FC 24 Pro Clubs Terrible Gameplay

I normally don't like these gameplay rants because I feel its a subjective area where one person's complaint is another person's reason for playing.

However after a run on Play offs yesterday where my team lost  6 times in a row all by 1 goal, I think I'm done with the terrible gameplay of FC 24.

We seemed to discover 6 different ways of losing games of football. The entire time it feels like an uphill struggle with our AI who I can only describe as horrendous.

The AI players :

Don't pass when you want them to

Pass when you DON'T want them to

Cut onto their weak foot to cross (??? Why)

Stand still while opponents run past them

Stand still when crosses come into the box

Either take throw ins too quickly or too slowly

Lose possession from indirect free kicks

Take 15 yard heavy touches forward for some reason sometimes 

Dilly dally on the ball until the passing lane is blocked 

The list goes on.

The Ai Midfield just feels completely non existent. The opponents make a pass then seem to be running at the isolated and exposed back 4 every time. Where is the CDM and CM? Why are thry constantly pressing up high into the opponents half? Why do i have to navigate thru a sub-sub menu of a sub-menu of a hidden away menu to change team tactics? And I've done tactics vefore: didn't make a difference anyway, not unless you set depth to 1 in which case yes they'll stay back, but they'll be far too far back and you'll get done in the huge gap between midfield and attack.

Why can't this just work like it did years ago, foe the more casual player, without having to trawl thru dozens of confusingly laid out sub menus?

Then there's the feel of the game. On 23 I felt in control of what was happening around me. If i wanted to play defensive I could. If i wanted to go all out attack we could. If I wanted to take a long shot. If i wanted to take a corner near post. Far post. Edge of box. If I wanted to switch the play across field. If I wanted to win a header.

I felt I was able to influence all these events. On fc24 it feels like the match is passing me by and I'm just a spectator. Power shots take too long and are unusable practically. Crosses aren't as reliable this year. Despite having 93 crossing, 98 curve and Whipprd Pass + my build was still playing bad crosses.

Headers feel like they predestined lock on to one player, more or less at random, and if it happens to be you then that's lucky. In a 6'4 build with 88 jumping, 85 Aggression, 90 strength and Aerial + I was still losing simple headers in midfield, to smaller opponents, even after I had positioned myself first, or even used momentum leading in to the jump.

If I wanted in 23 to play in my striker with a lobbed thru pass I was more or less able to do it. On 24 its practically impossible. The LB+Y pass is just useless and so is its corresponding play style.

They also GOT RID entirely of the LB+RB+Y ans RB+Y "driven" or fast thru passes, and replaced with a precision pass that nobody uses and is useless.

I've never had an entire party of players have such a collectively bad experience with a game. Disparate people of different ages and experience levels were all making the same complaints. The entire game feels like wading through mud, while at the same time having the unbalanced feel of being on an ice rink.

We also had to deal with dozens (I lost count ) of trolls, people joining the party and either just yelling abuse or deliberately playing badly. The player base is almost entirely toxic. And I believe the bad game play begets that. One bad turn deserves another. If the game play was good there'd be more people taking it seriously. As it stands the trolls can hide behind the excuse that the entire game is bad, and they're just taking advantage of that.

This game is a dud. No wonder it's been going for less than half price RRP since barely 2.5 months after its release date.