Football Manager 2005

[King Ellis]

One of the other benefits of pre ordering is the possiblity of it being sent to you earlier when they recieve their stock. I remember on the PES3 Gamefaqs boards people were saying how they recieved their games earlier due to pre ordering via online stores. I will probably order it when I put in a Madden 2005 order, might pick up one of those MAX pen drives too.

Some new news regarding FM, SI have announced there is 51 playable countires in the game. With all the various playable league and national teams there is a whopping total of 5,300 playable teams. I'll probably use about 10

[BleedMe]

Didn't see the point in starting a new topic so i revived this one instead. The demo is now out. thedugout.net has it, and i assume the SI website has it also. Downloading now, ill post what it hink of it later.

[King Ellis]

Wow I totally forgot about that. Think i'll try and download it now and pickup the magazine at the weekend. (Y)

[TMM]

It's the beta demo, but it is still good. Bugs are there, but the game is nice enough to include a 'Report Bug' button

I need to get use to the new lay out. Things have been moved around.

Can't wait til the game is fully released

[Dan]

It's on download now, ill post later with my thoughts.

[edcq]

damn, i can't believe no one is talkin about this game. I downloaded the demo and let me tell you . . . the game is pretty fast. I was worried that my computer wouldn't have enough juice to run it as CM0304 runs kinda slow, but i was pleasantly surprised at the speed. Everything about the game is pretty good, the only thing that bothers me is the new format for viewing ur squad, but i'm sure that skins will be available soon.

[Darloboy]

Am I the only person who can't play any league games?

[Whisper]

The game is awesome, not the speediest but fast enough. I'm impressed by all the media interaction and also the 2d view, when I first saw the FM version I didn't think it looked too good but it works brilliantly. Goal of the Month is an awesome touch as well by the way.

The level of realism is amazing too, like for me past CM games haven't always been totally realistic (Chelsea getting relegated in the first season for one example) They weren't unrealistic but just sometimes a little farfetched but FM seems perfect. Arsenal are stuffing everyone, I'm Man Utd and doing pretty well but am not creative enough (Same as real Utd) and Chelsea are winning games 1-0, 2-1 like in real life. THe main thing that impressed me was that in the chairty shield I played too attacking and arsenal just continually exploited the space with Henry and Reyes as they would IRL. Needless to say I was slaughtered 5-1.

EDIT ~ Another nice touch I forgot to mention, after a set of games in the Premiership, when then results are displayed you can select view goals to view every goal of the day, MOTD style. Similarly you can click on a single game (such as an England or West Brom one) and see the goals from that game only.

I did have some questions for you guys who have the demo though....

I've noticed that my game has no sound or pics (maybe because the sound/pic files aren't included, i haven't checked)

My Manager Information doesn't seem to be updating (biggest win, highest transfer fee, manager points etc.)

The player history also only seems to include league games and I was wondering why this was.

Yeah, so can anyone shed some light on these issues, not that they really are issues at all just things I was wondering about. The only reason I ask is in case anything needs reporting as a bug.

Edited September 24, 2004 by Whisper in the Wind

[King Ellis]

Anyone got the magazine yet? I looked yesterday but I couldn't find it.

As for the game, it looks cool and is running pretty smoothly. I'm Arsenal so I can ease myself into the game. Just beat Man U 4-1 in the Charity Shield Signed Matthew Killgallon from Leeds for 650k and apparently all my fans feel he will be a great player in the future and all the kids are getting his name on their shirts.

Arsenal 4th favourites for title? Behind Liverpool? :pinch:

Edited September 24, 2004 by King Ellis

[Whisper]

Meh, in case anyone cares... my start with Utd.

Friendly vs. Kobenhaven (A) D 1-1

Friendly vs. Maniz (A) W 4-0

Charity Shield vs. Arsenal L 5-1

CL Qual. vs. Trabzonspor (A) W 3-1

League vs. Man City (A) W 3-1

League vs. Middlesborough (A) W 1-0

CL Qual. vs. Trabzonspor W 4-0 (AGG: 7-1)

League vs. Blackburn (A) D 1-1

League vs. West Brom W 5-1

League vs. Tottenham D 1-1

I signed Van Der Vaart from Ajax for 15 million and sold Quinton Fortune to Newcastle for 2.5... Newcastle are bottom of the league without a win and Arsenal are top with a 100% record and about a +20 goal difference. My champs league group sucks (Inter, Ajax and Bayern) and so far I've praised Wenger, revealed my dislike for Jose Mourinho and informed Terry Venables that his West Brom side are on the way down.

Oh yeah... Thomas Hitzlsperger got the first Goal of the month with a screamer from 25 yards after beating about 4 players.

Anyhoo... how you guys doing on the demo?

EDIT ~ The only thing I find annoying about the game is sometimes it takes a while to process matches, you can change the speed though and although it still isn't all that fast you can carry on looking through your squad and such while it loads. Also I noticed that for some games it actually spends ages processing them whereas for others it takes less than a few seconds and the results are up... I wondered why this was since it was slower processing the u21 matches (It showed the scores as they came up) than it was for the World Cup quals. (Which just flashed up without processing)

Edited September 24, 2004 by Whisper in the Wind

[edcq]

how did ur players react to telling vernables that his team are going down? my players got mad when i told Worthington the same thing.

[Whisper]

Yeh, Rio, Ruud and Scholesy all thought it was an unprofessional comment to make. They were dropped...

[Sam]

So annoying that I dont get any fixtures because I have Windows ME. But I've got a load of friendlys instead to kind of simulate it and it is a really good game.

[King Ellis]

Well after the 4-1 triumph over Man U I drew away at Charlton 2-2. Ljungberg scored a cracking goal, neat one two with Bergkamp before smashing one in off the post from 25 yards. I then told David Moyes I thought his Everton side would beat the drop, he said mine might win the title. I then beat them 3-0 at Goodison. Then I played Aston Villa at Highbury, thrashed them 6-0, Henry got 2 and Pires scored the pick of the bunch, top right curler from 30 yards. Just drawn Milan, Real Madrid and Basel in the CL (Fuck) and signed Jon Stead for 3m up front, 3m in 12 months and a friendly. Not looking too bad thus far.

Beat Man City 4-0. Pires goal against Villa got 2nd place in the GotM, Ljunberg got Player of the month. Just drew 2-2 with Chelsea, they injured Cesc Fabregas and Henry although Stead scored on debut. Out of the 7 media comments availible only 2 are poisitive. Sour grapes I suppose. Might just insult them caus they injured Mr Va Va Voom.

Edited September 24, 2004 by King Ellis

[TMM]

One thing that annoys me is the squad layout. They're sorted by...actually, what ARE they sorted by? They seem to be in just a random order at the moment. I want them to be set by default to be sorted by position. Hopefully it'll be like that in the final version.

[fineintent]

Once you get used to how ugly the game is, it isn't too bad for a beta. I'm doing OK with Spurs atm - Andy Reid is a god. I'm friends with Steve Bruce and Big Sam.

[Lord Nibbler]

Why didn't I know there was a demo?

[Whisper]

Another thing, you guys who have the demo... do you get informed when one of your players gets called up for international duty... I never do with the seniors... only with the U21's and U19's.

EDIT ~ Never mind, they've started telling me now.

Edited September 25, 2004 by Whisper in the Wind

[Guest The Real Deal]

I downloaded half of the demo and it cancelled for some reason, so Im a bit weiry on weither or not its worth the download and time on a 56k modem.

Any suggestions?

[FLiam]

I actually don't like the demo.

I am going to wait for the Gold version, becasue seeing as this is the beta, things are still wrong and it is slow and on full detail, which is annoying.

When the gold one comes out, speed will be much better and I don't think it is going to be full detail. And according to SI there is a major bug in the 2D match engine which is why there are so many 6-0's and other high scores, but it'll be fixed for the final version.

The squad view is much better imo. Do order them just click the thing that says "Position" or "Name" or whatever.

This game is going to rock, for sure.