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Published
by SEGA
Developed by Sports Interactive
Release Date - 4th November 2005
Price : £29.99
I've
been struggling to think of an opening paragraph for such
an important review but I think the following says it all:
'What's
in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other word would smell as sweet'
W.
Shakespeare, Romeo & Juliet Act 2 Scene 1
For
over 10 years now we've called the game, that the Collyer
Brothers and Sports Interactive have developed, Championship
Manager but after parting with Eidos their work from now
on will be known as Football Manager. As the great Bard
says though the name is irrelevant. A rose would still smell
as sweet and look as good if it were called something else
and it's exactly the same with the football management games
that Sports Interactive have produced over the years. Whilst
Eidos have the Championship Manager name and 'look', the
code, ideas and brains behind the series all belong to Sports
Interactive and now it's the Football Manager series that
will be responsible for late nights, days off works etc.
The
most important question that most will have is how does
the game differ from past Sports Interactive games? Most
of you will probably have a very good idea of what the game
is like because Sports Interactive have kept with tradition
in releasing a demo of the finished article but I'll attempt
to cover some of what's new in the game. Football Manager
2005 includes 51 countries comprising of 140+ playable divisions
and 100+ cup competitions. Reserve and Junior leagues have
also been included. Well over 230,000 players and staff
have been included in the game which is fantastic and much
more in depth than any previous management game. Media interaction
has also been increased and now you can comment on other
managers should you have the desire to get involved in mind
games. Most will agree the interaction with the media is
still not as great as they would have hoped but it's improving
and that's what matters. Want to find a new coach, assistant
manager, scout or physio but don't have the time? Well now
you can place an advert in the job centre and your personal
assistant will draw up a list of applicants for you to cast
your eye over. If you fancy playing a game online Football
Manager 2005 reportedly supports up to 30 players without
any problems and although we've haven't had a chance to
test this it's certainly an exciting prospect.
The
first thing you're going to notice about Football Manager
2005 is the interface and if the truth be told it will feel
very strange at first. Initially I just couldn't get the
hang of it until I applied the Metallic (Right) skin which
shifts the navigation from the left side of the screen to
the right side. This made the interface much more intuitive.
If you were a user of the hotkeys in CM 03/04 you'll notice
that the hotkeys have changed in FM 2005. F1 used to bring
up your squad screen but now you'll need F6 to do that (F1
is now the hotkey for the news page). What also seems strange
initially is the look of the squad selection screen. Gone
(for legal reasons I assume) is the traditional CM view
and instead is a kind of detailed list view. This does seem
very strange to begin with but it does offer more detail
at a glance and provides more information than the old CM
view ever did. Again this will initially seem confusing
but after a few days play I would find it difficult to return
to the old CM configuration. For the first time in a Sports
Interactive game there are player photographs (for a good
amount of players too). You'll notice pictures of team shirts
on the match overview screens (and there are the official
kits complete with logos and sponsors where possible). Club
badges have also been included for a lot of teams. In fact
if you play in the English leagues (there's plenty of official
league names too) only the Premiership teams and a few in
the Conference North and South don't have the team badges
next to their name.
The
2D match engine returns and has progressed from the one
in CM 03/04. The matches now seem more realistic (player
movement is much improved) and now the match can even be
viewed in a split screen display so you can keep your eye
on other details whilst you watch the match. You can now
even change the speed of the match and the highlights. Match
reports can now be generated at any time (not just at half
and full time) and will update as the match plays out. Before
the game kicks off you get to see the line-up of both teams
so you'll have a fair idea of how your opponents are going
to play. Speaking of which the tactics element of the game
has also been improved and Sports Interactive have included
slider bars that allow you to change elements of your team's
tactics in a more graduated fashion. After a match you can
view the highlights of all the other games in your division/competition.
What I would say here though is that you can only click
the view goals button which then shows every single goal.
I would have much preferred checkboxes next to each fixture
so that I can just show the matches I was interested in.
There is much, much more that's new here too such as more
realistic injuries, more advanced loan and transfer negotiations
etc. Player agents can now even send you video clips of
their players (using the 2D match engine) to arouse your
interest in them. The game also has a few RPG elements too.
If you take a look at your own profile you'll notice some
Mental Attributes that all begin at 10. Ratings such as
'Ability to handle pressure', 'Media Handling', and 'Professionalism'
definitely seem to change according to your actions. In
fact it would make the bulk of this review look like a feature
list if we were to list every new feature in the game but
suffice to say that with the extra/improved features alone
Sports Interactive have done a great job.
Beginning
a new game (by starting one from scratch as opposed to loading
a quick start) will also draw your attention to several
new features. You can choose from four database sizes ranging
from small to huge. There is an option to load all the players
from any nation you wish which I would imagine is very useful
if you wanted to try and become an international manager
of a country other than the one whose league you'll begin
the game with (as it will give you a greater choice of players
to pick from). As before you can play with fictitious players
if you wish and attribute masking can be disabled if you
don't like it. If you want to, extra detail can be enabled
for a selected league which will allow you to look at all
that leagues highlights in full detail. What I really like
though is that you can begin a new game unemployed. This
has to the ultimate test of your managerial skills as you
don't know which team's going to give you your first job
although from my experience it's usually a team in the lower
divisions (Conference North and South in English leagues)
who have nothing to loose by giving a rookie a chance. Once
you've taken your job you'll be given a warm welcome by
your chairman as well as negative messages from the media
who usually don't rate your chances of success. Sports Interactive
claim the game now processes data more quickly than CM 03/04
did and I would agree with that. You can now choose from
four processing options ranging from the fastest (which
means you can't interrupt to carry out tasks) to the slowest
(which allows you to continue your duties whilst data is
processed in the background).
Enthusiasts
will be pleased to know that Sports Interactive have included
a pre-game editor with the game and it's pretty comprehensive
and allows you to edit practically anything in the game.
You can edit players, edit staff and edit teams exactly
how you want to. Want to give you favourite team a third
kit? No problem, and you can even choose from a variety
of styles as well as choosing the colours you'd like. If
you want to you can create a new team you can do and place
them in a division of your choosing. Over the years database
editors have often relied on home made editors to bring
the database up to date and it's great that such a comprehensive
official editor has been included with the first Football
Manager game from Sports Interactive.
Football
Manager 2005, just like the Championship Manager games before
it, is completely deaf gamer friendly. All information in
the game, the player attributes, the match commentary and
news items etc., are in text which makes the game fully
accessible to deaf gamers. An electronic (.pdf) guide for
the editor has been included so you can read up on how to
use the editor if you need to. We reviewed a downloadable
version of the game so we can't comment on the quality of
the manual but we would hope it will be of a similar quality
to the one that was with CM 03/04. Thankfully you can now
access information on competition rules from within the
game itself so if you choose to play in a foreign league
you'll have no problem in finding how the promotions and
relegations etc., are decided. The match text commentary
seems better than in the CM 4 series but it doesn't seem
as comprehensive as the text commentary that appeared in
the CM 3 series which may be a little disappointing if you
don't watch the 2D match highlights.
Football
Manager 2005 is the second game in the SEGA Sports Interactive
partnership (NHL Eastside
Hockey Manager being the first) and by all accounts
it's a cracker. It offers a lot of small refinements over
Championship Manager 03/04 that at first might not seem
such a big deal but with extensive play you'll find yourself
becoming more impressed and engrossed in this new game that
Sports Interactive have created. I've played every game
the Collyer Brothers and Sports Interactive have made since
Championship Manager '93/94 and I can honestly say that
Football Manager 2005 is the best of the lot which is a
fantastic achievement. Much was made about the bugs in Championship
Manager 4 and I personally experienced a few that resulted
in crashes. There's no such problems here though and in
over 10 days of almost constant play I've not had any problems
and the game has been rock solid in regards to stability
which is excellent. So a new era has dawned then. It's long
been the case that the greatest football management game
was a Championship Manager title but that's not the case
anymore. With the Championship Manager series now in the
hands of developers who couldn't create a worthy rival to
any Championship Manager that Sports Interactive created
it's a good bet that the next Championship Manager will
not be as good. It doesn't matter though because a new game
has taken over the title of the greatest football management
simulation and that game is Football Manager 2005.
Overall
Game Rating: 9.2/10
Many thought that Sports Interactive would suffer when they
had to change the name of their game. However, Football
Manager 2005 is the greatest football management simulation
to date and a great start for both SEGA and Sports Interactive.
Deaf
Gamers comment:
As usual it's another Sports Interactive title that's completely
deaf gamer friendly.
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