Hello again - it's been a while since we've last updated you with the Weekly News, but now we're back from holidays - Christmas and New Year-celebration is over - and ready to give you your daily dosis of PCM news! ;)
Happy New Year! Welcome to the year of 2007 - the year which will bring you two Pro Cycling Manager-titles for the first time ever. Both titles, the PSP-version and the PC-version, will probably be released around June/July.
Therefore, we'll also be very busy this year with updating you on the latest Pro Cycling Manager-news. So, again, Happy New Year! :)
New article published First of all, we've published a new article written by crew member Alex134. The guide helps you through the grand tours, and tells you how you end up being a succesful team manager throughout the grand tours - for example by winning stages and the jerseys. The article can be found in the "Guides"-section.
1.1 version of the Save Game Editor released A new version of the popular Save Game Editor by Jape has been released. It's not revolutionary, but it fixes a small problem with editing contracts. If you didn't have any problems, you can spare yourself the download. For those who had the problem, download the new version here: http://www.pcmdaily.com/downloads.php?cat_id=11&download_id=98
PPDB with new ideas PPDB had set "Around Christmas" as the possible release date for their first PCM2 DB release, but since we're now past that date, a new date has been set - 13th of January as the earliest, meaning that it will definately NOT be released before that date - also, it may not be released on the 13th of January. For the fans - us - we can only hope for a release soon.
There's no doubt, though, that it's really worth waiting for. A new, never tried before-idea has just been revealed. PlakkerNL and the rest of the PPDB-team will change the "Super-Prestige"-ranking into a national ranking, meaning that the DB will be released in many different versions, depending on the nation. For example, a Dutch version will be released which - in addition to the Pro Tour rankings - will have the official Dutch ranking, Topcompetitie. The new idea is still only on the drawing board, but it's likely that it'll be implented in the database.
The DB will contain around 120 teams, more than 300 new stages and a countless number of cyclists.
Cyclocross Manager 2006 - new release date As with the PPDB-project, many are awaiting the innovating project Cyclocross Manager 2006 which completely transforms your road biking game, Pro Cycling Manager, into a new Cyclocross Manager-game. Basically, the upcoming Cyclocross-pack contains new road textures which makes the roads look dirty and "cyclocross"-alike. In addition to that, it contains new stages which are true to the real cyclocross stages, a DB with the real riders and teams. It really looks promising, and we will of course update you when it's released. Originally, it was supposed to be released around New Years Eve, but it has now been delayed to this week, the first week of January.
Danish Championships? As we reported in the Weekly News #2, the Danish Championships are currently under way - but the past 1½ week the site which are in charge of the championships has been down. Today, it saw the light again, but without any content at all. Therefore, the Danish Championships are pretty much impossible to report about this week ;)
Stage Creation Contest 2006 On the 5h of December we reported about the yearly Stage Creation Contest which - if you're really good - can end up with a spot in the official stage creation team. Today, it's the last day to send in your best stage creation.
Andy Schleck will have his breakthrough in 2007 According to our user base, CSC-rider Andy Schleck will have his major breakthrough this year. With 32 % of the votes, he won the first place in front of T-Mobile rider Linus Gerdemann who won 26 % of the votes, and Igor Anton (17%) from Euskaltel.
Last year, Andy Schleck's brother, Frank Schleck had his breakthrough, so if Andy has about the same talent as Frank, it's definately possible that he'll once become a great rider. In 2006 he showed his talent by winning the 3rd and 5th stage of Sachsen Tour and by winning the climber's jersey in the Tour of Britain.
Linus Gerdemann has also definately showed his talent by winning the 7th stage of Tour de Suisse in 2005. Last year, 2006, he ended 7th in the overall classification in the same race - so he's definately worth the votes and also a guy we should keep an eye out for in 2007.
Great Manager 4 Usually, so-called forum games don't survive for too long - but "Great Manager" is now in its 4th year on the Cyanide forum, and still with a high level of activity level. You can now subscribe for the 4th season - you can read more about the game here: http://www.cyanide-studio.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=50492
No, this is not the ultimate PCM 07-competition - and no, you won't become a millionare - but after all, there's some sort of prize at stake. After having "survived" for one month in the very tough PCM-business we're now ready to take new initiatives.
The first one is a small competetion. It's pretty simple - make a banner which you think fits the design. There're no real rules - size and colours are only limited by your imagination. If we, the crew, think your banner design was the best we'll award you with a seat in the crew.
The competetion runs to the 8th of January 2007 12:00 am (forum time). The design has to be sent to CrueTrue@hotmail.com .
Cyanide forum member janullrick has created a very nice historical database. It has 50 teams, with all of its riders, accesoires, jerseys, tour de france profiles, and even commentary for the riders in 1996.
Hello, and welcome to this 2nd edition of the Weekly News. Not much has been said and done this week, but since we're a new site we can always dig up in old stories which we are yet to report about ;)
1989 DB - now in 12th edition! I don't think I've actually ever seen a DB which have been released in twelve editions - but this one now has. Compared to v11, this one has corrected the small career bug which was present in v11. We're yet to upload it to the website, but until we upload it you can download it at an external site: http://www.partage-facile.com/36645-OfficialRelease_1989.rar.html
PCM.daily League: Chuck is still undefeated! After a pretty chaotic game Chuck is still undefeated in the PCM.daily League with 5 games won in a row. Only_one is also undefated, but only with two wins. For the sake of excitement we'll hope Chuck gets some competition in the upcoming days ;)
Danish championships continuing During the latest few weeks the Danish championships has been underway. With 24 people to start with, the "peloton" has now been reduced to 11 people - including the leader of PCM.daily league, Chuck. Good luck to all participants!
PPDB getting closer to 1st release Earlier this week, it was announced that Savoluca, known for his databases for the earlier versions of Pro Cycling Manager, joined forces with PlakkerNL and the rest of the PPDB-team. He'll contribute as a "co-project-leader", and he'll therefore be a very central person in the making of the PPDB for PCM. The DB will of course contain a whole lot of teams as with the version for PCM1. It also includes updates graphics, entirely new stages, etc., etc.. To start with, they'll only release a 06-version which is due for release around Christmas. A week later, near New Year, they'll release a 07-version which then will be updated from week to week after that.
Other exciting database projects One of the most exciting projects for PCM is the "Cyclocross Manager"-project. It actually transforms your game into a totally new game, a cyclocross-game. It changes the road textures so it looks more dirty - more off-road - and teams / riders are of course also changed to match the real world of cyclo cross. To read more about the project, click this link: http://www.cyanide-studio.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=49646
Another exciting project is the "Danish DB"-project. If you're into the Danish cycling scene, it's pretty exciting - it contains only Danish teams, including a lot of new Danish races and riders. It's still far from done, though, but we're getting closer...
The first few 2007-dbs has started to pop up. The first one has been released by Mic91, but it contains quite a lot mistakes and doesn't seem to be well-worth the download. Other than that one, the following has started a project each: Rasmu89 (who has also made a 89-db), elfouc (who also has made a 89-db) and the PPDB as mentioned earlier. Especially the elfouc-project seems very detailed, but currently no release dates have been set.
Minor site updates Not a news update without a notice of the updates on the site: - We've added a few new screenshot categories, but without adding any pictures to them. As a user you're more than welcome to submit screenshots to the categories. - Actually, this was added last week, but here we go anyway: I've added a Donations-panel below the "Who's online"-panel. If you like the site to continue its work, feel free to make a donation - it'd be really helpful.
It's back! The yearly edition of Cyanide's stage creating contest has now been launched. Basically, the contest's purpose is to find stage creating talents for the upcoming version of Pro Cycling Manager - so winning this contest could end up with the winner being an official stage maker of Pro Cycling Manager 2007! The main prize, however, is the possibility to choose a game from the Focus-catalogue.
This is what the announcement said: Stages creation contest 2006 There we are at it again...
In order to find out the best designers in the community and the evolutions, we are planning again a stages creation contest.
This contest is open to every Pro Cycling Manager 2006 player (not a judge ). We strongly recommend the different countries' communities to take part in it to be able to discover their talented designers.
The involved will have to do a mountain stage of 2000m of positive height variation. No imposed place.
The stage's length will have to stand between 150 and 250 kilometers. You'll be able to choose by yourself if the arrival will be uphill or not. The limit of time to give back the stages is set at Monday the 1st January 2007 at 23h59.
Stages notation : The stages evaluation will be done by a few people jury : Wawan, Wizaja, Freire and myself.
The stages will be noted and a classification should be published in January. No reclamation will be accepted against the classification. This notation of course won't be objective because of its artistic part. We'll try to be as impartial as possible.
We'll have a strong looking at the following points : - Turns (pins, variety, not too much turns but enough) - 2D profile - the passes summits - « Isolated buildings » utilisation - Cities places - Forest places - Realism and cohereance of the stage (place of beginning and arrival, passes choosen...) - Global render of the stage - Lakes or seas are better, as bridges, tunnels or secondhand roads
We'll strongly penalize the stages including the following points : Non-respect of the little flat zones between downhill and an uphill sections. 3D surcharge which would make the stage unplayable (too many buildings, too many cities, too many roads...) Too high declivities due to hazardous villages or crossroads "Flying" objects over the road
Stages sending : The persons taking part of it will have to send their creation to the following adress : concourspcm_AT_cyanide-studio.com (replace _AT_ by @) The sending will be done by mailing of a .zip or .rar file which will absolutely need the following files : - The stage xml file - the bmp file (the map) (With the same name as the xml file and 512*512, 1024*1024 or 2048*2048 pixels)
Prizes : The contest's winner will be able to choose a game of his choice in the Focus ones's.
The best stage makers may be asking to help for the next Pro Cycling Manager's official stages.
). We strongly recommend the different countries' communities to take part in it to be able to discover their talented designers. 
