Do pocket digicams really offer manual adjustments?

Talking about digicams from Sony, Canon, Nikon, etc. I've noticed that five years ago or so, the so called 'high end', used to offer 'manual modes', where you could change Stops, Speeds, Iso, and even some weird types of 'focusing tools', but once you got the prints or even on the screen, it was almost impossible to distinguish a perspective that could be taken as depth of field…
So, these pocket cameras only offer a fake manual mode that badly mimic a SLR, or they really can make these adjustments?

They can make such adjustments, It's because of their small sensors that they use short focal lengths, and with these short focal lengths it is very difficult to achieve shallow depth of field. The principle behind this is the same as with crop frame and full frame DSLRs, the latter being able to achieve shallower depth of field at the same angle of view as their crop frame counterparts.