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Published
by Eidos
Developed by Beautiful Game Studios
Release Date: Out Now
Price: £29.99
Championship
Manager 5, an introduction.
Without
a demo, without reviews and without a general lack of information
Eidos and Beautiful Game Studios have released the latest
in the Championship Manager series. Why has there been such
a lack of information? Well let's just say that by the time
you get to the end of this review you'll know why. We've
always been given review code for previous CM games but
this one was different in that our emails have gone unanswered
with anything related to CM5. Don't worry though because
we have money, we know where the shops are and we are going
to give you the facts regarding this fifth title in the
series. I would also like to make it clear that the game
was reviewed using the first patch that
was available on the day of release to give the game a fair
chance.
What's
the game about?
Football
management of course, well at least that's what it's supposed
to be about. Before the release of Championship Manager
5 the series was revered and held in high esteem by football
fans all over the globe. However when Sports Interactive
and Eidos split we all knew that it would be different from
then on. Eidos retained the name and Sports Interactive
kept the source code and database. Eidos formed Beautiful
Game Studios to work on CM5 whilst SI teamed up with SEGA
to create Football
Manager 2005 a game that many recognise as the true
successor to Championship Manager: Season '03-04. Eidos
thought the game could be better if they took control of
it which in many ways defies logic because no other development
team had ever created a game to rival the work of the Collyer
brothers and their development team, Sports Interactive.
What's
good about the game?
Usually
for a Championship Manager game this section would be easy
to write but I can honestly say it's been a struggle to
think of many things. Eidos have been shouting speed, speed,
speed at us for months in reference to the fact that the
game is supposed to be quicker than the Sports Interactive
games. Creating a game with all the 20+ leagues takes only
a few minutes which is excellent and the day to day processing
seems fairly quick too (although this is not much quicker
than FM2005 to be honest and whether you are running one
league or all of them the processing times are fairly similar
which is strange). The tactics now allow you to not only
set runs but also feeds too. The training has been streamlined
making it easier to understand. These last two 'pros' are
not as worthwhile as you might think though because different
tactics seem to have no effect and the training always seems
to work wonderfully well and it's only when a player is
injured do you see the red arrows that indicate that progress
is not being made. Player attributes can now be either out
of 20 or 100. There is also a 'Player Cam' that allows you
to watch how a player is performing in a game. Whilst this
sounds good though it's worth is debatable.
What's
not so good about the game?
Yes
it's quicker but the speed comes at a price. There is such
a lack of detail in the game it's shocking. Results seem
unrealistic in a lot of cases with teams scoring silly amounts
(7 goals and upwards is not uncommon). Duplicate players,
players and staff at the wrong teams and in some cases players
are classified as playing in the wrong positions. Fictitious
staff members and crazy player attributes are also included.
The game claims to have used the Opta Index which must be
a joke according to the statistics in the game. Crikey it
wouldn't have taken much to have had a quick look at a previous
CM game and altered the stats a little here and there. They
could have even asked the fans of the teams to rate the
players and it would have been more accurate than this.
Throughout the game you're peppered with ridiculous media
articles that describes completely unrealistic transfer
speculation such as Rio Ferdinand to Southampton for £8m
and such like. The message filtering is poor too and you
either have to read all the messages or miss all of them
that don't need a response. There's a lot of things wrong,
far too many to mention here to be honest. You can start
with a 'small team' an almost immediately apply for the
best jobs available and get them which is just crazy. Transfer
negotiations seem to take forever to conclude and prove
ultimately frustrating. There's a real lack of free transfers
making it difficult if your team hasn't any money. Players
have no history when you begin a new game so you can't check
on their past records. You'll notice that the English league
matches are refereed by foreign refs (Japanese, Portuguese
etc.) which just doesn't occur in real life. You can't see
live updates of the league tables during a match either.
Substitutions that you've ordered are not always carried
out. There are way too many errors in the messages that
appear too. There is just so much wrong it makes you want
to cry. I should also mention that there's no multiplayer
game in any shape or form. If you want multiplayer then
you're expected to shell out for CM Online on a monthly
basis which is way out of order. International management
is also no longer possible which is shocking.
The
Match Engine.
No
we hadn't forgotten the match engine because it deserves
a paragraph all to itself. The games are played on a titled
2D pitch in an attempt to give you a clearer picture of
the action. In truth it looks pretty dire. The players look
like those discs you have to collect in Pikmin and the ball
bounces around rather like a beach ball which is actually
quite amusing to watch. Goalkeepers obviously wear the new
Teflon Gloves © as they fumble the ball into the net
all too frequently. Shots that hit the woodwork can (but
not always) rebound to almost the half-way line. Defenders
back away from the ball all too often and score some great
own-goals. It's a long way away from the refined match engine
that you can find in FM 2005. The speed of the matches is
also an issue with the game. By default you can watch the
match in real-time (it isn't 90 minutes though as the game
is speeded up when it goes out of play) or you can watch
the game at increased speeds of 2X, 6X or 60X but these
are almost unwatchable. Selecting Fast Result will quickly
go to the goals whilst the Highlights option will supposedly
show you all the highlights in addition to the goals. Some
of the so called highlights are really silly though and
of no importance. In short it's a very poor match engine
that isn't going to please many fans of the series.
How
does it look?
lf
I had to pick the worst element of Championship Manager
5, aside from the match engine, it would have to be the
look of the game, because it's a major step back for the
series. The three skins look like they have been thrown
together in minutes rather than months and the game lacks
the style and clean interface of the previous Championship
Manager games. It's not only the match and interface graphics
that are poor though and without a busy cursor, poor placement
of buttons (the continue button is a tab that changes it's
label according to the situation). and no shortcut keys
you'll be really disappointed.
How
deaf gamer friendly is the game?
There's
little to comment on here as all the information in the
game is text based. The sounds that are there for the match
are very basic though so you are not missing much. What
I will say is that in most cases a poor choice of fonts
has been made and some text is not as easy on the eyes as
it should be.
Final
Thoughts.
There's
little doubt that the game was bought out without reviews
and without a demo because Eidos hoped fans of the series
would buy the game based on it's passed merits. It's not
a total disaster but it's not far from it to be perfectly
fair. Even if the most glaring bugs were fixed you'd still
have a game that feels so very basic and old-fashioned that
it's just not on. Having taken control of WBA I was surprised
to walk the Premier league without really doing anything
(no offence intended Baggies fans) which suggests it's far
too easy. The official forums for the game have been filled
with gamers who feel ripped off and justifiably so. The
game is a cash in on the Championship Manager name that
Sports Interactive established and it deserves to flop.
This might sound harsh but £29.99 for such a poor
game is way out of order. If you must try the game wait
for the demo because otherwise you'll be in for a hell of
a shock to see just how low the Championship Manager series
has sunk.
Overall
Game Rating: 3.0/10
Deaf
Gamers Classification:
(Click
the letter or here
for details)
The game's information is text
based so there's no problem there. A better font could have
been used though. However the quality of the game leaves
a lot to be desired and it's evident from this that although
the series is not dead it's time to call a priest in for
the last rites. Don't be fooled by this game because it
isn't the Championship Manager you all know and loved.
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