From The Side Line

Soooooo

2007-01-21T13:10:00.000Z

We(I) have moved to Wordpress cause Blogspot likes boys. So...

Click Here

Susie

2007-01-20T19:59:00.000Z

Most people pass off Susie as a shadow of its former glorious self, a one of millions of graphics and the number 1 place for graphicsers to hang out and help out. But in fact there really isn't any other place on the community like it. Susie was started many a years ago by Scene favourite Caleyjag as a place to host a mega pack of graphics for CM4 I am led to believe. Its success is largely thanks to Caley and his innovative Coding skills and his sheer commitment to everything he has done. The quality of Sortitoutsi far outstretches most of the scene. It is brandished as the number 1/ biggest site on the scene.

Susie is famous for its graphics or quantity of them rather. All be it this year has been disappointing on the graphics front Susie still cannot be knocked for quality and support from the scene. In a recent discussion on throw-in, another big boy of the scene, about where you go for graphics, Susie was the main place. Almost everyone but staff members of fm graphics said Susie. The other favourite is fm graphics. This shows that despite the rocky year Susie has suffered it still comes on top for choice of graphics.

However I won't lye and tell you Susie is at its peak. It is a falling(not fallen) giant. Earlier on in 2006 the site crashed due to server problems and took a while before it was back up. Years of hard work was lost and effectively only the members were held when Susie returned. Shortly after re-establishing Susie as a stable and working website, webmaster Caleyjag left the site to a former Moderator:- Smithjurd. The manner of the change was admittedly unsure and done behind closed doors. And being the over-involved sceners we are conspiracy theories were flying around as to what exactly happened, this lead to months and months of arguments and shifting of members and staff. The new generation of Susie was in and the old era of Caleyjag, Cleon and others had fallen. This lead to turmoil in the site and since this time last year when the "old era" was still going strong I casually say Susie has halved its visitors. Even more problems occurred mid way through 2006, such as new webmaster Smithjurds new way of working of either too strict of too lenient led to even more arguments between staff and members.

Despite its problems of the past 9 months or so no-one can deny the class that our biggest site has. Considering the fact that Susie doesn't get as many visitors as it used to its forums is full to the brim with graphics. Not so much on the site but you cannot breath for new posts and activity in the graphics forum. It is by far, the centre of the graphics community on the scene. If you were to look around the downloads area of Susie then look at a downloads area of any other site you will find that none match up to that of Susie. Every day a new batch of graphics fly into Susie's books. It just doesn't happen anywhere else.

Away from graphics Susie is also strong on general FM. Its often forgotten about features like the Staff and Player scout can't be found anywhere else. It is a dream feature that doesn't get anywhere near as much credit as it deserves. It is also regularly updated with decent and readable articles from the staff. There was a dry period in the summer of 2006 but after a brief T.W.A.T.S article from Fantastic at Balls acting as a kick up the arse rectified the creativity of the staff. Now the site is regularly updated with pieces.

Unfortunately the site is rarely projected to the scene as a good guy, its always shrouded in conspiracy theories and bad feeling. Not to mention the shocking state of their server. But we cannot get away from the fact that although Susie has past its golden best, it isn't dead yet, far from it.

Are We Really A Group Of Fansites For A Game?

2007-01-20T17:53:00.000Z

Yeah so with the carry on over Article X or whatever it was called here still fresh off of peoples lips around the community I called help but ask the question are we really just a group of lads passionate about Football Manager? A Game?

Sometimes when having a wander around the scene- or rather seeing what Robs been up to at the community Blog- I think to myself does it really matter who is slagging off people over the in-ter-net? After all its only a small part of our lives this scene business. You would think it was a huge political movement or the official community of websites of the world wide web.

The scene is such a big part of the scene that the scene is now about the scene. Not fm. I can't remember who it was who said on throw-in that fm articles suck, or something along those lines. and that scene articles are the only thing worth reading. And I have to agree with him. I rarely find myself reading an article about the actual game itself, and if I do its just a referral to help me with something. Scene articles are more interesting if I am completely honest. If we compare 2 articles of the same age, so to speak, one being about football manager, the other the community. We will always find that the scene article will get more coverage and more general interest than the average how to win the league with £200,000 guide.

Since its the talk of the moment lets use the Site X article as our example of the scene piece. Its had 40 comments so far. Its now 18.19pm on Saturday 20th January 2007. And we will take a personal favourite that was released on the same day in this Uruguay Guide. I happened to be managing Panerol at the time of this release so I found this very helpful. Here it is. This article has had 1 tiny little comment since then, now 18.21, and its only a link from Rob to the community digest. Not a word of thanks from readers or nice job buddy.

Both articles were published the same day. I know that the Site X article has had more publicity due to a handful of scene sites passing comments on it and Pitchside only gets linkage from the portal. But it just goes to prove that people are more interested in the politics of the community surrounding the game than the actual game itself.

It is rather said that instead the community is talking about a cheap and petty slagging match between a bitter scene and the management of a website. At the end of the day we are here to enjoy each others company and advice about football manager. A game. The scene metaphorically speaking should be filled with lads sharing advice and chatter about what’s the best tactic to dominate the international scene. Instead we are told to stop spamming and have to read post after post of O RLY owls and over hormonal teenagers “wubbing” each other up in a gay manner.

The "proper" side of the scene that is actually focused on fm is rarely spoken about on the big scale. Its often associated with n00bs and a "scene career" starts off talking about footy manager but then moves onto scene relations and politics. It does happen. Its a very common trend I have found. Unless you fall into the habit of making graphics and skins you move on from fm and get bored and find yourself posting only in the "spam" forum of sites and only discussing scene affairs.

So why do we feel the need to so heavily discuss the scene? You could ask me why I wrote this, mainly because I am bored and there isn’t anything on tele and I need to save my money for tomorrow so I am staying in doing nothing, and its my Blog, I can do what I want. The events of the last few days prove that we are no longer a few sites who follow fm.

Oh Behave

2007-01-18T17:28:00.001Z

I know its fashionable to hate throw-in. And its easy to do so, but come on... All they get is stick. I know they bring it upon themselves but we are meant to be a community. A community that's based around footy manager. Petty articles aren't needed are they? Really...

Throw-in.com is one of, if not the best community on the scene. The forums are run great, maybe a little strict at times but so what, members are more or less happy because they keep posting. If you don't enjoy posting then fuck off and shut up. There is talk at the minute of scrapping post counts at throw-in and there was a cool club established the other day. It all looks like Susie a few months ago and we know what happened there. Members weren't happy and did fuck off and shut up.

It would be a shame to see it happen to throw-in. I like throw-in, well I lye, some of it does my balls in but generally the lads at ti are sound enough. Throw-in is one of the biggest producers of guides on the scene. I know that I hate guides because they are illiterate and boast no creativity or sense but so what, ti produces enough and they help me. The myth of getting staff to produce loads of crap is bollocks, most of the guidance I get is from members who do team guides. People like Joaquin17, Hammer, Simmo etc etc. These guys help out the most. Staff don't do a lot to the naked eye at ti tbh. Throw-in also is home to one of the best graphicsers or however you spell it in Seafire. His ideas and production rate is bloody good for the lack of support he gets from his fellow staff and other members. Without dragging on and going all boring, ti is helpful, its not perfect, far from it. But it does its little job and does it well.

However, there is a lot wrong with I admit. Click Here for the latest edition to slagging throw-in off. I have to give it to the writer that hes spot on in many places. Slayer does shout from the rooftops that hes TI owner. There is elitism going on, cool club yes I am looking at you. And everyone is kissing everyone else's ass.

But at the end of the day people en mass visit throw-in. And of late it has been Susieafying (don't worry, just break it down, Susie-a-fy-ing) itself and people have started to question the running of the site. If you don't like it, like I said don't go. Lets put to rest bitchy argumentative articles and posts around the community eh? You know it makes sense.

Only a short post but you got 2 for the price of one today, so shut up.

Sexy FM

2007-01-17T20:43:00.000Z

Whilst loading up fm for another session with the "game" I was just thinking how different this experience is since I first set eyes on the series a long long time ago- CM 00/01. When the "game" actually was a game all those years ago the appearance of the game was not as important of a factor as it is now. The Game could stand on its own two feet and the sheer "nicotine" that filled your lungs when you got to December of your game with Man Utd kept you coming back for more.

These days the "game" is a simulation and I am now unqualified as an experienced manager, despite having a shelf in my room with every edition of the game, all of which well used. I am 14, therefore cba with game in game out developing a tactic. I tell you this a lot don't I? So I will stop there. Basically the game now needs versatile new graphics and guides to keep you interested.

I suppose that's a bad situation. I know that for me FM is a shadow of its former glory that came about in 2001/2002. But since then the games graphics have come on leaps and bounds. When I first got CM it was pretty ugly to say the least, and didn't do anything but stack up appointments at the Opticians. Its panels of blue with the legendary yet simplistic nav bar on the left was about all you could see. It was simple and basic and compared to other games of the time- not necessarily management games- it was pretty far behind the market.

Championship Manager 00/01

It is nothing much is it? But it wasn't required to be a work of art. It was all part of the experience to stay up till silly o'clock in the morning, and wake up next morning not in the morning at all, with sore eyes that sting when you blink. You know you've achieved something.

Championship Manager 01/02

Pretty much the same story here. It was the finest edition of the game was 01/02. I think most would agree with me, in most discussions on the scene people say that 01/02 is the meaning of the series etc etc blah blah blah. You have heard it all before. Again a shit advert for Photoshop

Championship Manager 4

Oh look what we've got here. This is new huh. I remember when this came out, it was a revelation and a complete regeneration of the game. 2D pitches as well, ooh very fly. This was the first time we had proper fm skins that could change the look of the game completely. Its new experience it offered was fantastic to some. Unfortunately the game was late, had too many patches and was generally a shit tip of a game. But it had to start somewhere. Look where we are now. Its debatable as to how good the game is, but hey, I'm hooked. Simulation or not. This was the first of its kind and was a new step in making the game sexy.

Championship Manager 03/04

The Same here, don't need another pointless description.

Football Manager 2005

A new name, a rebirth of the brand and game we all love. This new skin called 'Metallic' developed by sports interactive's Ter was magnificent. It was a revolution and was the first time proper images were used. It was even better than the previous CM 03/04 skin which was also held in high regard. Around this time Sortitoutsi.net was starting to make it big as the home of graphics on the net.

Various skins were available and the skinning community was really starting to take off. It existed before hand at CM Skins and Susie earlier but 2005 was the year that got the ball rolling faster. Susie proclaimed to be the biggest fm skinning site on the scene. And it was.

It was as seen here the big boom year for graphics. Not just skins. If you look at how many skins were available it was a lot. There were more for 03/04 but that page was taken from this time 2 years ago, so the 'scene season is still early. Over all though 05 boasted more graphics.

I don't need to go onto 06, its pretty much the same story but footy manager 07- the current game- is rather new and shexy. The attitude this time around to skins has been more relaxed. There aren't a lot of skins available for this edition is there?

Check This Out

In there it says that he might not be looking in the right place. Hes not, there just aren't any available. And the ones that are are pretty crap. Even Hellenic hasn't lived up to my expectations set by the last edition. But why aren't there any skins this time around?

It is maybe because Flexion- the default 07 skin- is so god damn sexy. I have never seen a skin like it, only maybe Turnstyle III of fm 06 by Ricey matched up. It is the perfect colours to keep you into the game and stop you from turning it off rubbing your eyes. It flows smoothly and I like it a lot. It is a gapping contrast from its predecesors and is at the cutting edge of design.

Maybe artists who previously designed skins find it hard to beat. It doesn't need changing maybe? Or maybe they just can't be arsed like most of the sceners today. Graphics are such a big part of the community now a days and the lack of skins this time around does ourselves no favours. It would be a crying shame if creation of skins didn't pick up.

Our game needs to be sexy, we have become used to it now, we can't rely on Ter only to satisfy us. Get your fingers out Skinners.

Meh

2007-01-16T19:38:00.000Z

Well fm-fusion is taking a while and is under scrutiny as to whether it will open or not. So I guess I will be back posting updates here. I have taken a back seat role recently in football manager and have taken part in the discusting deed(s) of *un-ravels list*; using pre-made tactics from sites around the scene, giving teams a little more cash, and saving before big matches so if I lose I can restart. Basically I cheated. Yes I am now evil, I don't deserve a place on the community and you should all click away right now before I poison you even more with my hideous fm habbits.

Sooo...

A relatively new site by Gobwolf has been completed and is ready to go. Fmtacland.com is the place. Its basically a very small and basic tactics portal that has 3 sections; attacking, normal and defensive. Simple and effective. It was at this convenient little place that I stumbled across a wonder tactic. I can't fault it. RL Barca its called Click Here. I am currently on another Arsenal team using the tactic and am in September. Early days I know but its bagging goals and the team is playing generally very sexy. I suggest that if you are a lazy ass at times like me and can't be chewed with tweaking settings every 20 seconds then this tactic shouldn't go a miss.

I am not feeling very creative at this present moment in world history so I will update soon/ tommorow when I have progressed further with Arsenal and picked out something else to complain about.

The End(Well For Now)

2007-01-09T20:42:00.000Z

I know this didn’t last long, but I won't be updating much/ if at all for a while. I started this Blog to practice some writing and get me into gear for a new role I will shortly be taking on at a new site on the scene. I think I done alright, not many articles but I think I have done OK. I might update if I suddenly get a new lease of creativity that I cannot hold in.

See you not so soon

...

2007-01-09T18:59:00.001Z

NOTE- several paragraphs of pointlessnessnessnesss ahead, but read it anyways. I am bored. Second day back at school today, was rather shit if I am honest. Didn't do a lot of sleeping last night and changing courses half way through the year is not recommended. My head is completely pounding. But last night I started a new game on footy manager with Sunderland. My team. So at least I had something to look forward to when getting home from school. Either that or I could go and play snooker but its January, I cant be bothered...

So anyways, my Sunderland game. Started it off about half way through Big Brother last night. Was your average game on FM. Searched for some young talent and bought the usual players, Greg Halford, Marvin Williams, Salif Diou and someone else, cant remember his name but he’s crap so I will forget about him. I then moved onto tactics and started putting together a basic 4-4-2 tactic. Slightly changing the settings, nothing drastic. Just keeping it simple. I haven’t played with a 4-4-2 tactic in this episode of FM so it was a nice change.

Contrary to belief and regular coverage simple tactics that never get changed from game to game or aspire to be anything different seem to work. In my first game I thrashed Preston- Sunderland’s real life bogey team- 6-0. I was rather surprised actually. I wasn’t really paying attention to the game at all and was more interested than arguing with my mate on msn, so i swiftly pressed continue. Scanned through some bollocks about the press praising up Connolly and Halford and a huge list of injuries(there are quite a lot of injuries in the game, even with the patch I find /o\) and accepted a few loan offers for some of my deadwood in my reserves.

Next game- Sheffield Wednesday away. Just click through keeping the same tactic and line up but for swapping Tobias Hysen for Marvin Williams on the left of midfield due to injury. I started the game quite brightly and could already imagine my name on the trophy of which is at Sunderland far too often to be frank. It was only 3 minutes into the game but I was pushing forward well and the possession was swaying my way with about 70% to Sheffield’s 30%. two stray balls from Greg Halford nearly made way for David Connolly to open the scoring 2 times in about 30 seconds. Unfortunately his finishing isn’t the best. 20 minutes into the game Marvin Williams was starting to turn it on and making blistering runs up the left wing. A sweet curling ball was placed into the area for Connolly to bring down and slot home for 1-0. I was clear leader of the game and only an own goal would of brought Sheffield half a chance of crawling back. Just before the break John Stead made it 2-0 with a neat counter attack from Liam Lawrence.

The game ended at 2-0 and I was 4 goals ahead of Leeds United who were 2nd in the league table. I haven’t turned on since but i thought since its a Blog, Id tell thee what I am doing in FM. I will try and finish the season with this one, its rather hard with all the bloody injuries and newsy crap that fills your screen whenever you click continue.

Good night

Guide To The Scene

2007-01-07T13:26:00.000Z

Not often I will do an FM guide but I feel like writing this one. Not an FM guide as such, its all about the scene, see I told you it would be about the scene the other day did I not? Well that paragraph ended a bit soon for my liking, so erm. The scene. Its basically a load of lads who have bought FM and somewhere along the line realised they don't need; sleep, human interaction and any other game than FM. That's better, 7 lines.

So, you just, like me got a copy of FM from Santa Clause did you? You have won the league with Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool, Man United and most notably Bolton already have you? Feel you have done really well as a football manager and can take the world on? Well get your ass on Google and type in FM cheats, you know you want to. You haven't discovered the editor yet so if you remember correctly you got the money cheat for GTA on a little place called cheatplanet.com didn't you? Yes you did. Now go on t'net and check it out. Oh, no cheats for FM? Darn it. Why not try Google, Google knows the answer.

So half way between typing Fm Cheats for PC you realise, you don't want to cheat. You want some 'guidance'. Hmm. I wonder if there actually is a little corner of the web dedicated to my lovely, my precious, my world. without hesitation 'football manager tactics' is typed into Google and on the first page, first result is the massive CMFrenzy. There was an article over at FGN about this place. Saying it is n00b friendly and taps into its own little area and is never covered by the scene. Here it is here. Have a read of that, its very good and covers a lot of what I am about to write. So anyway you arrive on CMFrenzy and look around. Have a look around and somewhere on that page there is a line that tells you how many millions of downloads they have. 1,500,000 or there abouts is the sum. Pretty impressive. In fact in terms of hits CMFrenzy is the biggest site on the scene. And there is no surprise as to why. It is the perfect site, extremely n00b friendly and has everything to do with surprise surprise, FM.

Yeah so without straying further from the point; upon finding CMFrenzy you realise that there are people out there like yourself. People who want the best for their sweethearts- FM. The scene is a massive place. You can find anything to do with FM here. Whether you are after the perfect tactic, a new look, or just chat about your experiences with the game, somewhere on the scene there is a place for you.

So lets properly start then. A Guide to the Scene. I will have a run through of the beat place for the following and also tips for becoming a professional 'scener'. So lets have a start with probably the most common search on Google. Tactics...

Tactics
People in pursuit of tactics will probably be first to tell you about FM-Britain. After being on the scene for a short time over a year the site has begun to get a lot more visitors. And rightly so. The tactical guides and tips are amazing. I don't go any further for tactics than little (FM) Britain. Take a look at this tactical guide by Wwfan. Click Here. Look at that. So in depth and about something that is rarely seen n the scene. This site is full of it. A great site and was one of my first on the scene. In fact I have been a member there longer than any other site for FM.

Player/ Team Guides
I cant declare myself as a member of the fan club for Guides. I find them drab pieces of work and don't deserve the title of articles. However when I am stuck for who to be or what to do with a team when i do take over a club i normally refer to these guides. And yo can't go further than throw-in.com for them. The guys at TI make these en mass. About 10 each week, most/ all of them aren't even staff. There is a real feel good factor about this type of written work at throw-in and although they are still lacking obscure teams there is a decent choice of teams and no-where on the scene comes close. Fm-orgy says it will be focusing on guides, we will have to wait and see eh?

Online gaming
Why not indulge in some fm online. Get yourself together with a mate and challenge yourself. I like FM online, pity I never do it due to my ghey IP address. Susie is the place tbf. Playfm.co.uk- an affiliate of Susie was the most complex system for online games on the scene. Now caleyjags site myfmcv is around, I haven't had a proper look around so I don't know what it does exactly. It has been compared to playfm so if your candle is lit with that sort of stuff then check it out.

Graphics
Well I don't know about you but one of the main reasons I hang about the scene is graphics. simple answer to this is Susie. But again the brilliant caleyjag has come up with a brilliant plan. The community downloads project will iron out any competition soon enough but will make graphics more accessible. Until then the mass of graphics makers on Susie cannot be matched.

Forum Atmosphere
Well officially, goal-kick has the best forum feel and community spirit. But tbh that's lies. Argument upon argument rings out and people getting over emotional about the Internet just makes you close the tab for GK. I think that throw-in/ Susie has the best forum atmosphere now. Susie is still I feel a tad elitist and I will never go back there because of an argument several months ago. But its recovering. Still it isn't very n00b friendly and you have to be slightly ghey and like wubbing your mates to fit in. Throw-in however is the model site. Great banter and discussion. The staff are very strict and often a bit dramatic in there running of the forum but they have it right. Everyone fits in and its a very welcoming place.

Articles and Written Word
Well a few moths ago I would of said Fantastics balls. But since Balls came back it has never been itself in my opinion. Rarely is the site updated and I can now get what I want article wise at Footygamer.co.uk. That's all there is to say on the matter really, lots of alternative discussion of FM, great little site.

I cant think/ be bothered to think of what else you need to know about where to go on the scene. If I were to give you a perfect site to go to then I would say throw-in.com. Its my home on the scene so apart from seeing me there daily which is enough reason to join tbh there is everything you need. Good forums, great main site full of content, not a lot of downloads though.

The scene is a very judging place. So you need to behave properly or you will be branded a n00b and get ignored even if you come up with a great plan to make the scene better. Always type in proper English to anyone scene involved. This includes MSN. And if you are making a reply to posts from the following people make sure it is spelled properly and is just a re-arrange of words from their original post;- caleyjag, Fantastic, Footyslayer, Rob, Q, Smiggs. These people are the scene and must be loved from behind at all times. It also makes you look very fly if you agree with these people.

If it happens that these people aren't posting on the forum you are posting on, then that forum is far too crap for you. You must leave and join TI/ Susie immediately. Away from posting habits it helps if you boast about having a world beating LLM game(that's lower league management). It makes you look like a seasoned FM player and even if you lye you will be cool.

Writing articles and guides makes you thought of in high regard from the owner of the site you post it on. at throw-in no matter how bad a guide is team guides and player guides are appreciated and promotes you instantly from n00b to legend. Remember, the scene is full of nasty men, always carry a set of keys to put between your fingers and sleep with your eyes open...

Enjoy

Its 2007, gimme a break

2007-01-01T22:15:00.000Z

Sorry, nout much to write about today. Well I lye, there is loads but I can't be arsed today, not a lot has happened with the Barcelona thing, and if I start writing a story it will be crap and boring. The tactic basically is what you need to look at, its scores lots of goals but concedes also. End of story. I will come up with a new piece tomorrow, something to do with the scene. I still feel a tad drunk from this morning. I am sure you can hang on until tomorrow for an update.

Thanks, good night. Again have a happy new year.

Oh I've Not Lost It... Barcelona Part I

2006-12-31T16:51:00.000Z

Aye, as Peter Kay once said, I've not lost it. This will be my 3rd proper go at a serious game in FM since I got it 6 days ago. I'm only onto my 4th pre-season game against Trabsozspor and I am yet I have a warm fuzzily feeling about this one. Its an easy opponent but yet again I'm kicking bot. Its now finished, 5-2 the score. Overall a great performance. Oh I should mention that I am Barcelona.

They key to my not so astounding success is my rather astounding tactic. I gave it a proper tweak and mimicked a successful tactic I used with Barca on FM06. Its a pretty rash tactic and I wouldn't recommend it for mediocre teams. Its very offensive(it swears at old people and has 2 ASBOs) with 4 attacking midfielders and a lone striker. Further behind is 1 defensive midfielder and then 4 defenders. I don't need to say there is a goalie do I? Well tough, I have.

Due to me now knowing how to take screenshots(\o/) Here is an excuse to use them.

My team has had no additions to it, mainly because my board is on the rock'n'roll and are only offering me £3.5M for transfers. The current squad I feel is very competent and I'm hoping we can challenge for the League Title. Although I could do with another defender. I need some muscle to dot the I's and cross the T's as I have conceded in every game because of mistakes from Rafael Marquez. I have my eye on Fabio Cannavaro. After his performance in Germany he was labelled the perfect defender. Unfortunately he plays for Madrid and only signed this Summer. If he has a decent season he could possibly be a target for next season.

Further up the field though its a different story. My 5 clinical strikers are firing on all cylinders. I'm sorry but I just cannot leave Gudjohnson out of the frame. Hes really showing his talent. Ronaldinho is as fabulous as ever.

Anyways enough rambling, this article has gone way off topic. Meh, its my article not yours. Aye, so I'm not bored of FM anymore[/fickle]. I think this ones going to be a long one. Hopefully I can get a strong start to the season. I am glad this game has rekindled my love for the game. It only takes a few wins and I am interested again. You can see I am lazy can't you? Anyways, I think I will make this into a story, so when I get the season going Ill post up updates.

Until then have a great night and I hope the New year is a good one for you! Don't get too drunk...

What Next For FM?

2006-12-30T11:35:00.000Z

This article has been written before and I probably won't be able to match the quality of similar pieces. But so, its Saturday morning(I think) and I feel a bit sick and am rather bored. Therefore this article is going to written by moi. As it says on the tin, What next for FM? Few games can say that they define a Genre, there has been classic games released recently- in the past couple of years- such as; Halo, GTA series, Colin McRae series. These games will continue to be loved for many years. Yet they cannot compare to the status of which football manager has. Almost all of my mates if not all of them have a copy of FM. When you think of manager games you think FM. No question. The only 3 games i can think of that nearly acquire this 'status' is The Sims, GTA and maybe FIFA football. However these games have serious competition. FM sadly does not.

With FM being so widely popular SI have the difficult task of keeping the customers happy. To get the customers from year to year to purchase the game. Arguably they have been doing this. However there would be no point in this article if I agreed with that statement now would there?

If you read the first entry 'A Random Dribbling' you will have gathered that I am not the greatest fan of this simulation bollocks. I suppose its nice so that everything is accurate and you don't get John Stead top scorer of the Championship or be able to get Rooney for £10M. But I feel the game is just to deep. Anyway I am straying away from the point. Something needs to be done in FM to give it a new lease of life. And I don't mean something like a new scouting system. 3D match engines have been discussed on and off for a few years now. And at first I was a fan of the the idea. Getting away from little dots running after 5 pixels would be great wouldn't it. Well yes it would. Although it is a bit optimistic for SI to virtually create 290,0000 people for in-game-use. It would take about 10 years for every player to be created.

Not only does the 3D idea fall on its arse because of the complexity. The size of the game if everything were virtually enhanced would be extraordinary and simply too big for your average computer. It would be nice to have a better match engine, but it unfortunatly will not be happening any time soon.

So 3D could be an idea for further games, I know I would certainly be asking Santa for FM08 if that was the case, but what other ideas are there? Obviously years down the line if the series is still going then you, the manager, will be able to look out at your team in training/ matches and be able to pass coments to the players. But until those days where we can go to Mars for a pint of milk a new system will have to do. I like this year how you can talk to other managers more and there are alot more questions from the media like in real life. But I feel its lacking something. You often have to settle for something you dont want to say because the questions only have 4 options. I would like to see you be able to type in what you think. Difficuilt, but Im sure with a bit of thinking SI could pull it off. With the comments you make affecting your team so much in this episode it is vital that something is done to improve the system.

I also feel that the manager, and players for that matter, should have more involvement to the game with regard to thier personal lives. I think it would be pretty cool if you were the manager and you had to get your ass out of bed in the morning, go and get your cornflakes and then piss off to work. If he was having problems with the wife then you would become moody the club suffers etc.

I don't know how future versions will pan out, but it would be nice to see a revolutionary new game in place. Still SI cant win, there will always be one bugger complaining about how they have spoilt it. Who knows what the future will hold.

Team Guides

2006-12-29T20:58:00.000Z

Right, a Team Guide. A team guide looks to help the reader of the guide fully understand a team in football manager. It should be helpful, interesting and funny. Obviously. And will give the reader all pieces of information possible so that he can go onto fm and win the league with relevant team aye? Well... in theory yes. Team guides are a good concept and I think the scene is lacking a good guides site.

Fm-guides.com had a go at it. The guides were made manually and weren't en mass. The guides were of the finest quality the scene has to offer and told you pretty much everything you needed to know about the team; info and stats, history, good players, bad players, best players of each position, best tactic, players to buy etc etc. They were cracking reads. And under he reigns of Simmo the site, should it have opened, would I'm sure have been a sucess in its own way. Unfortunatly it never opened to the public because of hosting issues.

However the site would have faced a major problem. Quantity, or lack of it. Its all well and good saying well 'I prefer quality'. But do you really? Think of a n00b searching on Google for guides for Grays Athletic or other ridiculously obscure teams. They just aren’t available. OK you might find the odd LLM guide but its no where near as deep and comprehensive as it needs to be. Getting staff to do 1 guide a week to keep content up on places like TI just wont do. (I know that staff aren’t forced into doing that anymore before WW3 starts.) 1 guide per week is 52 guides per year per staff member. say there are 2 staff members on the job of writing team guides. that’s 104 guides per year right? Well no. There will be some weeks the staff wont do anything, I dare say every other week. So we are back to 52 guides per year per site. But take away about 5 for various other reasons like staff changes or holidays and Christmas etc. Its not a lot of guides is it?

There are thousands of clubs in fm. 290,000 people. It doesn’t tell you how many clubs damn it, just take my word for it, there are thousands. Scene-wide 1000 unique clubs aren't covered every year. No where near that sum in fact. So it goes without saying club guides don’t cover what is needed of them. Its just humanly impossible for club guides of the quality of This One and cover the amount of teams required.

Apart from the sheer scale of a task undertaken by a site who 'does team guides' team guides pose another dis-advantage. In my opinion team guides are a waste of time. I know they are helpful, and people do(cough) appreciate them. But I can't help but think that writing 'Rooney is best played just behind his partner up front who I recommend to be...' or 'buy this fella cause he’s good for his current club and will fit in nicely' must be boring. They are uniformed and pretty drab. The only real reason I can see myself reading a team guide is if I am managing the club at this present time or the Authors last guide as any good.

OK so team Guides are shit pieces of literature in most cases. We cannot avoid that fact tbh. But they don't need to be epics do they? I would rather see a system put in place on websites where all teams are listed and there are certain categories in place such as;

Best Players of every position
Deadwood
Recommended Tactic
Recommended Players to Buy
Recommended Players to Sell
Other Good players in that League

In my opinion nothing else is needed. Just bullet-points for each category and more team guides will be made. I am not saying it will happen but its just my two cents on what I think would be a more efficient way of working.

When I start up fm I look at teams and subconsciously have a look at the above categories. I can't see why people need to do a 10 paragraph every angle look at ny opinion. The scene needs a home of guides. And guides for obscure teams as well. I think that we can safely say that Chelsea don't need a lot of guidance. Its just about been covered a million times.

1st Entry- Random Dribblings about my Neeewww Game

2006-12-29T14:20:00.000Z

Well, this year I have been going through a change in life. I have become more adult, so to speak. Apart from getting a lot more facial hair, football has been involved in a massive change in my life. I dunno what it is but this season I just cannot get into football. I sort of lost interest at about the same rate as Sunderland were losing games last term. My main interest in life these days is music. Muse to be specific. It seems a lot more exhilarating for me than watching some baby faced, over paid jerks playing footy. To be frank if it weren’t for my not so exciting schedule for Saturday nights and Match of The Day I wouldn’t be able to tell you who was at the top of the pile. The last time I was really interested in footy was about this time last year. I was a season ticket holder at Sunderland and played fm day and night. It ws part of my routine. Yet over the past half year I have become bored with it. I cant explain, just me I suppose.

But since I have grew up with footy so far in my life its hard to just drop something so precious to me. I watch Sky Sports News now and then and when I bought fm on its release date on oooh, was it October 20th? I started to take more an interest in the game. Unfortunately I scratched fm only days after buying it and didn’t play again until yesterday when Santa Clause put another under my tree. With my not so large football brain I went on and set up a game with my beloved Sunderland. Looked round at the new squad. Oooh Dwight(shite) Yorke. Maybe hes not so bad in fm as he is in real life these days. Ill put him in the team for my first friendly against **insert name here**. I then went and logged onto ti and had a quick look round the tactics forum. Nothing took my fancy. I messed around with the settings and had myself a nice 451 system going. This worked for me on fm06 and s generally my tactic of choice. Anyway my mum came in and told me to get in the shower and get ready because we had to be at my nanas for 11. So I turned off fm and closed my new laptop dissatisfied with my first proper taste of football this season.

I rolled back into the house 3 hours and a Christmas dinner later, slouched on the couch(hey that rhymes) and turned on fm again. I couldn’t see my Sunderland game going anywhere so I had a browse through the stories on ti. See if I could find inspiration for my game. But again, nout really suited me. I remembered an a coulomb Dutton wrote the other day about Peruvian leagues and there season starting in February or some other carry on. I gave it another read over. That was it, I decided, Im gonna spend my xmas evening not with the family, not round my mates looking at their prezzies, but on fm. Yes, that sounds like a plan to me. So I opened up fm and Selected on New Game and chose The Brazilian Leagues and The English Leagues. Added a new manager and looked at the teams round the premiership. Arsenal top in December, closely followed by Chelsea. I clicked back onto the screen bit where you add a game, chose Arsenal and went and had a look at the team. Hmm, Henry has reached his yellow card limit for the next game against Sheffield United, Ljungberg is Injured and Lehmann is unfit.

Suppose the team is feeling the pressure of the heavy festive fixture list. So I got my assistant Pat to pick the team for tonight’s match at the Emirates. Answered a few questions from the media about how I’m feeling the pressure or some other tosh and proceeded to the match. First 10 minutes goes without major event. Then on about 11/12 minutes Van Persie is played in on the edge of the area by Cesc Fabregas and proceeds to put it past the keeper in a neat fashion. More none interesting crap went on for the most of the game till the 86th minute when Lauren put away a penalty to seal an easy victory. A poor performance on both parts. What’s Lauren doing taking penalties anyway?

Anyway, transfers are round the corner and my team is lacking in depth. Without Henry my attack is impotent and against Sheffield I only had 4 strikes on target. Also my defence isn’t much. With our Ashley fucked off to Chelsea the left back position is empty. So I foolishly have a look at some left backs in the premiership. Christ I have no chance. Looking at £10M for a decent one. So I turned my search to my scouts. Since with my small mind for football all my first thoughts went out the window. The thought crossed my mind that fm is no game for n00bs. Its realistic to the point where its no longer a game, but a simulation. I liked it when it was a game, back when you could buy anyone you fancied and stick them in your team and you would kick ass and be top of the league. This new fm is crap. You have to use your brain and think. I know there is no point in winning every time without fail, it get boring after a couple of months. But so what. Its fun.

Maybe I have just lost touch with football but fm isn’t what it used to be. It doesn’t have that nicotine factor about it that wants you coming back for more. Its drab and professional and all crap. I don’t want to think like a manager. I want to think like winning the league. After all I buy a game to play on, play being the key word. Not simulate. So anyway, my Arsenal game. I send a few scouts out and wait for the news to arrive. Aaannnddd its boxing day. Arsenal vs Chelsea. Chelsea are 8 points behind me and could do with the points. So I send the press a lovely message about me being unsure of Jose Mourinho to knock his moral and make me look big in front of my players for the game. The news lands in my pigeon hole that I’m favourite for the title clash at odds of 2/1. I clicked continue and picked my side then proceeded to the match at Stamford Bridge. To cut a not so long but longer than I can be bothered to tell story short the match ended with 19 players on the field and a 0-0 draw.

Just what you would expect, a game like that in real life will have been hyped up for ages on Sky and match of the season. Instead it was a bit naff. And put me right in the mood for some Christmas pudding. So off went fm and away I toddled to the kitchen and helped myself to a piece of pudding. So my point of the Article then? Well nout really, this was a diary entry that I thought would make decent reading for someone and let me put my point across about how fm isn’t a game anymore.

I heard a while ago that a manager in the premiership refers to fm for players. Well this just proves how much the game has changed from its former glory. I want to win every game, I’m crap at fm and I’m sure there are people out there like me, maybe not on the scene but some random kid called Conor who lives in Coventry and likes footy and was given fm as a Christmas present. That kid will be disappointed I guess. I think Ill stick to Pro evo in future. I probably think this fm will be my last unless I can rekindle my love. I probably will be able to...