[Coffee Warlord]

It needed to be done.

I actually had the willpower to stop playing fairly early last night, mainly because I had a bunch of stuff to do at work today. But, here's the early impressions. I started up my boys at Notts County again, and I'm hoping to start a dynasty on them after I finish the first season.

There's just SO much more 'fluff' to this game. There's blurbs about your players every freaking where. There are fun news articles about your team after every match (akin to FM2005's writeups for international and major cup games). You get just a freaking ton more information about your team. Yay for immersion!

The streamlining of training is quite nice, though I haven't gotten far enough into the season to let you know how it's working. I do love the fact that every player has a 'current opinion of his training schedule' blurb, however.

I have yet to use the team talks, instead leaving that to my assistant for the time being. I'll try it tonight, we'll see. While I haven't really attempted to use the 'quick tactics' thing mid match, early impressions are it's a little clunky. But as I said, haven't look at it enough to make a full opinion.

I still suck at this game.

The game announcers are much improved, with extra handy details. "So and So should take the blame for this goal" and so forth. Nice to know.

Can't comment on the speed in comparison to 05, because I played 05 on a pissant computer, but my new machine (3000+, 2gb ram) pretty much flies. There's VERY little 'greytime', and I'm running a Large DB, with 7 countries and about 20 leagues.

I'm liking it. I'm liking it a *lot*.

Btw, either my guys just flat out *suck*, I'm playing them wrong (I'd like to think I know enough to where this isn't true), or there's been a change in player's match ratings. I'm getting a ton more 5's and 6's for my guys than in 05, instead of the usual 7's down the board, with 1 or 2 higher/lower.