JasonM

Well, I'm not in desperate need of the money, just sold Nacho to Chelsea for £32m. Which is a solid £29.8m profit on him after signing him a year ago from Real Madrid. Big clubs such fucking vultures.

I look forward to him never playing for them and coming crawling back. They all come crawling back. Well they don't, but they might.

Although I do now need another centre back, cause now all I have is Ben Gibson and Ignasi Miquel which means really all I have is Ben Gibson. I was looking at Marc-Oliver Kempf. Tempted to try a double raid on Hoffenheim for him and Sule.

Total steal on your end. 13 heading and 12 jumping for a premier league center back, good luck on him trying to stop an offense when they start going full Stoke.

I don't know, but Bammy has some great skills for a striker.

High anticipation and off-the-ball makes him lethal at getting open. High First touch and technique makes him grabbing a pass glorious. High composure, decisions, and finishing means he always knows what spot to shoot at. And then he's hard working and a team-player, he looks like a phenomenal striker to me with skills in all the right places.

Whether you like how it went down or not, Nico Rosberg won the race. Was he lucky today? Yes, and he readily admitted so on the podium. Should Hamilton have won the race today? Again, yes, but these things happen in Formula 1 sometimes, it is what it is. At the end of the day Rosberg was the winner & he clawed back 10 points on his teammate & rival, so why the hell shouldn't he celebrate? It's not like he caused the accident that brought out the Safety Car, nor was it he who made the call to bring in Hamilton for another pitstop.

Hamilton might be a massively talented racing driver, but he needs to handle losing much better. His behaviour on the podium today was that of a petulant child who'd just had his favourite toy taken away from him. He knows he isn't going to win every single time, he should be a professional on the occasions that it doesn't quite work out for him

Hamilton did the podium interviews, shook everyone's hand and vowed to come back for the next one. I fail to see what he's done wrong. His team has cost him a dominant victory but he hasn't publicly blamed them.

Lewis has had the reputation of being a spoilt brat. Sometimes rightly so, but today isn't one of them.

He did the podium interview after trying to walk off with his champagne, only to be sent back by a Mercedes PR director. He had no interest in being part of the interview.

I'm beyond annoyed at people blaming Rosberg for the Hamilton loss. It wasn't Rosberg's fault, he drove his race and he ended up being the winner because the Mercedes garage made a huge mistake in going for a pitstop that late. Rosberg won it fair and square, and he also admitted that he got lucky due to the mistake, the reason he celebrated was because he won and he deserves to celebrate a win regardless of how good/bad it might be. Hamilton has done the same in the past.

F1 isn't a sport for sentiment, people will lose in the most stupid way possible and people will luck to a win in the most stupid way possible. That happens in the sport and people need to realize that Rosberg didn't cheat and Hamilton got a massive unlucky break thanks to a stupid mistake from his crew. Blame the crew for the loss, don't blame Rosberg for winning.

Rosberg didn't cheat in any way, and he came across the stripe the first, that makes him the deserved winner any way you cut it. Did Hamilton deserve a win, yes he did, but again it's on his pit-crew and not on his teammate.

Secondly, I loved Verstappen's race all the way until the untimely crash (that made the race interesting). He was aggressive but smart, and he had a cheeky sly streak in overtaking Sainz during a blue flag situation that was kinda dickish but brilliant too. His crash was an unlucky effect of his eagerness to overtake the much slower Grosjean, who went on the brakes way too soon and left Verstappen no chance to avoid impact with Romain's back-tyre. Max deserved points, but it wasn't to be sadly enough. I think in a year or so when he's smarter and more experienced he will truly be a great driver because his mindset is perfect for the sport, he dares to push and he knows what he can or can't do, once he gets consistency through experience he'll be a phenomenal driver.

Verstappen is easily the most talented kid on the grid. Not as experienced as Sainz/Nasr/Ericsson, but he has much more talent than all of them.

At the same time, in most cases I've found where you can refuse money - the other people are ten times worse off than you. Not to mention that not taking money can lead to a path in the quest where you can get more than you would've been paid OR find some awesome gear instead.

I personally don't like such game mechanics in games like Mass Effect, Dragon Age, KOTOR because it forces you to be a nice guy all the time because else you're gonna miss out on that phat sweet rifle/axe/crystal that you otherwise wouldn't be able to get.

Good decision based games let me be a dick and be rewarded for it in a different way. Being an asshole should give you just as much a leg up in a game than being a nice guy is. Just change the game around it, instead of a sweet blaster that shoots out love, you get a blaster that shoots out pure hatred or whatever.

After spending a second season in Superkarts I managed to win the championship and FINALLY got to leave the karting scene behind me.

Having had enough with open wheel cars, I decided to not sign with Formula Rookie and instead go with the Clio Cup. And I must say, the Clio's might not be as awesome braking wise or speed wise, but they are really stable on the tarmac and are a far cry from the squirrely karts I had been driving before.

I'm not as fast as the AI right now, but it's a car that really lends itself well to seeking it's limits and I hope that I'll enjoy my season in Clio Cup more than all the seasons of karts combined, because fuck Karts royally with a huge wooden ladle with spikes on it.

Eh, a job is a job and Witcher's need to get paid in my eyes. It might be a bit cold, but it's a dangerous business and they're the only ones doing it, they're getting stiffed enough on the money in the first place.

Fuuuuuccccckkkkkk.....I want this game

Maybe I;ll get Witcher 2 on the Steam summer sale.

I personally loved Witcher 2 a lot and it was a great and beautiful game all on itself.

Technically you don't need W2 to be able to play W3, there's even the possibility to NOT ''simulate'' Witcher 2's events, which forgoes a few minor events later in the game.

God this game is fucking gorgeous.

Took the screenshot at 1920x1080 with all the graphics maxed out. For some reason foliage didn't change to ultra, so maybe I had to restart my game for it to work.

With everything at the highest level I run the game at 24FPS standing still, around 20 on the move and sometimes it dips down towards 15 when entering buildings.

I don't play on Ultra though because I prefer running ambient occlusion off and some of the graphics less insane, on most-high (textures ultra + hair effects) it runs closer to 60.

But man, even on lower settings the game is BEAUTIFUL.

Did the wraith in the well mission and I really liked the battle that ensued, it wasn't the hardest because it's still early game (playing on blood&broken bones (4th out of 5)), but the wraith kicked my ass two times before I really learned to rope around and try to counter strike instead of going onto the offense. Also having to trap the wraith inside an Yrden was a nice thing to add as well, really forced me to think smart and lure her towards me timing the spell and then quickly dodge before slashing her a few times.

All in all, higher difficulty is fun and doesn't feel abusive yet. It's really about fighting smart and letting people and monsters come to you rather than rushing senselessly into a battle. And I also later found out in the lost-brother quest that beashtiesh will gang up on you if you let yourself get surrounded. None of that one-at-a-time kinds of mook logic.

I really enjoy the combat system on higher difficulties. Brute-forcing isn't a sustainable tactic and they will block you to death.

Having to dodge/parry or Riposte even simple soldiers make every battle interesting, even when you're better you can explore combat to find new ways to make people look foolish/dead.

Not being able to hack through hordes of men like they're made of paper mache is fun, keeps the combat grounded and somewhat real-ish.

Also perfectly timing a parry to break their stance, and then lopping of their heads make you feel like a real badass.

But if I want to hack through hordes of men like they're made of paper mache I can right?

Drop the difficulty to the lowest and you'll be unstoppable and can just hack like you're facing a team of Shaq's and Dwight's.

So i'm currently 2-0 as a manager with this new try at the game. I gotta say that the same style can still win, and it feels good having a few wins to start out with.

My Muay Thai kicky/punchy guy started his career with an awesome Head Kick KO in a QFC fight. Also didn't have any negative remarks on the tale of the tape so he might be a talented guy, it's a shame he's 25 and won't train as quickly.

Weather might be rainy this weekend, so the Monaco parade "race" might be even slower and more boring than usual.

I really enjoy the combat system on higher difficulties. Brute-forcing isn't a sustainable tactic and they will block you to death.

Having to dodge/parry or Riposte even simple soldiers make every battle interesting, even when you're better you can explore combat to find new ways to make people look foolish/dead.

Not being able to hack through hordes of men like they're made of paper mache is fun, keeps the combat grounded and somewhat real-ish.

Also perfectly timing a parry to break their stance, and then lopping of their heads make you feel like a real badass.

Bought the digital version for PS4. Early reviews make this seem like it is easily in the running for GOTY.

It sounds like a really phenomenal game, and after having loved Witcher 1 and 2, I can't wait to get to playing Witcher 3.

The only thing reviews have been talking about are bugs and some performance issues on both PC and console versions, but they've also added that CDProjekt are doing their best to patch it out as soon as the actual release happens or shortly thereafter.

I've been burned enough in the past not to put a goalie on the bench. Like the rest I hate it, but when your goalie is hurt you'll be fucked hard unless you somehow have a Peter Crouch lying around.

Ok, just went into the Premiership officially, and the club decided to mark the occassion by improving both junior coaching and youth recruitment, whilst also allowing me to scout the entire world now.

This means I have decided to completely revamp my scouting system to maximize as many nations as possible and hopefully find as many gems as I can around Europe and the rest of the footballing bastions across the globe.

I currently have 16 scouts, and I have always seen that they can juggle around 2-3 nations at the same time without losing knowledge of one of the nations. Four or more they tend to lose knowledge of the first nations whilst they're working on the fourth etc.

So lo and behold, the ridiculous list of 48(!) assignments split up between 16 poor scouts that have gotten the hardest tasks in their lives now...

Allan Gemmill 15/15 - Italy, Slovenia, Hungary

Andy Shearer 17/14 - Belarus, Romania, Bulgaria

Anouar Hadouir 17/20 - New Zealand, Australia, China

Bryan Ruiz 15/16 - Costa Rica, Mexico, Canada

Dario Drudi 20/20 - Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay

Iray 14/14 - Spain, Portugal, Morocco

James Smith 5/18 - Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia

Jay Blake 19/15 - England, Ireland, Scotland

Joe McClaren 19/15 - N-Ireland, Wales, Iceland

Kwong-Wah 20/17 - Netherlands, Belgium, Germany

Matthieu Jean 12/12 - Finland, Ukraine, Russia

Morten Nagel 18/17 - Denmark, Sweden, Norway

Nandi 15/13 - Turkey, Greece, Israel

Phillip Hudson 20/16 - France, Austria, Switzerland

Ruud Bruns 17/17 - Czech Rep, Slovakia, Poland

Shane Box 20/19 - USA, Japan, South Korea

So you might be wondering, ''that bloke is an utter madman''... Well you would be right, but I guess you gotta pay a price of sanity if you want to turn your team into the best scouting team ever. Of course, as the board hopefully allows more scouts in the future I will be branching out further into Africa, Asia, and the Americas... of course hopefully also finish off Europe by scouting the former Yugoslavian states too.

This way I have the most possible coverage and the best possible scouting. Because my scouts are only active in 3 nations at a time their knowledge levels stay high, scouts will of course get preference in nations where they have skills at. (See Bryan Ruiz in Costa Rica and Druidi in BraziGentiGuay). But for the ones that don't cover any home territory they will take a bit longer to get up to speed, but because they aren't overstretching that happens in region-scouting, once their knowledge level is high it will stay high and at best dip only lightly...

Hopefully this means I can continue finding gems.

Speaking of gems, as new manager of South Korea I have found a few gems in the squad of South Korea. The team is pretty young and talented (lacks depth tho), and I am inclined in bringing a few kids over to Nottingham.

Namely, this 23 year old left back that has been too good for the Korean leagues.

Go on then...

If you're going for a top-end gym, get a top-class trainer so that every single skill training is covered. Next to that you need 2-3 Circuit Training coaches, preferably two on each days. Reason for all this is because coaches work the best when they have 5 or less students working with them during one part of the day.

If you're going for a cardio gym, invest in 4 top end circuit trainers, making sure you have every single possible option on every day-part (agility/balance/Speed/General). This way people can CT what they want, and hopefully not end up filling classes either.

And of course, make sure the condition and cleanliness is always maxed out. Bad condition makes training results worse, cleanliness ruins morale. Both things will cause people to flock to a different gym.

Rich would be so proud of me, I just bought a gym that makes $20,000 profit a week for $1.

That's actually a great get. If you need any suggestions on running the place, I could give you some.

Decided to sign up and join EWB. Let's see if this can keep my interest like a few years ago.

So Max Verstappen can finally follow in his father's footsteps of lighting the pitbox on fire...

If the Clippers drop Game 7, they really need to prepare to toss over the entire roster because that would be four playoff series where they wouldn't have made the Conference Finals with a core group that should be able to compete. And with Jordan being heavily chased they will have a lot of cash bogged down on the trio of Chris Paul, Blake Griffin, and DeAndre Jordan.

And J.J Redick and Jordan Crawford alone won't put them over the hump.

They really need to go out and find meaningful core players that can complement the team and come up big when the others aren't coming up big.

For me this is absolutely gutting news. One of the true pioneers of the blues sound has played his final tune. His music got me into blues at a young age and I always hoped that I one day could go to a concert of him, sadly that will never happen for me.

The world lost a real music legend, kept playing right up to the end and was an ironman deep into his 80's.

Lucille won't be crying anymore

RIP BB

It's 2023, and Nottingham Forest is back in the Premiership! After a storming first season with the club I reached the semi's of the FA Cup (elimmed by Man Utd), and I won the league with a big 15 point difference between Forest and Charlton.

Of course, now the big work of staying up begins and I need to shape up my offense for next season. Whilst I was easily the best scoring force in the championship, most of my actual skill is flagging. Walcott had a career season with 20 league goals, but in the latter part of the season he fell of the cliff hard and it's clear his best is now behind him permanently. He's still part of the team for the Premiership season, but it's not going to look like he's going to start a whole lot.

Aside of that there's Giorgio Rasulo who had the most goals for the team with 24, and he's slowly edging into his prime at 26, he's a good talented kid but i'm unsure if he has the class to be a main striker in the best league in the world.

Lastly there's 28 year old Luke James who is in his prime, and has been decent for the team in the four season's he's been with The Reds. Had 14 goals past season and he's solid yet unspectacular in his abilities, again not someone who can carry an offense.

Sadly, my youth intake is the drizzling shits so there's no future Alan Shearer in there that I might bring up.

So i've been searching around and around, looking for two kinds of strikers. One that's close to his prime or is just in his prime, and secondly a young striker that can become the future club legend the team needs. Sadly enough, England and the UK are way too expensive with talent so I had to look abroad...

Firstly, the ''present''.

Dave Hoyt turns 28 early next season and I couldn't imagine my luck when I stumbled across him. I couldn't scout him fully due to scouting restrictions, but what he shows is that he's a top class striker stuck in an average league. Sure his vision, jumping, and bravery are suspect. But it's clear that his other abilities show him as probably the best striker the Americans have ever produced (sorry Clint). 5,75M brings him across the pond and into the big leagues, and I have signed him for his prime seasons. Hopefully he'll make me a very happy man by living up to his abilities.

Secondly, the ''future''.

Eduardo is 19 years old, likes to go on long walks on the beach, and his favorite colour is hopefully red. A transfer fee of 4,5 million brings him to the UK, shockingly enough his work permit was accepted after the second attempt. But that makes me happy because his bottom line finishing is 17, at that age that's just amazing. Again like many strikers he lacks bravery, but he looks like a total package on the field and might become a star both in Uruguay and in Nottingham. He might be a future star, but if his skills pan out decently he can pitch in immediately from the get go rather than having to be nurtured for a while. And his young age means there's still a lot of growth left in this player, which can only bode well. He's already been showing up the Uruguayan league since he was 17 with a wild 20 in 26 record for his club. And he's been capped too, so that might be a show of confidence and talent.

Also, during the winter break I engaged in a bit of a raid in Ireland and Scotland, to strengthen my midfield. These two players are the huuuuge steals I have gotten in that raid.

I'm afraid I got some good news, because Adam Barrett came in from Cork on a free. And what a freebie he is. An All-around midfielder who can play defense and offense at the same level. He's only 19 years old at that too, and he's already a gifted passer with some insane hoss-y physicals that makes him terrifying on the pitch. He reminds me of another Irish legend and former Forest player, Roy Keane. He looks to have the talent to become a world beater if he continues to grow like this, and I for one have also already started to train him to become competent as a center back, and afterwards I also want to make him able to play striker too, this kid's an all-round stud so he needs to be able to play every single instrument. Oh, did I say I got the lad on a free yet, because that's ridiculous!

Well if Barrett is Keano, then Jordan Campbell here is the next Graeme Souness. If you think getting an Irish lad on a free was a dirty steal, then you'll shake your head in disgust at this kid's price... In January he was signed from Scottish Premiership side Dundee United for a whopping 3500 Pound Sterling. Yup, for a price of a banger I signed a kid that might become the best Scottish midfielder of this generation. He's also a year younger than Barrett, yet he looks at the same level if not beyond at some areas of his game. A kid that can lock down the defense, yet has speed to burn and can also mess with people in the air. This kid has got it all in every sense of the word, yeah he might not be the bravest or he might not (yet) be able to finish like Ronaldo... But when you're 18 year's old, you get signed for a pittance from Dundee and you immediately start playing at a high level for Nottingham Forest, then you can get hype about someone. And whereas Barrett is getting trained as a center back, Jordan is getting trained to be able to work as a striker... Don't worry though, he's such a talented defender that he'll probably be trained as a center back too.

Anyways, I digress. I have signed a few more players that are worthy of being called steals. Like a top class Scottish defender for 1,5M from Hearts. Or that one Irish goalie I showed the other day. It's been a busy half season from January to now, having planned ahead for the promotion I have been able to find amazingly class players for ridiculously low prices... Here's to hoping all those kids keep improving and give me a chance to challenge for the league one day. Like the good old days of the 80's

Any tips for creating a fighter or just in general?

Sprawl 'n' Brawlers seems to be the most effective early build.

Plenty of points into Boxing and Wrestling. Then Punches, Striking Def, Takedown Def, GnP, Balance, Speed and Strength.

The older your fighter, the more points can be allocated but apparently 18 year olds can catch up with 25 year olds in 2 months real time.

If you're starting out and you have no one sending you money. The best way is to have 1-2 25 year olds for low level fighting and making some money. And using that money to fund a few 18 year olds that you're gonna train up to hopeful future greatness. (Give or take hidden traits, they can fuck you over big time).

Sprawl and Brawlers are effective and very popular due to the love of submission fighters on the lower end of the scale.

I personally played quite a lot a few years ago and a friend still plays it religiously (Seek John Hetfield, he might have work/tips for you).

One of my money fighters was a guy that had a lot of takedown defence (sprawler), and aside from that was really heavy on the punching. He was a SnB kind of guy, but he could go toe to toe with bonafide brawlers too.

Another BIG suggestion is to always go to a different gym than the default Cozad gym, Cozad are shit and they won't do anyone any good. Even the cheapest gym's are better than Cozad's, always. Find a gym that fits your training idea, or if you have the cash just go to the biggest and best gym.

Conditioning - This is the most important stat if you want to train people and have them become stars. Always max out conditioning at creation, because this means they'll last longer in the gym AND in fights. And this means they'll also recuperate faster after fights and training. More conditioning means more training, better fighters, and better fights. Max it, always!

Sparring is extremely useful, but it depends on how much people are sparring. If there's one good guy in the sparring group and there are 20 scrubs, that will mean it will take longer for the scrubs to improve because the good guy has to split his time with the rest of the scrubs. Either a small group, or a big group with lots of good fighters... but the latter is a very uncommon sight.

VIP is a thing that really helps you if you have it. You can track skill gains , you can see sparring schedules, you can have more fighters, you can auto-switch dirty clothing, you can scout opponents their skill levels and in turn see their tendency giving you an advantage in planning... It's one of the few games that really give you a huge bang for your buck in terms of what you get, it will help A LOT.

QFC you shouldn't ever do but once. That one time is to quickly match-up your new fighter and hopefully get a quick glimpse of his traits. Stuff like that matters because you can see if he might have a suspect chin, or a lack of heart. A bad destiny roll makes a huge difference in fights and his career, so even if he loses that QFC fight you might get an advantage of knowing if he might have a good hidden-roll, and if he doesn't you can cut him quickly and create a new guy.

Hidden Choice another big decision. I will sum these up in good ones and bad ones, the bad ones are pretty useless...

Good Ones: Adapt Gameplan, Big Heart, Granite Chin, Doesn't cut, FAST LEARNER(get this one, always), Natural KO Power

Bad Ones: Amateur Record, Never Injured, Popular Fighter, Self Confident

Adapt Gameplan, Your fighter is smarter during fights and will change his gameplan if something isn't working. At the start not really useful because he's one dimensional, but for project fighters important because later on he might switch from submission to KO-ing when the former isn't working.

Big Heart, it's harder to rock this guy during fights, and he'll have a bigger chance of surviving a tough patch during a fight. The Rocky-skill, quite useful but not the best hidden.

Granite Chin, Makes his head like piece of iron. Makes him very tough to KO directly, very important for everyone really, extremely important for sluggers.

Doesn't Cut, Makes it harder for him to bleed. Not extremely important, but it's nice if he doesn't start bleeding because cuts might cost fights.

Fast Learner, Every 18 year old you create needs this, this makes his skill improvements faster and causes him to catch up at a much quicker pace. For 25 year old's not useful because they're money fighters. Must-have for the ones you're going to build.

Natural KO Power, Speaks for itself, extremely useful for brawlers because it makes KO'ing people that much easier. KO's are nice to have.

Amateur Record makes your fighter a little bit more experienced, which shouldn't matter in a few matches.

Never Injured, injuries only happen post-fights and whilst they may keep you from training, it's still kinda useless because when you're not injured you never get injured from training.

Popular Fighter, makes your fighter a little bit more popular. Really Really useless because if he starts winning his starting pop shouldn't matter.

Self Confident, Your fighter is more confident during fights. It's useful in a way, but there are much better choices available that will make a bigger difference.

I probably have more suggestions, but I forgot them.

Ok, so I have learned to love the superkarts. There are insanely fast nimble and you can do some crazy stuff in high speed corners. On the other hand, they are about as stable as a 60's middle american country as even the slightest bit of kerb will throw you to the other side of the nation. Of course, AI being bullshit they just fly across the kerb (and grass) like it's made of asphalt.

AI is too much of an asshole to really race in karts, they don't care for you and will ram you all the way to next week because you're apparently not going fast enough despite beating them by a second or two every lap. So I assume that AI Karts are just a big motorized ICBM driven to fuck up your lap/race. I've had a few moments where I was literally t-boned off of the apex and whilst my kart flies into the dirt never to be seen again, the one that rammed me somehow ended up getting a better position rather than being wiped out too.

Another thing... Fuck Caterham 7's and everything they stand for. They invited me for a tournament, and in one practice session they had made me into a sniveling mess who had no racing ability whatsoever. It's like wrestling a whale across a gas-station and they are designed to just lose their tail even when you're trying to ease them through a corner. I plain hate them, it might be because i'm used to quick and light karts with massive downforce, but I just don't like road cars. I prefer a good car(kart) designed for racing.

So here's where I lost my mind. That C7 tournament was in the middle of my season, between the UK nationals which I dominated in Superkarts and the world-championship Superkarts... And those Caterham's did such a huge number on me, that I never got back into the groove of driving those Karts. The Caterham's killed my driving mojo, and as a result I had 5 terrible rounds that caused me to finish 11th of 12th in the Superkarts championship. I couldn't restart, because I disabled restarts so that i can't cheat my way to easy championships.

So to my eternal chagrin, i'm going into season 4 once more in Superkarts, having to drive the same tracks again just like last season... But I won't do it today, I'm just too annoyed with the C7's ruining my sense of driving to really focus on doing Superkarts...

Hopefully tomorrow I can just blitz through the Superkarts and hopefully for Season 5 I can step into a proper racing car. None of those Karts, and none of those road cars... I need a purpose built racing machine.