14 DAY TRIAL // 
In the middle of the second biggest race of the year, the Italian Il Giro, I have a dilemma that is pretty much paralyzing me: should I push Frank Schleck hard in order to try and secure a final victory, despite the problems with his time trials skills, or should I just focus on one or two stage wins with my supporting riders in order to have my leader fresh for Le Tour de France?
This is the sort of problem that a real world directeur sportif (some sort of a cycling coach but with more control over his riders actions) would face when dealing with a squad that is as talented and as ripe for conflict as Radioshack Nissan Trek.
And I love that Pro Cycling Manager 20212, the cycling simulation from French developer Cyanide and publisher Focus Home Interactive, allows me to contemplate such realistic dilemmas, despite the fact that, like every year, the launch had some issues and a few more patches are needed before true greatness is achieved.
Gameplay
The basic gameplay of Pro Cycling Manager 2012 is similar to that of the previous titles in the series, which was to be expected given that Cyanide has long settled on a way of representing the mechanics of the real sport in a virtual environment.
Basically anyone can choose a cycling team, which is harder than it sounds given the inclusion of the Continental level division (about 80 new outfits to choose from), and then play the role of general manager and directeur sportif.
The first position implies having to deal with the overall strategy of the chosen team, which means dealing with sponsors, choosing key personnel, seeing which races are best suited to the riders currently ready to race and then evaluating performance and shifting perspectives for the rest of the season.
The mechanics are close to those seen in last year’s edition of the game, although the newspaper is no longer available and there are more options when planning out the schedule that every rider will have to follow for the season.
Once the simulation of an actual race starts, players become directeurs sportifs, able to give their riders orders, create strategies, exploit opportunities and hopefully lead the team to victory or at least solid finishes.
It’s a solid system that simulated all aspects of the sport (apart from things like medication, which is probably too close to doping to be included) and most of the systems are tried and solid, with a few exceptions.
One problem for those who want to take a lowly team and guide it to success and promotion to the World Tour will be the fact that sponsors tend to set rather unrealistic targets most of the time, which are sometimes hard for top teams to accomplish and can be downright impossible for those who have just one rider with an average score of more than 65.
One troubling aspect of PCM 2012 is the problems that plague both the Quick and the Detailed simulation modes and that make actually playing all stages the only viable options for a gamer who wants plausible results.
The Quick Simulation has no new options over the 2011 version of the game, yet it tends to overpower the riders of one’s team. I managed to get stage wins, both on flat land and in the hills, without actually bothering to try and set the right orders.
The other problem can be seen in the Detailed Simulation where I was never able to win a stage (even with the same riders and in the same race where I ruled supreme in the Quick mode) despite repeatedly changing order and making sure that I was as close as possible to real-world tactics.
The big positive development in Pro Cycling Manager 2012 is the way the Artificial Intelligence has been tweaked to make the virtual stages play out closer to real world than at any other point during the series.
Long-range attacks (watch the beautiful move that Andy Schleck tried during 2011 in Le Tour de France) were very rare in PCM, but now the A.I. seems able to gauge when one of its riders has a chance, based mainly on the pace of the peloton. It sometimes launches cyclists far from the finish line and I have even seen one of these attempts succeed in a smaller 2.HC race.
There are also more and better options when it comes to sprinting and train creation, and the computer-controlled teams also make much better choices linked to breakaways, both in their formation stage and when it is time to catch up to them in order to create a mass sprint.
Graphics and audio
As long as you max out the graphics options in Pro Cycling Manager 2012, the game looks very good, with extra care taken with the riders’ faces and a lot more details integrated into the environments.
The peloton is also better simulated in terms of movements and accuracy for the various pieces of kit and every cycling lover gets a photorealism that can rival that of a television transmission at times.
The only graphics problems I have noticed have been linked to some missing pieces of tarmac on some courses and to the design of the finish sections, where the crowds are repetitive and the banners can seem wooden.
One area that seems to have received no work from Cyanide is the audio design and it’s especially jarring to hear the same phrases from the commentators that we have been listening to for the last few years, with little variation and no actual impact on the experience of the player.
The soundtrack is somewhat more palatable, but it can quickly become repetitive and I advise anyone who wants to play Pro Cycling Manager 2012 to get a copy of the Tour de France album.
Multiplayer
Pro Cycling Manager is a series that has always sustained a very dedicated and vocal multiplayer community, which has often created a complex role-playing metagame (see an example of how it can happen here on the PCMdaily website).
In this year’s installment of the game, the development team at Cyanide introduced a new mode called Armada, which is somewhat similar to the Ultimate Team concept that EA Sports has introduced in FIFA.
There are options to use real-world currency in order to get more content, but the mode can also be enjoyed without spending any money as long as the players are willing to give a lot of time to the Armada mode in PCM 2012.
The mode is an interesting take on cycling and there’s no doubt that many will find it interesting to assemble their dream outfits and then race them online, especially given the promises that developers have made about more content and options for the Armada mode.
The problem is that Armada did not arrive alongside but rather replaced the old multiplayer mode, which means that custom databases and real teams cannot be used in online modes, which made a lot of older fans rather angry.
So be warned that, while Armada is a solid mode, you might no longer be able to enjoy some experiences that gamers have long seen as crucial to Pro Cycling Manager, at least at the moment.
The game is solid, especially after two quick patches, and does a better job than the 2011 version at simulating the mechanics of the professional peloton. The community is also set to move its work to this year’s version of the simulation, which means that soon database and stage makers will release more content to enjoy and that even more complete compilations will begin to appear during the fall. For those who lack much knowledge about cycling or haven’t played a simulation type video game PCM 2012 might be a tougher sell, mainly because of the rather steep learning curve, but this is still a fun experience as long as you have the time and the energy to learn what it is about.
The Good
The Bad
Conclusion
