AIFA Updates

The following is a timeline containing more details in the creation of this project. As there are still many leagues, teams, and players still yet to be created, this will continue to be updated.

## 2022

* January 2022 - Expansion of Neural FA
	+ 8 teams were added to a "lower division" (fourth tier) in order to create a suitable cup format. These teams and stadiums were selected from the original "final cut" list, and the rosters were selected from the original run of player names in the same way the original 60 were.
* February 2022 - Neural Lower Division teams created in PES.
* January 28 to February 8, 2022 - Badges for the 38 Ottostaat clubs were made.
* March 12-16, 2022 - All 38 Ottostaat teams' kits were created and loaded into PES.
* March 20, 2022 - Despite a March 6 planned start, simulation of the new league's games began.
* March & April, 2022 - This Wiki was created.
* April, 2022 - Simulation of Neuralander Cup games began, originally scheduled for February and March.
* April, 2022 - Data collected for Quevedos
	+ Teams and grounds for Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries were used.
* May, 2022 - 24 Kronrodya clubs were selected, and badges were created.
* June, 2022 - Simulation of Kronrodyan games began, retroactively, with a March season start.
* July, 2022 - Data collected for Alfvenbruk. Scheduled for a fall start, will be retroactively simulated.
	+ Teams and grounds for Scandinavian countries were used: Norway, Sweden, Finland, Iceland, Denmark, and the Faroe Islands.
* July, 2022 - 23 clubs for Quevedos, with football ground names, selected. Scheduled for a fall start, will be retroactively simulated.
* August 8, 2022 - Official launch of AIFA/AI Football Project YouTube & Twitter.

## 2021

* June, 2021 - Preparing the second season.
	+ The league concluded in June due to the late start, with a proper August-to-May calendar planned going forward. For ease of setup, no players would switch teams.
* July & August, 2021 - Individual stat adjustments.
	+ To simulate fluctuations in form and skill from season to season, all players had all stats altered anywhere between -5 and +5, randomly drawn across a normal distribution. Goalkeepers were boosted to account for the unrealistically high scoring and to account for the gulf in stats between attacking players and keepers. (In hindsight, this range created some wild swings in player form in the two seasons, and would be adjusted further. Goalkeepers were also not boosted enough to prove capable of handling the higher rated forwards and midfielders.)
* September 13, 2021 - The second Neuraland season began.
	+ All matchdays were summarized in highlight videos on YouTube:
		- Premier League Highlights, 2021-22
* August & September 2021 - The start of Ottostaat data collection.
	+ I decided to add a German-inspired association to this fictional universe. The clubs and stadium names of German, Dutch, Austrian, and Liechtenstein teams were gathered in August, and whittled down to 38 teams.
* December 2021 - Ottostaat rosters were created.
	+ Loaned players were introduced to help fill out the Otto-Klasse teams. Initially, the Otto-Liga teams had too many players, and the Otto-Klasse too few.
* December 2021 - Data collection also began for Kronrodya.

## 2020

* January 2020 - First successful run of the neural network, generating a list of over 5,000 club names. The list was cut down a total of three times: 432, 299, and finally, down to 90.
	+ Of the 90 remaining names, 60 were selected, while the remaining 30 were kept and used for additional place names on the map. (Note: "Crumlin Town" was initially one of the final 60 teams, but was removed after learning it was a real place in Dublin.)
	+ With over 1,000 football grounds collected, the process was repeated. Over 10,000 potential ground names were generated, of which 360 potential ground names were chosen for the final cut.
	+ Next was the rosters, with an input list of over 6,000 footballer names from the various leagues. Over 9,000 names were genreated, and randomly assigned to one of the 60 teams. Each team had a list of 150 names, where 20-25 were assigned to players in the game.

* February, 2020 - The badges of the first three clubs were created. All 60 were completed by July 1, 2020.
* July & August, 2020 - The kits were created for all 60 teams.
	+ The teams, logos, and kits were imported into PES 2017 and assigned to the PES, PLA, and PFA leagues. Teams were assigned to one of the 60 fictional teams randomly, and assigned to different tiers by personal preference.
* October, 2020 - Despite a planned September start, the league began simulating games, with past matchdays included to catch up.
* Highlights videos of all games were created, organized by league. They were compiled in YouTube playlists here:
	+ Premier League highlights
	+ Second Division highlights, discontinued after Matchday 19
	+ Third Division highlights, discontinued after Matchday 19

## 2019

* Late 2019 - Data collection began.
	+ The data collected included names of football clubs from England, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales, and the Republic of Ireland, as far down the pyramid as reliable data was available. The input data contained a total of 4,044 names of football clubs. (Due to the high frequency, "FC" and "Football Club" were not included in the data, and B teams, youth teams, academy teams, etc, of clubs were not included to avoid duplicates.)