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Man Of The Match, a free-to-play, play-to-earn Football game announced less than a month ago, already surpassed 1 million views on its announcement trailer. In case you haven't heard of it, Man Of The Match is an upcoming Football game where you play as a manager, or player, but with a few twists.
For one, players and managers can use face-scanning technology to import their image and likeness to the game. So in case you ever wanted to see yourself as a world-renowned striker, MOTM does just that. As a manager, you can customize many aspects of your team, such as your stadium, ticket prices, and much more.
However, Man Of The Match goes beyond, creating a world of competition between all players where you can potentially earn money. In the game, there are continents, and within each continent are countries. Each country has their own national team and local clubs.
Each competitive match gives the players a chance to earn money. Even if you're dead last in your division, there are still opportunities for you to earn. How is this possible? Let's find out
ClutchPoints reached out to the Man Of The Match Games Inc., and got a chance to speak with CEO and Founder Gilad Tsur Mayer.
Gilad Tsur Mayer Interview – The Origins Of MOTM
Origins
Gilad Tsur Mayor is not only the founder and owner of MOTM, but he's also a veteran software engineer, an author, and web developer.
On speaking about the game's actual development, he said “It's been about a year that we really've been working on it”, he said, “I had this idea for 17 years.”
He explained how he first got the ideas of creating his own Football game. “I have the funniest story. Imagine me, being 21 years old. Inexperienced, little kid, playing Pro Evolution (now eFootball), back in 2006. It had the most amazing Edit Mode. So obviously I did what any 21 year old kid would do, and create myself as a forward, and score as many goals as possible.”
“And then, it hit me. Why not actually do that?” That idea inspired Tsur Mayer, an idea which never let go of. He sent e-mails and messages to “suits” to receive venture capitals, all in effort to get support for his idea.
He didn't receive the support he was looking for back then, but that did not stop him. Instead, Tsur Mayer focused his studies on technology while working various positions, gaining knowledge and experience along the way. After some time, the idea re-emerged, and he realized he needed to pursue it.
“Last year, I was having an existential crisis,” he said, “I was doing okay financially. I was telling myself, ‘You have everything you want, but there is nothing with passion. Life is short and you have to pursue your passion.”
One year later, his game caught the attention of over one million people with their Announcement trailer.
The World Of Man Of The Match
We then went on to talk about the wider scope of Man Of The Match. MOTM consists of continents and countries that make up the world of the game. But there's more to it.
“The world of Man of The Match is divided into continents, countries, and each country has its own association, national teams, local and continental competitions.”
Man Of The Match's league setup is a bit different from other football games. In MOTM, you know who your rivals are in advance, and you'll play them periodically throughout the schedule. This creates creates more motivation between club mates, their teammates, and the manager.
“We wanted to have a world of context for this game to really immerse in it.”
Whether you're a player, or a manager, your accomplishments, as well as your clubs, your performances may potentially affect the entire landscape of MOTM. Perhaps your continued success may translate to your spot on the national team. This means you may get a chance to win something big for your nation, and also for yourself, but more on that later.
How Man Of The Match Puts You In The Game
One of the most exciting aspects of Man Of The Match is having your player/manager look like you. We asked about the thought process of implementing this feature. After all, playing for professional football club has always been many people's dream.
Of course, not everyone gets the chance to pursue that dream.
“We have billions of people with that particular dream, and Man of The Match is the second chance to do that.”
Tsur Mayer went on to talk about the important of using our own image in a game for and by the community.
“Who’s the best hero you can think of? It’s yourself.” Tsur Mayer said, “In that matter I think that being ourselves in the game is key to believing we have something deep inside us.
One thing Gilad Tsur Mayer doesn't like about other football games is that player creation gets a little too unrealistic. When talking about some of these other games and modes (like Pro Clubs) in FC, he pointed out what he didn't like.
“For some reason everyone has pink hairstyles and it’s not believable. I think that experience has a flaw, because it’s not believable.”
He has a good point there. Multiple new sports games nowadays follow a very arcade-style customization path that encourages more ridiculous looking uniforms, hair colors, and so on. Man Of The Match takes your own face to create an authentic looking player model. But how do they do such a thing?
When first hearing of this feature, we thought it meant using something like face scan apps seen in MLB The Show or NBA 2K games. We spoke to Mr. Tsur Mayer about how they plan on tackling this side of development.
“It doesn’t have to be an app. We will have an app, but it doesn’t have to be. We can instruct you how to position yourself for multiple photos from various angles. Then we can upload them into our system, and we can just combine them together into 3D models”
So while the team isn't using any groundbreaking technology, it seems creating player accurate models is something they've put a lot of time into.
“We really want it to be accurate to the experience of being a footballer.” Tsur Mayer already succeeded in the visuals with how impressive the trailers look. But how about the feel?
MOTM Gameplay, Player Progression & Platforms
The developers don't plan on launching the game until at least 2025. There's still plenty of work needed to be done, but got a moment to speak about development.
While there wasn't much he could talk about now, Tsur Mayer did indicate which features he'd really like the team to tackle.
“I'll probably say the movement and animations, both goal to goal and the players.”
Tsur Mayer wants to have a balance “between something fun to play, and something fun to watch”. So while having some similarities to an arcade style football game is fine, they really want to focus on the animation and movements to create a truly authentic football experience.
We did get to speak a little bit about player progression. Tsur Mayer and his team took a different approach to character building in MOTM.
“We want to incorporate something that will keep that balance but gets you thinking of how you want to develop your player. What we want to do is have virtual training for all players. You need to choose which attributes you want to develop in that training. For example, you take pass accuracy, acceleration, and shot power, but when you choose those three, you are not choosing the others. The others are at risk of decreasing while the attributes you chose increase.”
This progression system prevents creating an overpowered roster of 99 overall players. Players can decide for themselves which is most important, dependent upon their position.
Additionally, we spoke about which platforms the game would be releasing on. When asked which systems he'd like to release the game for:
“Our mission in this game, and frankly overall business model, is getting them (Man Of The Match) out to as much people that can play this game.”
We're currently at a phase where the next-generation of video game consoles are taking over. Soon, the PS4 and Xbox One will be obsolete in terms of player counts and populations. That being said, Tsur Mayer didn't count those platforms out, just yet. However, he and the team plan and wait to see as time goes on.
“Our model isn’t for selling copies. We want everyone in. But if the landscape of those platforms goes low we'll see that and whether or not PS4 is included. Who knows in 2025?”
Man Of The Match Customization Is For The Community, By The Community (CONTINUE HERE)
One of the most fun parts about building a new team in a sports game is customization. Whether you design the uniforms, build the stadium, set ticket prices, etc., there's something fun about the process of creating your own club. Man Of The Match not only brings you to the game, but it brings your ideas and creativity as well.
So, how is Man Of The Match's customization by the community and for the community?
Tsur Mayer talked about the community builds their own Sports brands:
“Currently our idea is not to accept or work with brands like Adidas and Nike. We will let the community build their own sports brand, which will have a guideline, like how you would design your materials or case. And the community will sell it in the marketplace.”
Tsur Mayer continued, “So you can have that sports brand on your club. And you can edit your club name, colors, uniforms, and much more. From stadium to flags to everything else it's extremely customizable.”
We also talked a bit about the fun that comes with just having fun in the creation process.
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“It’s like a different mode you know. Something you can play with for hours just to create your identity.”
The dev team recently showed off a video showing off one the aspects of customization, which is the Name Generator Tool:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8aPtTW1yM5Q&ab_channel=ManoftheMatch
Man Of The Match Rewards Players With BIG Incentive To Keep Playing
Man of The Match is a free-to-play and play-to-earn game. So what does that mean? As the name suggests, you literally earn money by playing Man Of The Match through advertisements the game has.
It’s a free game and gives you free money.” He said. “It sounds absurd and it is and people tell us there is no free money. I’ll explain how and why.”
Tsur Mayer explains this in better detail:
The “Why” In Earning Money
“Let’s imagine we're in a match and you’re the manager and your lowly club is in a state cup against one of the biggest clubs in the country. It’s 10 minutes to the final whistle. As a manager, you need to have someone on the bench to get fresh legs or make a change, like sub your forward and bring on new defender into the match, right?”
He continued.
“But when you play video games the only incentive you have is for playing time. If that is the case, then no one will ever want to be on the bench. So we have to introduce some other motivation for people to say alright I’ll be the player on the bench. And I’m not losing or I’m not the sucker, but I will be getting something in the future.”
Indeed, money is the ultimate motivator, so how is it implemented in MOTM?
How Players Earn Money via MOTM
Tsur Mayer went on to explain how players earn by playing Man of The Match.
“One of our core values is to be as accurate as we can. Football in real life welcomes advertising and sponsorships. So what we’re going to do is not have real brands, but fake ones with the sponsor ads on your jerseys and around the stadium. Perhaps your stadium is named after your sponsor.”
The idea of having your own special brand for your own team sounds very exciting. Things like this add to the immersion and overall authenticity of MOTM. So how does the money get distributed?
“With every country, imagine each having its own sponsorships. We take a big part of that money and distribute it for every club in the country. So it doesn’t matter if you’re the champions of the league, or the club ranked last, you’ll get something. The only question is how much?”
The money from the ads get distributed not only to managers but players as well.
“Then you have contracts between clubs and players. So basically, we’re introducing a mechanism that takes (money) from the advertisements and distributes it across the league”
We can't imagine something like this will be easy to pull of, but Tsur Mayer believes he's found the way.
“It’s a big undertaking. But when you go into the details you see it’s possible and makes sense.” He went on to explain the game will have an economy, but no microtransactions or pay-to-win mechanics.
Man Of The Match – Our Impressions
Generally, people reasonably fear Kickstarter projects due to some games never coming out as expected. However, we feel something different about Man Of The Match. Mr. Tsur Mayer speaks with a very down-to-earth attitude. Nothing about our conversation felt scripted, and we felt the passion he and his team share for the game.
Speaking of the Kickstarter, Man Of The Match's project earned $16,636 dollars, exceeding well past their $10,000 goal. Six days still remain as of writing this article.
Of course, the kickstarter money doesn't cover the entire project, but that's not Tsur Mayer's goal. “That amount will not even pay the rent for one month. We want to prove something bigger. We want to pull bigger investors to show them there’s something here.”
But overall, he was extremely happy and overjoyed at the game's popularity and reception. “It was very nice to see and we’re grateful and speechless. People just have faith in this project.”
And he's not just talking about Kickstarter, but the Announcement trailer surpassing 1 million views.
“Obviously, something happened that we didn’t expect, and we got much more (views). I don’t know why. Somehow, the YouTube algorithm took that video trailer and put it in the recommendation of many people. And it caught like fire on Twitter and other places.”
In a day and age where major sports titles receive so much criticism, we like to stray away and try something different. But if nobody takes the risk like Tsur Mayer, then there's no opportunity to try something new. We want to let you decide on whether or not the game is worth supporting. The game is going to be free-to-play when it launches, so there's no risk to trying it out, then.
Overall, he's just happy that the word is spreading.
If you still feel a bit skeptical, we can understand. However, he even published a video on YouTube, tackling the difficult questions they face as they develop the game. Hopefully this may answer some of your questions and concerns.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDqop4maelw&t=195s&ab_channel=ManoftheMatch
As or writing this article there is no gameplay other than a concept video for MOTM. But considering the game is free, players can always wait to see the gameplay before deciding if the game is right for them.
MOTM Release Date
There is no current release date for Man Of The Match, though the developer is aiming for a 2025 release. It's too early in the game's development
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