a safety.
- Consider spikes a pass to prevent touchback
- Adjustments to catch and fallback
- Spiking the ball on goal line will not result in kickoff anymore
- Made man coverage less aggressive against HBs if not near end zone
- Ball swat direction is now stronger and aimed more towards the ground.
- Kicking the goal post on kickoff will always result in touchback
- Fixed an issue where blitzing defenders ignored the QB on screen plays
- Add failed moving block animations variation
- Man coverage defender guarding screen target fix
- Diving at end zone corner along sideline will now register TD, if the ball crosses goal line
- Fixed cases where the player stood up immediately after making a dive
- Defenders are now shifting direction to pursue the QB and peel off engagements easier
- Increased the ball mass to reduce fumble force.
- Allow requesting a timeout during or after the play. It will start a timeout on the next play selection.
- Fixed cases when the referee could be seen sliding
- Fixed the AI controlled team not reacting to practice play changes
- Fixed an issue where causing consecutive delay of games during 2 point conversions lead to an exploit where the offense would regain possession of the ball instead of a turnover
- Fixed the user controlled team not performing kickoff in coach mode
- Fix for glitching route art after pause-unpause while holding input.
- Delay of game on PAT plays at the end of quarters now should replay correctly.
- Stepping OOB, or getting tackled OOB will keep the game clock running, unless it's the last two mins of either half.
- Snapping at the moment of game clock reaching 2 mins will not trigger the 2min warning UI.
- Disabled timeout pre-request while the ball is in play.
- Change timeout pre-request to be enabled only during post-play
- Increased min time to call fair catch (for the ball to hit the ground) from 0.5s to 1.0s
- Fixed receiver buttons not showing up in passing drills.
- Going OOB at the end of halves will only stop game clock, if a forward progress was made.
- Fixed the catch chance widget showing on top of the QB during long-snap passing plays.
- Fixed an issues with the "Delay of game" penalty always resulting in a turnover
- Sideline updates:
- Updated the Sideline Officials to move and signal
- Repositioned sideline and on-field officials based on play type
- Sideline officials now role swap on certain game events (e.g. kick received or turnover)
- All sideline and on-field officials signal now based on play type and distance to ball
- Added very simple avoidance method on sideline players
Animations:
- Improvements to basic locomotion for a smoother more natural feel:
- Addressed QB's strafe to scramble delay issue.
- Fixed an issue that caused locomotion transitions to be played unusually slowly sometimes
- Added run to strafe (forward running towards own end zone -> strafe towards own end zone) transition that can be used by kick returner.
- Integrated new QB walk animations used for very slow movement.
- Activated blocking stance move to idle transitions.
- Added an accelerated run cycle for a small amount of time before transitioning to a normal run.
- Made small adjustment to blocking stance move to idle backwards transitions conditions.
- Fixed a weird lean motion done by character when stopping after run/sprint
- Updates on Run, Sprint and added back lean for decelerations
- integrated the more extreme run and sprint banking while deactivating 90 degrees cuts
- integrated a decelerated run version when losing speed
- changed accelerated/decelerated run behavior: remove hold time and replaced with instant acceleration as trigger to go back to normal run; additionally, these special run cycles trigger when the instant acceleration is different than 0
- now when sprint is active the locomotion will not descend to a run cycle due to loss of speed, this is intended so we can use extreme banking for fast turns/cuts.
- integrated QB idle to scramble transitions.
- integrated new idle to run and sprint transitions that end in a forward lean.
- Increased the punt animation speed
- Added new catch animations
- Added new slow jump catch animations
- Added new injury animations
- Added new jump catch animations
- Added new tackle animations
Dynasty
- Enable changing team logo and info
- Loading screen updated
- Simulation times optimization and status display on loading screen
- Coach mode available in Dynasty
- Individual match return flow adjustments
- Fixed the match results if multiplayer invitation was accepted while playing or spectating
- Fix for automatic progression in dynasty
- Coach Hot Seat news category
- Changes to Max Social and Stadium Costs
Matchmaking
- Sportsmanship now has a higher impact on matchmaking priority
Multiplayer
- Fixed floating player widget (overhead) not showing Catch button above the intended receiver in the client.
- Fixed a soft lock observed in Online Exhibition when the host disconnects from the internet on the Game Settings screen and selects Start Game
MPL
- Allow to add cards to roster after card reveal.
- Fixed the default playbooks
- Fixed the cards being removed from starting positions in the depth chart if the user exits the game without switching to another tab
- Players are in poses that are not appropriate for their position
Challenges
- New challenges types and UI fix for new challenges system
Customization
- Fixed not being able to scroll through the items when the ‘locked’ filter is applied
- Fixed the team color not updating after typing the hex code in 'Team Uniform'
- Fixed the Helmet material
- Fixed cloning team sometimes causing in duplicate jersey numbers
- Fixed the arrow buttons missing for 'Year In College' during player customization
- Fixed some preview celebration animation related issues
- Fixed some Player Banner preview issues
- Logo upload is now available in the Customization menus too
- Fixed the "Explore" button functionality in logo selection screen
- Fixed the selected filters overlapping with the ‘Filter by’ and ‘Sort by’ sections
Animation and Cinematic Sound Updates
- kick return catch, jump catch and swim animations audio edit
- block run and move animations audio edit
- player spotlight sound effects adjustments
- adjusted crowd intensity to make it more dynamic
- catch fallback regular and fail animations audio edit
- pre-snap crowd intensity lowered when the Home Team is on offense
- catch run animations audio edit
- Impact (player collision) sounds bugfix and implementation
Commentary Updates
- Fix kick quality commentary trigger conditions
- yardsline distance modification for good kick and bad kick cases based on player position
- Updates to Touchback
- Editing the nighttime commentary version in the database, as well as creating and configuring the objects
- Greeting for daytime/nighttime
- Remaining night commentary added to the project and night greetings observer finalized
- Good catch new commentaries implementation
- Fix TD announcer playing at two point conversion
- Incomplete pass new commentaries implementation
- No touchdown commentary on illegal forward pass
- Catching TD announcer doesn't play for two point conversion
- Kneel and spike commentaries
- End of 2nd Quarter delay adjustment and incomplete pass objects modification
- Spike and Swat commentaries edit
Cinematics
- Improved in-game cut-scenes
- Intro screen - added a background movie animation