A game review by someone who is not used to sport simulations. You have been warned~
Love or hate it, Football Manager 26 is out and the new UI is the main topic for both veteran and new players when discussing this game. Don’t worry as we will be touching on that and many more in this game review~ I will compare my experience of roughly 10+ hours of gameplay, as well as what I have researched on older titles to give a more extensive view for both newcomers and veteran players alike. So please be nice đ
New Game
Starting a new game, I was bombarded with a plethora of customization. I’ll be honest, I laughed way too hard seeing the really long option list for height of all things. Also the option to look like a pirate is appreciated.
UI
With the Game UI being more inclined for the console players, PC players have a harder time navigating than usual. Veteran Players voices their concern as the older UI was much more friendly with less drop down menus and more customizability.
As a Newcomer to the franchise, I personally found the menu more friendly to me via keyboard than using a controller. (Yes I have played using both). My inexperience to the predecessor games surprisingly being an advantage when it came to dealing with this tricky UI. But that doesn’t mean I didn’t have a hard time. However, according to players who have miraculously figured out how the UI works, they have been having a lot of blast!
Men and Women Football
With the new addition of the Women’s Football, new possibilities has been added… Is what I would like to say but when playing a bit of both the Men and Women’s football options, there wasn’t much of a difference between them except for the smaller database player wise and teamwise in regards to the Women’s Football. Career, lengthwise, seems to be the same but I’m pretty sure I’m going to need more time to fully play through it to make a proper judgement.
Matching and New Tactics
The new Matching, has been praised by both newcomers and veterans players alike. I’m personally still trying to get used to it but it is a very nice addition that I appreciate. For Tactics specifically, I actually quite like this one too. When I played, I tend to match my training to whatever tactics I ended up choosing.
Training and Injuries
My favorite part was definitely the training. Planning everything out and trying to focus on balancing rest and training, I just, I like it okay? Though, one of my main complaints is that my players gets injured way too often. Like I have 1 team training on that day, BOOM, 2 are injured. They literally had the doctor scheduled right before the team training but noooo, let me just get sprained right after that.
Overall and Comments
There are a lot more materials and features in the game that I haven’t touched on and I believe I am still barely touching the surface in what this game has to offer. However, my experience on it is, well its not that bad. Despite all the “What is going on???” I stuttered (which was a lot more than when I played DTS which is saying something), I personally had a pretty good time. There are moments, where the game just borks, so watch out.(This is specifically for the fully released game, I did not have as much crashes in Beta surprisingly).
Though, some veteran players do state they prefer FM24, which.. fair. I personally haven’t played it so I didn’t really have a comparison between FM26 and its predecessor.
In conclusion, I will rate this game… eh 7/10? 6.5/10? Probably 7/10
Will I play this game again? Sure, why not. (As long as it doesn’t crash). There is still a bunch of stuff in the game I haven’t fully delved in yet so I’m definitely gonna play it again.
Leave a Comment