Alright boyz, here we go!!! Football Manager 05 First impressions

[FrogMan]

Originally Posted by Lucky Jim

Yes. I didn't really buy that they would be from playing the demo, but I can say with absolute certainty that playing on large database for me this time around is like playing on medium in last year's game, and I'm playing with more leagues as well. I've been really impressed with speed. This is coming from someone that tolerated the slowness of previous versions, but was pretty darn frustrated at times. And I have to say I'm really pleased with the speed of fm2005, it may just be comparative to some of the slogging of the last two years, but man it just seems blazing at times. I have a good system but the simming is significantly faster for me, I can't see why this wouldn't be the case for slower systems as well. SI has done a great job with this, the media stuff is much more fun than I thought it would be, may get old fast, but right now I'm having a blast talking crap with my rivals. Other than some issues with tactics changing mid-match which are certain to be patched and which haven't affected me personally really, I've been unbeleivably happy with the game. Game status: "Real football managers don't need food" This is the 4 day mark.

see bolded part, and wow! Good news!!!

Quick question, what kind of system are you running this on?

FM

[BillyNYC]

Does windowed mode work? In the demo, I had problems with it and I'd really rather not use full-screen if it can be avoided.

Also, I'm guessing the main menu is not in Danish (or was it Dutch) as the default like in the demo?

[FrogMan]

Originally Posted by BillyNYC

Does windowed mode work? In the demo, I had problems with it and I'd really rather not use full-screen if it can be avoided.

Also, I'm guessing the main menu is not in Danish (or was it Dutch) as the default like in the demo?

Can't answer for the windowed mode, but the problem with the language in the menu was depening on where you downloaded your demo. I didn't have that problem, so hopefully it should be all right for the full version

FM

[Lucky Jim]

Originally Posted by FrogMan

Quick question, what kind of system are you running this on?

Like I said, I have a good system. 3 Ghz processor, 1 Gig of Ram, hyperthreading. But I'm running a ton of leagues, all of italy, all of spain, all of England, top in Germany, France, Portugal, Holland, Brazil, Argentina, and the MLS. I basically started this game to see how slow it would be with this many leagues and large database, fully intending to have to restart with more manageable settings as something like this would have meant watching a movie during sims with 03/04, but it's been fast. I mean that really and truly. I can't vouch for slower systems, but again I can't see why the speed increase wouldn't be relatively the same across hardware. I don't want to get your hopes too high, as most of my satisfaction has probably come from the surprise of it, but the figure on SI's site about it being 40% faster seems to be about right, maybe a little low even. Once I was through the transfer window it was like 01/02 all over again, which frankly was one of those things I was starting to believe never really happened in the first place, that it was just some bullcrap gaming nostalgia that made me think a cm/fm could run that fast.

So I have a good system, but the difference between last year and this year is undeniably clear to me. I'd say sim times are about half of what they were and you have the option to interrupt them and mess around if you're getting bored anyway. Again I don't want to get your hopes too high, but this has been my experience with the game.

[FrogMan]

oh no, don't worry about getting my hopes up, I see what you mean and also believe that if for you sims look to be faster on FM than they were on CM03/04, they should be also faster on my machine, which will be a good thing

Thanks for sharing the info.

FM

[jbmagic]

for people that played cm03/04

what you guys think of footballl manager 2005? much improve, better, same?

[Router Help]

I think most people are reporting speed increases, but Lucky Jim may be getting more of a speed boost then some. I think FM takes advantage of Hyperthreading more than previous versons.

For Marc Vaughan, does this mean FM supports SMP as well?

[FrogMan]

I agree with router help.

My last (and first) version of CM was CM4 and on my game, I was running something like 6 or 7 nations (Italy, Spain, Holland, MLS, Scotland, etc) with mostly the first league, except for England where I had the first 4 levels. It wasn't completely bad, only some slowness at times. If I can play with the same leagues and see it go faster, I'll be a happy man

FM

[Lucky Jim]

Agreed about the hyperthreading and whatnot, FM runs like I thought 03/04 might run on this system when I was buying it a few months ago. I was really disappointed by what was a real lack of improvement between the speed on my 800mhz, 256mb, laptop and the slightly improved 3Ghz, 1Gig, desktop I'm talking about above. The code may be optimized to take more advantage of the capabilities of higher end systems, along with hyperthreading. But it's still going to be faster for anyone I'd think, it's just a LOT faster for me right now.

[Eaglesfan27]

I'm so excited. The game arrived an hour ago, and my first career with FM2005 is loading now. I spent an hour fooling around with retain commands (I know you can do it in game, but the DDT file seemed easier in some way) and with some init.cfg commands. Now, my league is creating. I don't have hyperthreading, but I have a Pentium 4 2.2 Ghz with 512 MB. I was tolerating the speed in CM 03/04. I'll be really excited to see how the speed improvement is on this game once my career finishes initializing in a minute.

[scooter]

A little more information on the hyperthreading from SI's forum (with some input from SI folk):

http://community.sigames.com/eve/ubb...7645#516207645

I seem to have an issue with FM on my laptop. I got the game yesterday and tried to install it on my laptop. Installation went fine. I go to start up the game, the little "speedometer" screen pops up, but then it just stops - and I mean it's like I never started the program (There is nothing running in the Windows Task Manager). I tried to reinstall, still nothing. I loaded the game on my desktop and it works fine there so it's not the CD.

I had downloaded and played the demo on my desktop, but I had never tried it on my laptop. So I tried that yesterday. I go to start it up and I get one of those "A problem has occured" and do you want to send a report to Microsoft? I'm not sure what the problem is. I have both CM03-04 and EHM that run fine on that laptop so I'm a little baffled. I would think that EHM and FM would have similar copy protection issues, but like I said EHM runs fine.

I'm a little dissapointed because I really wanted the game to be "mobile". Maybe if Marc hasn't gotten bored of reading 3 pages of this thread he can find my issue and give me some ideas of what the problem is (or some of you).

As far as how the game is playing, I like it very much. It doesn't appear like a lot has changed at first glance (aside from the interface), but like someone else said here, the matches seem like real matches now.

[ArlingtonColt]

The game has sucked me in real badly... I won Promotion to League 1 with Yeovil Town and my board awarded me with a 10k budget :P..... now I'm trying to sell some players and get players in on loan to help me keep from being relegated.... good times once again

[cartman]

Originally Posted by scooter

A little more information on the hyperthreading from SI's forum (with some input from SI folk):

http://community.sigames.com/eve/ubb...7645#516207645

So, from the sound of one of the posts from a SI guy, it appears that FM '05 is multi-CPU aware. I wonder if this is actually the case? If so, I'm heading over to newegg to look for dual CPU motherboards....

[klayman]

Originally Posted by jbmagic

for people that played cm03/04

what you guys think of footballl manager 2005? much improve, better, same?

I'd find it hard to go back to Cm03/04 after playing Fm05, so I would say it was a lot better. The split view on the match screen, putting advertisments for staff openings, and increased media involvment (with manager mind games) are certainly things I would miss in Cm03/04, but you might find that you can live without those things.

[RPI-Fan]

Originally Posted by ArlingtonColt

The game has sucked me in real badly... I won Promotion to League 1 with Yeovil Town and my board awarded me with a 10k budget :P..... now I'm trying to sell some players and get players in on loan to help me keep from being relegated.... good times once again

Just curious - how are your transfer efforts going? As much fun as I had with CM4, it had some MAJOR flaws (never got to play CM 03/04). Biggest example was that I had this one just tremendously badass forward, Jon Palmer, with my Conference (and after two seasons D3) side Margate, who racked up like more than a goal per game, and almost an assist per game, or something insane like that.

When I realized I wouldn't be able to sign him to a new contract with 1.5 years remaining on his current deal, I tried to move him, but NOBODY at all would bite - this was just ridiculous for a player who was easily the best player in all of Div 3. Likewise, I picked up a stud 17yo wingback for like less than L20k - again totally unrealistic - this guy had absolutely ripped up Div 3.

So in short, are you finding a lot of activity on the transfer market, particularly for lower level teams? Do the top players on lower-level teams command reasonable fees?

Thxs,
~kns

[Godzilla Blitz]

Is anyone able to comment on the difficulty yet? Is it challenging?

[daedalus]

Originally Posted by cartman

So, from the sound of one of the posts from a SI guy, it appears that FM '05 is multi-CPU aware. I wonder if this is actually the case? If so, I'm heading over to newegg to look for dual CPU motherboards....

Finally! A good reason (besides VMWare) to have a dual-processor system!

[ArlingtonColt]

Originally Posted by RPI-Fan

Just curious - how are your transfer efforts going? As much fun as I had with CM4, it had some MAJOR flaws (never got to play CM 03/04). Biggest example was that I had this one just tremendously badass forward, Jon Palmer, with my Conference (and after two seasons D3) side Margate, who racked up like more than a goal per game, and almost an assist per game, or something insane like that.

When I realized I wouldn't be able to sign him to a new contract with 1.5 years remaining on his current deal, I tried to move him, but NOBODY at all would bite - this was just ridiculous for a player who was easily the best player in all of Div 3. Likewise, I picked up a stud 17yo wingback for like less than L20k - again totally unrealistic - this guy had absolutely ripped up Div 3.

So in short, are you finding a lot of activity on the transfer market, particularly for lower level teams? Do the top players on lower-level teams command reasonable fees?

Thxs,
~kns

Well usually I don't get their "current value" when I try to transfer my players I end up selling them a bit cheaper than their "current value". For example I sold a young forward who wouldn't resign with me valued at $1.5 for $850,000 (the board pocketed $300,000 of it the scoundrals!). As far as buying players, I can usually only afford the players that are on the transfer market and usually they are older players. I get most of my "stars" through loans and older players that aren't starting for their current club and want out. I don't think you should rip the game for finding a 20yr old gem not every GM has an eye for talent.

This game has sucked me in moreso than the 106 hr career I had going with Cheltenham/Blackburn in CM 03/04. I'm lovin this game.

[ArlingtonColt]

Originally Posted by Godzilla Blitz

Is anyone able to comment on the difficulty yet? Is it challenging?

Sorry for the double post, but it all just depends on how you play the game as to how difficult it is... pick an easy team like Chelsea or Real Madrid and you will have an easier time than if you picked a conference team or an even smaller club. The game is as difficult as you wanna make it.

[Eaglesfan27]

I'm only 4 hours into the game, but I love some of the new features. The new filter mechanism is great. I really like the new look and feel of the tactics screens. I spent 2-3 hours just fooling around with tactics that I think will work best with my team. I also find myself intrigued with the mind games.

[Godzilla Blitz]

Originally Posted by ArlingtonColt

Sorry for the double post, but it all just depends on how you play the game as to how difficult it is... pick an easy team like Chelsea or Real Madrid and you will have an easier time than if you picked a conference team or an even smaller club. The game is as difficult as you wanna make it.

Thanks.

It seemed though that last year's version became easy at all levels once you figured out that certain characteristics (speed, acceleration, etc.) were very important in winning matches, and that the AI didn't value them appropriately. You could get inexpensive players that would perform excellently although they were not considered to be solid players by the AI.

Klayman was able to walk a conference team to the Premier Division in a handful of years with little difficulty following this path.

CM 01/02 seemed to have a great balance in this regard, and was the most challenging edition that I've played.

Very encouraging news regarding the speed though. I'm very close to buying this version.

Also, is it easier to print stuff to file/printer this year?

[jbmagic]

so this game the AI teams are smarter and more challenging than cm 03/04?

do you need to be familar with the players to like this game? i have very little knowledge of the soccer players and rules....not as popular here in the united states..

[scooter]

jbmagic, if you are interested in the game, give the demo a try. It is essentially the full game that you can play for 6 months of game time. Some knowledge of the players is helpful, but not required (each one of these games I pick a different country I've never managed in before and pick a team to manage just to "meet" some new players - this time around it's Heerenveen in Holland). As far as knowing stategy, etc. that is also helpful but not truly required. I would just start with the default tactics and try putting different players in different positions (you can even set up your assistant manager to pick the team, run training, resign expiring contracts).

The biggest trick will be coming to terms with buying and selling players. Being from the US, we are much more accustomed to trading players. Everywhere else in the world they prefer to exchange players for money.

Give the demo a try. If you have questions, there are plenty of people here at FOFC that play that can probably answer any questions you may come up with (I suggest starting here as trying to ask newbie questions on SI's forum can be a bit of a shocking experience).

[Sharpieman]

Originally Posted by klayman

I'd find it hard to go back to Cm03/04 after playing Fm05, so I would say it was a lot better. The split view on the match screen, putting advertisments for staff openings, and increased media involvment (with manager mind games) are certainly things I would miss in Cm03/04, but you might find that you can live without those things.

So, its a lot more than just a roster update?

[RPI-Fan]

Originally Posted by ArlingtonColt

Well usually I don't get their "current value" when I try to transfer my players I end up selling them a bit cheaper than their "current value". For example I sold a young forward who wouldn't resign with me valued at $1.5 for $850,000 (the board pocketed $300,000 of it the scoundrals!). As far as buying players, I can usually only afford the players that are on the transfer market and usually they are older players. I get most of my "stars" through loans and older players that aren't starting for their current club and want out. I don't think you should rip the game for finding a 20yr old gem not every GM has an eye for talent.

This game has sucked me in moreso than the 106 hr career I had going with Cheltenham/Blackburn in CM 03/04. I'm lovin this game.

Yea', in the game I was talking about, I couldn't move that stud forward *PERIOD* - even when I listed him on a free!!!

And that stud wingback I picked up was pretty obvious... he had great stats, absolutely tore up Div 3 (7.50+ rating average, which is incredibly high for a defender), and was only 17yo!!

So anyways, it sounds like it's a lot better this go around. If you really need to offload somebody it sounds like you can do so, though if you need to do it right away you aren't going to get full market value.

Thanks for the reply!

[MrBug708]

I still hate gogamer

[Karim]

Originally Posted by FrogMan

quick question, what kind of shipping option did you take when you ordered EHM? I took the regular one and I'm trying to figure out if I can keep on being the kid hoping everyday that the gift will be in the mail or if I'll have to wait two more weeks before it even gets close to come to me...

Whatever is one step above regular... That's what I usually pick for all on-line purchases.

[Eaglesfan27]

Find a way to contact them. It seems like your order somehow slipped through the cracks. Actually on my receipt their number is listed: 1-888-948-9661. They shipped mine less than 2 hours after I ordered and it arrived today.

[Karim]

Originally Posted by klayman

I'd find it hard to go back to Cm03/04 after playing Fm05, so I would say it was a lot better.

This is the reason I've avoided FM05 so far. I took one look at the demo and knew if I spent any time with it, EHM would take a back seat.

[jbmagic]

Originally Posted by Eaglesfan27

Find a way to contact them. It seems like your order somehow slipped through the cracks. Actually on my receipt their number is listed: 1-888-948-9661. They shipped mine less than 2 hours after I ordered and it arrived today.

how is the manual?

is the game and manual in english when you order it from there?

[Router Help]

I haven't seen this mentioned here yet, and I don't see an official announcement on the SI boards, but Sega's website lists the US release as being on 11/30.

[Eaglesfan27]

The manual is about 60 pages and it covers the basics. It is in English as was the game. The default currency was the Euro and the date was set to the European convention, however, those things were very easy to fix via the preferences screen.

[klayman]

Originally Posted by Sharpieman

So, its a lot more than just a roster update?

Well, if you accept that most of those things are more than eye candy, then yes it is more than a roster update. If you don't, then it probably is. I haven't played enough to know if the underlying engine is any different (espcially regarding speed attributes dominating the pitch and poor ability regens in later seasons). I'm sure they have been tweaked, but fixed might be another story.

[klayman]

Originally Posted by Karim

This is the reason I've avoided FM05 so far. I took one look at the demo and knew if I spent any time with it, EHM would take a back seat.

I've been having trouble getting back into EHM.

[jbmagic]

i live in california and i never seen EHM in any store i been too.

stores like best buy, citcuit city, compusam, fry's

i have a feeling football manager 2005 will be the same way...

i dont think they send the games to many different usa stores

[cartman]

Originally Posted by jbmagic

i live in california and i never seen EHM in any store i been too.

stores like best buy, citcuit city, compusam, fry's

i have a feeling football manager 2005 will be the same way...

i dont think they send the games to many different usa stores

It's distributed by Sega, which isn't exactly a small player.

I've seen it at both CompUSA and Fry's here in Austin.

[Axxon]

Originally Posted by Godzilla Blitz

.

CM 01/02 seemed to have a great balance in this regard, and was the most challenging edition that I've played.

Honestly, that's nostalgia talking. Taking a team from conference to premiership in consecutive seasons wasn't that hard. The only challenge at all was winning the conference which you had to do outright.

Going consecutive from div three was a cakewalk once you knew the game. Don't get me wrong though, I loved 01/02 more than any other version until now but to hold it up as some sort of grail to balance or even suggest that it was balanced in difficulty is due more to selective memory rather than reality.

A lot of folks would also win the League Cup with third div teams in the first year and get into Europe as div 2 teams as a result though admittedly that never happened to me. I genuinely stunk in cup matches.

[klayman]

Originally Posted by Axxon

Honestly, that's nostalgia talking. Taking a team from conference to premiership in consecutive seasons wasn't that hard. The only challenge at all was winning the conference which you had to do outright.

Going consecutive from div three was a cakewalk once you knew the game. Don't get me wrong though, I loved 01/02 more than any other version until now but to hold it up as some sort of grail to balance or even suggest that it was balanced in difficulty is due more to selective memory rather than reality.

A lot of folks would also win the League Cup with third div teams in the first year and get into Europe as div 2 teams as a result though admittedly that never happened to me. I genuinely stunk in cup matches.

While this is true, the difference in the degree of difficulty of accomplishing such a feat was greatly decreased in the CM4 series. It took me 10 different career games to move Hereford to the Premiership in sucessive seasons with the CM3 series, while I accomplished the same feat in CM03/04 on my first try.

[Axxon]

Originally Posted by klayman

While this is true, the difference in the degree of difficulty of accomplishing such a feat was greatly decreased in the CM4 series. It took me 10 different career games to move Hereford to the Premiership in sucessive seasons with the CM3 series, while I accomplished the same feat in CM03/04 on my first try.

Right but he did say that it had great balance which is what I was commenting on. Better balance than cm4? Probably but great balance? No.

[klayman]

Originally Posted by Axxon

Right but he did say that it had great balance which is what I was commenting on. Better balance than cm4? Probably but great balance? No.

Which is why I followed your quote with "While this is true...".

[Axxon]

Originally Posted by klayman

Which is why I followed your quote with "While this is true...".

Well, I realized we basically agree but I did want to clarify what the main point of my post was because there was a lot of stuff in my post you could have been referring to and I also clarified that I didn't doubt the point you made.

So, I'm taking it we agree then?

[Marc Vaughan]

Originally Posted by scooter

A little more information on the hyperthreading from SI's forum (with some input from SI folk):

http://community.sigames.com/eve/ubb...7645#516207645

I seem to have an issue with FM on my laptop. I got the game yesterday and tried to install it on my laptop. Installation went fine. I go to start up the game, the little "speedometer" screen pops up, but then it just stops - and I mean it's like I never started the program (There is nothing running in the Windows Task Manager). I tried to reinstall, still nothing. I loaded the game on my desktop and it works fine there so it's not the CD.

I had downloaded and played the demo on my desktop, but I had never tried it on my laptop. So I tried that yesterday. I go to start it up and I get one of those "A problem has occured" and do you want to send a report to Microsoft? I'm not sure what the problem is. I have both CM03-04 and EHM that run fine on that laptop so I'm a little baffled. I would think that EHM and FM would have similar copy protection issues, but like I said EHM runs fine.

I'm a little dissapointed because I really wanted the game to be "mobile". Maybe if Marc hasn't gotten bored of reading 3 pages of this thread he can find my issue and give me some ideas of what the problem is (or some of you).

As far as how the game is playing, I like it very much. It doesn't appear like a lot has changed at first glance (aside from the interface), but like someone else said here, the matches seem like real matches now.

Sounds very strange - have you installed any unofficial skins or anything else which might have placed a corrupted file in the installation?

[Marc Vaughan]

Originally Posted by jbmagic

i live in california and i never seen EHM in any store i been too.

stores like best buy, citcuit city, compusam, fry's

i have a feeling football manager 2005 will be the same way...

i dont think they send the games to many different usa stores

Distribution of NHL EHM this year has been somewhat 'patchy' unfortunately in the US, this is something we'll be working with Sega to improve for the future ..

[scooter]

Originally Posted by Marc Vaughan

Sounds very strange - have you installed any unofficial skins or anything else which might have placed a corrupted file in the installation?

None at all. That was another reason to uninstall and reinstall it. I'm still enjoying the game very much. I just wish I could drag the laptop out in front of the tele to play some FM and watch some football tomorrow.

Edit: I went back and tried to reinstall one more time. Still the same outcome. This time however, I also tried the Data Editor. This at least came up with the same kind of error notice that the demo did. Marc, is there any way you folks can look at the error log file that's created and tell what the problem is?

[GoldenEagle]

If you want more of a challenge, trying doing your own tactics.

[Router Help]

Originally Posted by scooter

None at all. That was another reason to uninstall and reinstall it. I'm still enjoying the game very much. I just wish I could drag the laptop out in front of the tele to play some FM and watch some football tomorrow.

Edit: I went back and tried to reinstall one more time. Still the same outcome. This time however, I also tried the Data Editor. This at least came up with the same kind of error notice that the demo did. Marc, is there any way you folks can look at the error log file that's created and tell what the problem is?

Do you have any CD/DVD emulation software on your system like Daemon Tools, CloneCD, Alcohol 120%? I've read that some people are having problems when this software is running.

[scooter]

No, I don't have any of that stuff. It's a fairly new laptop - I got it about this time last year. It's a Toshiba with a Mobile P4 2.30 GHz processor with 480 MB of RAM, 60 GB hard drive and Windows XP Home Edition (SP2). It has very little for software on it. I bought it pretty much just to play sims on: FOF, TCY, OOTP5, NHL:EHM, CM03-04. Like I said, I'm a little baffled, all this other stuff works fine. I guess I'll just have to stay tucked away in my home office playing FM on my desktop.

[jbmagic]

Originally Posted by Marc Vaughan

Distribution of NHL EHM this year has been somewhat 'patchy' unfortunately in the US, this is something we'll be working with Sega to improve for the future ..

is football manager 2005 going to be the same way?

[FrogMan]

Originally Posted by jbmagic

is football manager 2005 going to be the same way?

I think that when Marc said "improve for the future" he means for every new releases from SI Games distributed by Sega, which would include FM2005...

FM

[Crapshoot]

One of the questions I have about FM is the transfer market- do stars move to the big clubs over time ? I've always found in CM that plays tend to be under ambitious- and the big clubs come in for your player rarely, and you can usually reject it. I'd like to see more player ambition/desire to move overall - it was one of the things that always bugged me about the older CM's./