No longer do you have control, in 10 per cent increments, of every way in which your team functions. Gone are the myriad sliders and toggles that have fascinated and infuriated in equal measure over the last 10 years, replaced with a much simpler, binary set of team instructions aping the touchline shouts introduced over the last few years. What I didn't expect was something quite so drastic. "This year we've focused mainly on the animations for substitutions." "Why?" "Because the existing animations don't." The existing interface of slide bars and toggles didn't accurately represent the way modern football was coached, he claimed - a sentiment that, in all fairness, can be used to justify pretty much any new feature in a football game. I spoke to Miles earlier in the year and he mentioned a long-overdue tactical overhaul as one of the game's most noticeable new features. It's rumoured that FM15 will allow players to select from six Nasa-related jokes to tell at half-time. Part of the game's appeal is the continuity that exists between iterations - unlike FIFA or PES, there's no re-learning needed for each release.įM14, then, represents a small break in that continuity, and one which occurs in possibly the most important area of the game - tactics. 95 per cent of it stays the same each year, and many are happy to purchase a new version simply for the updated rosters, the small improvements and the odd shiny new feature. Now, a game like Football Manager can be a curious one to review. Either way, after 20 years of worship at the altar of increasing complexity, something has triggered what feels like a pretty dramatic turning point for this series - for the first time, this year Football Manager has simplified itself. The truth, I'm sure, is a little more prosaic. Or a blank look from Troy Deeney when asked whether he ever felt like he'd have more stamina towards the end of games if he closed people down 10 per cent less. An inter-squad kickaround, perhaps, interrupted by a bellow of "get it in the mixer" in Gianfranco Zola's distinctive, Sardinian tenor. It's tempting to imagine Sports Interactive's Miles Jacobson experiencing some kind of Damascene moment while visiting Watford's London Colney training ground this summer (for an epiphany to occur at Vicarage Road would perhaps be too neat).
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