Football Manager 2009

I always load the new verisons of this game with an open mind.

Bearing in mind that you have probably been playing the last version for a year now the changes often seem wierd. The screen seems squashed and the new match engine seems pointless.....until you have been playing it for about 5 minutes and then it all seems to make perfect sense.

Yes it is different from the 08 version but most important yes it has improved.

The game has been cleared of alot of clutter, from your management link it has been condensed down into sub divisions to make it easier to navigate.

The pre and post match press conferences will make the game longer but more realistic. You can also send you assistant should you get bored of doing them.

Picking your team is easier with small icons telling you if the player you pick is playing in there natural position or if they are acc, comp, or ineffectual instead of having to click into each individual player to check.

The 3d… more »

I always load the new verisons of this game with an open mind.

Bearing in mind that you have probably been playing the last version for a year now the changes often seem wierd. The screen seems squashed and the new match engine seems pointless.....until you have been playing it for about 5 minutes and then it all seems to make perfect sense.

Yes it is different from the 08 version but most important yes it has improved.

The game has been cleared of alot of clutter, from your management link it has been condensed down into sub divisions to make it easier to navigate.

The pre and post match press conferences will make the game longer but more realistic. You can also send you assistant should you get bored of doing them.

Picking your team is easier with small icons telling you if the player you pick is playing in there natural position or if they are acc, comp, or ineffectual instead of having to click into each individual player to check.

The 3d match engine is good (it does slow the loading time down however - but you would expect this). However been a die hard champ manager/football manager fan i wil continue to use the 2d version. They have introduced a tv full screen version which makes it easier to view the 2d version.
You also get an opinion of your assistant during the game on how he thinks the team are doing.

I could go on for hours and im sure the full game will have plenty more features to write about. One more thing - you can sign marcelo from real madrid for around £5mill. Bargin.

Bring on 14/11/2008 and fm 2009. Looks like my partner will once again become a fm widow for the forceable future.

This is not much of an improvement over fm2008... I too have a high spec laptop and the game runs slow and freezes with monotonous regularity. At first i thought it was just me and my machine but there are too many other reviews here saying the same thing, so it has to be the game, not the gamers after all!
The 3d match view isnt worth a light, and the press conference feature gets monotonous too after a while so i just avoid using it,
And am i the only one who finds the amount of injuries ridiculous?
I am now three quarters of the way through a season, and there hasnt been one match involving my club which has played through without my team suffering at least one injury to a player. In one instance i had four serious injuriesin the second half of the match alone, each one resulting in layoffs lasting over a month per man. My injury list at one point had 12 players on it.........a bit difficult for a league 2 club to cope with.....and at that point too over 120 players… more »

This is not much of an improvement over fm2008... I too have a high spec laptop and the game runs slow and freezes with monotonous regularity. At first i thought it was just me and my machine but there are too many other reviews here saying the same thing, so it has to be the game, not the gamers after all!
The 3d match view isnt worth a light, and the press conference feature gets monotonous too after a while so i just avoid using it,
And am i the only one who finds the amount of injuries ridiculous?
I am now three quarters of the way through a season, and there hasnt been one match involving my club which has played through without my team suffering at least one injury to a player. In one instance i had four serious injuriesin the second half of the match alone, each one resulting in layoffs lasting over a month per man. My injury list at one point had 12 players on it.........a bit difficult for a league 2 club to cope with.....and at that point too over 120 players were on the league 2 injury table.. It does rather make the efforts of the gamer pointless, every time you sign a new player he is immediately unavailable to you for a month or two! If real football in this country was actually this dangerous health and safety officials would ban the game nationwide! Come on fm2009 makers, bring some realism back into the game and make it playable, for heaven's sake! My overall verdict on this game is that i really do wish i hadnt bothered with it and stuck with fm 2008. Oh yes, and you dont want to know what i think about that activation process.......