Football Manager 2013

[Jamie Oliver is fat]

2013 is going to include a "classic mode" which sounds like just the thing I've been wanting for years

FM has become a bloated, trainspotting-esque, spreadsheet mess for people with Aspergers

I've felt that alternative games have become intimidated out of the genre as they simply cannot complete with the level of complexity and detail of FM. Only EA Football Manager remained and did a reasonable job for those of us who just wanted to play at football management like games from years gone by, and not have to invest dozens of hours into it

Sounds like this "classic mode" could get me back on-board;

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-09-06-football-manager-2013-interview-acres-of-new-information-about-that-classic-mode

[Unoriginal]

I'm obsessed with the game, love the complexity and detail and don't have aspergers. I do however have a lot of free time and nothing better to do. Classic mode is a brilliant idea nonetheless that may destroy the competition because there doesn't seem to be any reason for other FM simulators to exist now.

[Utter Shit]

900 new features in the game. Can't wait.

[Jamie Oliver is fat]

I'm obsessed with the game, love the complexity and detail and don't have aspergers. I do however have a lot of free time and nothing better to do. Classic mode is a brilliant idea nonetheless that may destroy the competition because there doesn't seem to be any reason for other FM simulators to exist now.

They've done the right thing pleasing both crowds I think, this should get them a whole load of extra punters

Maybe your Asperger's is undiagnosed?

[Tokyo Sexwhale]

900 new features in the game. Can't wait.

Does it allow you to operate on cruciate ligaments?

I usually skip a couple of generations of these, though I'm more tempted to play it when Villa are doing badly in real life, so I can cast myself as The Messiah.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

The challenge modes sound great, and much more like what a jobbing manager would be thrust into rather than getting to cherrypick whatever you like.

I'm unsure as to whether I want more or less detail. More detail makes it more realistic but also makes you do the work of half a dozen staff that would be helping you with that shit in real life. Less detail means I can't make the correct tweaks I want.

I've always been a transfers manager- start off by shipping half the squad out and going out for any bargain I can lay my mitts on, and then grimacing as they take a painful month or two to gel together. Usually I hang in there and they start cleaning up towards the 2nd half of the season.

[Tokyo Sexwhale]

Yeah, I spend an age at the start of the game looking for wonderkids, free agents, bargains and expiring contracts, as well as changing most of my coaching staff.  I then chop out all the dead wood.

No..must not buy it...

[thugler]

This classic mode they are going on and on about is completely pointless to someone who's been playing for years and wants them to improve the actual game.

Last time they mooted 9 zillion new features but most of them are incredibly small things. A match engine with decent graphics and better conversation trees would be a genuine improvement. But it doesn't seem to be the way they are going. Who gives a crap about a 'realistic tax system'.

[Utter Shit]

Who gives a crap about a 'realistic tax system'.

That's EXACTLY the sort of thing I care about in the game. The realism of it is what really makes the game for me, and foreign superpowers that can randomly fuck you over due to issues outside of your control is exactly the sort of thing that is happening in the modern game.

Shoulders, I'm sure you already know this as it's been consistently signposted in the game for a few years, but you can delegate almost every area of your job if you can't be arsed with certain bits. I always get someone to cover training, as it's just too dull. I ended up delegating press conferences in the last game as well, hopefully they will improve them as in FM12 it was incredibly repetitive. Then again it's difficult for the makers - how do you fit in enough conversation strands to keep it interesting for people who are willing to dedicate hundreds of hours to the game?

[KLG-7A]

Do you really need anything more advanced than this?



Answer: no.

[Unoriginal]

I'm glad the loan system has been revamped too, considering how awful it is right now, especially if you're a lower league team. While I like challenge mode, starting the game unemployed offers similar challenges if you take the first job offered to you with a low reputation.

[Nobody Soup]

I think the classic mode sounds a good idea but I think I'd rather just play less matches in one sitting than do less stuff. well, it might be good if you can turn it on and off, some periods of the game do get a bit slow and annoying, like november after the champions league qualification has been assured. I think overall though I'd feel empty and hollow winning on classic mode, which really sounds like it's for wimps.

I think if anything the things I would rather lose control of would be the power to sign anyone you wanted when you first went to a club. not that I want to delegate my transfers to directors, I don't, but it would be more realistic to identify targets and express preferences and then make do with what you got based on how much they trusted you and the money they were willing to spend on a single player, the idea of an overall budget to allocate as you see fit isn't how teams would work.

still though, dunno if I should. this would mean giving up my current game, started back in 2010 and now at 2053 in the game, the sheer fucking time I invested in that is pathetic. also, thankfully I'm over the hump with that game and I don't know if I really want to go back to planning tactics on post its at work and writing pretend newspaper articles and magazine features on the history of my teams. because that's apparently "sad".

I want testimonials, that mick meijer [nb]youth academy product, 700 games for helmond sport, 9 years as captain.... well I'm sure you understand[/nb] was allowed to retire without one is a fucking travesty.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Shoulders, I'm sure you already know this as it's been consistently signposted in the game for a few years, but you can delegate almost every area of your job if you can't be arsed with certain bits. I always get someone to cover training, as it's just too dull.

Yeah, but the fact those aspects exist indicate that if you go into it, you can do a better job of it than the people you're delegating it to.

That's what I mean by torn. I want to exploit everything going but at the same time, devising training sessions and refreshing them every few months is boring.

What's really boring is the media stuff. They're still doing it all in the dullest way imagineable.

[Jamie Oliver is fat]

One of the features of old games I used to like was shit like expanding your stadium and increasing capacity and seeing it happening, change the price of hot dogs and go sniffing for a good sponsor, not micro-managing shit like who is a mentor to who

Football Manager just feels boring. It's so good and realistic it genuinely feels like a job

When playing games like Soccer Boss (on casette ffs) I used to dream of a game that had an actual match engine where you could see the goals going in like you were watching telly

Now we have that, and it's fucking boring

EA Football Manager theoretically has access to a better match engine, but the influence of Football Manager is stopping them using it to make a proper enjoyable football management game

[Morrison Lard]

Soccer Boss

Without doubt, my favourite football game ever.


I always preferred #King in goal to #Pate.

[Waking Life]

I also really liked World Champions for the Spectrum and the original Football Manager game in its BBC Micro incarnation.

Although the flashing goal screen in Soccer Boss was always an exciting moment.

I've not played the current Football Manager series for about 10 years and I still think Championship Manager 97/98 was the best version I played.  Most of the time was spent playing actual matches and it had the data editor.  People were still doing patches for it up until a few years ago I believe.  I've tried with later versions, but maybe it's because I just didn't have the time to invest when I was older; wading through pre-season took me hours.

[Junglist]

CM01/02 is updated to the modern day, with a whole load of changes (play a match in about four seconds, for example).

Considering the iso is freeware, its well worth messing with. And my tactic (Souljah) from those heady days of discussion on TheDugout is still standing strong.

Easily the second/third greatest game of all time.

[Depressed Beyond Tables]

In the spectrum version I was able to hack into the program and set my budget to tens of trillions of pounds. Naturally this made it easier to attract talent to my club. All that money went to my head though and I would end up making questionable decisions like putting Van Basten in goals because he had a good shot on him. It sort of ruined the game for me and I ended up feeling like a kind of successful *Nick Leeson of football management. 'Course things were different back then.

_{* former CEO of Galway Utd}

[Utter Shit]

There was a management game on PS1 called Player Manager (I think) which was one of the most poorly conceived games of all time. The managing element was quite good - relatively deep (though not a patch on the king of console management games of the time, Premier Manager '98), lots of fun issues to deal with etc, and it felt realistically difficult. The problem was, you could also play as your side, and this part was ludicrously easy. As in, you could quite easily get the ball with a player, walk past every player in the team, dribble around the goalkeeper and score, every time. So any time you needed a result, you knew you could just play the game yourself and absolutely murder them. It was a shame really because if they removed the player part, it was decent. It was like a legitimised version of the old "take over the opposition team before a game and play without a goalkeeper" trick on modern-era CM/FM games.