They haven't even released one actual in-game screenshot or video of FM25 either. So much for not putting anything new into FM24. It's an incredibly worrying sign TBH. I expected FM25 to be a stripped down version given the engine change and whatnot but it looks they're struggling to even have a basic game a couple of months before release at the moment. Prime opportunity for a competitor, if only we had one.
The stripped down version they're talking about will still be feature heavy, probably comparable with the version from around 2018. Obviously no international football is a big loss. The removal of weight is odd although I get the reasoning - but it would have been an interesting opportunity to add in a new mechanic where players can lose or gain weight based on their morale, their personality and whether they're pissed off and want to leave. It would affect how you set up your training regime and would also allow you to add in a dietician as a staff member.
FM24 is free on epic games but for whatever reason it won't let me pass the capcha https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/football-manager-2024
So the trailer dropped and said nothing other than the fact they're not advertising a beta this year. That along with the delay adds to the feeling that it just isn't going to launch in a good way. Shown a few pictures of the UI on store fronts, to mostly negative reaction. I'm waiting to see the functionality as the modular design is fine if it allows for a good level of customisation. Adding and removing info from screens, hopefully the ability to resize the modules ect. I don't think they've done themselves any favours with how they've rolled out this information that's for sure. Kind of funny that one of the images is Fran Kirby's profile, where she is listed as 188cm/6'2. Women's football is a headline feature for the game this year and Brighton are a club they have an official partnership with. Just get those details right, SI.
Agreed. The feature roadmap on the website is entirely pointless, if the dates on it are just "TBA". Asking for people to pre-purchase already, when they've released next to nothing positive, feels completely off. That trailer looks like a perfume ad, just words and stuff going on with none of it FM25 related. Gonna have to be a lot of leg work between now and release date, because at the moment they're onto a bomb. FM24 with an updated database from sortitoutSI is looking the favourable option right now. The streamers have already got their discount links ready, but at least two of them have already said words to the tune of "here's the link if you want it, but I'm not sure why you would do yet"
I think the roadmap is pretty much them just pointing at the game and saying that they have things to talk about. I'd rather they did it all in 1 event but I guess it makes sense, they can have weekly conversations and of course the youtubers prefer short form content. I'd imagine there were a few pipe dreams of people looking to decipher the roadmap too, at SI towers, not just talking about how shit they think the new game is going to be. I'm actually quite looking forward to seeing how they've implemented the women's game. I remember when they announced it Miles Jacobson put out a blog post stating that they were doing it 'properly'. I'm not sure they'll be able to do it in the same match engine and have it feel authentic, it'll be such a let down if my tier 3/4 Norwich side are playing football identical to the top men's leagues. If they've managed it in the same match engine it'll potentially be good news for better variance on the men's side too going forward. Going back and reading that blog post the opening does come across as a bit virtue signally. Especially when you consider how he'd previously shut down people talking about it by saying they'll add it when they sell out stadiums like Championship clubs do.
I’m not bothering with FM25 I don’t think. I got FM24 a couple of weeks ago when it was free to download so am currently working my way through a save that I started unemployed. I loaded a few more obscure European leagues such as Slovenia, Croatia, Slovakia & Belarus (plus more!) to see what I could get. Took over NK Zrinski Osječko in Croatia who were in a second division relegation battle. Won 2 of my first 4 but then lost 8 in a row & I resigned Fast forward 2 months & I got the FK Spišská Nová Ves job who were mid-table in the Slovakian 2nd tier. Won my final 2 games of the season to secure a top half finish & am currently top of the league in my first full season going 13 games unbeaten with 9 wins. Really enjoying it, just finding it difficult to juggle the finances correctly. I’ve always struggled with that in previous games too, I get too excited & sign everyone I can as soon as I can. I have some players on £350+ per week that I signed almost the second they became free agents, but have since signed better players than them on only around £120 per week
This f*cking game Took my Nova Ves team to the verge of the 2nd division title. I just needed to avoid defeat in my last 2 games to win but conceded a 94th minute equaliser vs 4th place in my penultimate game and lost 2-1 at home to 8th in my final game to finish 2nd, progressing to the promotion / relegation play-off. Played the first leg at home battering the top flight side 4-1, then lost the 2nd leg 4-1 but went down to 10 men after 40 minutes Thankfully there was no extra time and won 5-4 on pens after Adam Bogdan saved the final penalty to secure promotion on his last game of his career. Absolutely mad game sometimes
Delayed until March. Had a sneaking suspicion that 3 weeks wasn't going to be enough to have it ready. Crazy they put out the pre order with the roadmap last week really.
On the bright side, this delay means the people that got it of Epic for free pretty much got a full game cycle's worth for free. Suppose I'll reinstall it.
They really should have taken a year off and released an official squad/league/transfer update for 24.
They should probably still do a data update for 24 but I doubt they will. It'll be a mix between licensing reasons and needing 'all hands on deck' for the next game. Although I'm pretty sure it's a structural problem and not a database and their 'scouts' aren't the ones fixing the game. At least we have the Daveincid's database updates, which I assume he will keep doing.
When I did the role, we would have our files ready for around now so the scouts will have potentially been on a similar timeframe. The sensible thing to do would be focus on making it ready as FM26 and releasing a data update for this season, even if it was a charge of £10 or something. Releasing in March feels pointless to me.
After the bollocks that was opening preorders 11 days before announcing a massive delay I'm not sure I'd be asking for money for a data update if I was SI. If they had said 6 months from the off and then offered an optional £10 update I think people would have been reasonably happy though. The fact they haven't used the idea of having an update as a way to soften the blow makes me think they probably aren't doing it. I do wonder what they've been thinking over the last month or so. I wonder if they were hoping to squish game breaking bugs and then launch it half baked because that's what such a massive delay makes me think, it clearly isn't ready. Not a great look considering they've.... at least been trying to give the impression of being more open with their community over the last couple of game cycles. To be honest I've always thought that was platitudes and people high up at SI are a bit old school.
Good point about the pre-orders! I personally held off because I was waiting for the announcements as the things mentioned so far made me very cautious. Perhaps giving those who have pre-ordered an update for free? It's been a huge own-goal from SI. They usually release it before it's 'ready' don't they, so this one must be an absolute mile away if they're extending it this much. FM does have a very loyal fanbase though and practically no competition so maybe that will save them.
Far too many red flags, the writing was on the wall for it before it even began. No early access was the biggest tell IMO. To be honest it was a bit sick to be asking for pre-orders when they clearly knew there was never a chance of it being ready. They also need to make it clear if the new March date is going to be ongoing from year to year, or if they'll aim for the standard November date for FM26, in which case 6 months of FM25 would be utterly pointless and nothing more than a cash grab / working demo. Really, really poor from SI.
Indeed, Daz. A very loyal captive audience. At least it's been, for the most part, a good game. I know a lot of FIFA players that haven't really liked the game in years. To be honest this isn't unexpected, my feeling has been that I'm glad I really like 24 because I might be playing it for a couple of years. Migrating and updating 30 years of code, a lot of which will involve technical debt, was never going to be a smooth process.The fact they felt the need to take out so many game modes was an obvious sign of that, granted it was obviously even less ready than we had been told.
Lots of comments online that the March date isn't because they specifically need that much time, but more because it's the latest month they can possibly release it before the end of the financial year, and thus avoid any penalties or other issues with their licencing agreements. They will have based their contracts on offering a yearly return, leaving March as the last date to hit a few weeks of sales before the turnover on the first week of April. Makes sense to me, I could believe it. It would mean that cancelling FM25 to focus on FM26 instead would not be an option, which is why I think there won't be any sort of "goodwill" FM24 update.
It'll be very interesting to see the sales levels in March. I personally won't buy anything until there's confirmation of an estimated FM26 date, as @Foxwell says it would be completely pointless. Plus - I'm not sure about anyone else but it's far more interesting starting a game earlier on in the real life season than after the January update. Particularly down the pyramid as all the loan slots tend to be gone anyway!
Even if they announced it with an 8 month cycle 'till the next game I still think it'll sell well. The game is 20/30 quid less than the modern triple a game and people play them more. Football manager also has a decent number of players that don't really play other games. That being said do we even get reliable sales numbers from SI these days. They're probably more open to announcing player counts which are massively inflated by gamepass people.
