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Championship Manager 5 Review

Chris Leyton

23/03/2005

Can Beautiful Game Studios live up to the Champ Man heritage and is No.5 a worthy addition...

With the notorious split between Eidos and Sports Interactive all but a distant memory and having witnessed the first fruits of Sports Interactive newly found relationship with SEGA in the shape of Football Manager 2005, the heavily delayed next instalment in the legendary Championship Manager series is finally upon us â“ but can it live up to its heritage and more importantly can Beautiful Game Studios fit the shoes of Sports Interactive.

Having gained control of the franchise and âlikenessâ but having to start from scratch when it comes to code and the database behind the game, there were initial concerns that Championship Manager 5 wouldnât quite capture the depth, freedom and suspension of disbelief that previous titles in the series managed so successfully to blend. This doubt was confounded last year when the first demonstrations of the title revealed a lightning quick gameplay experience, which led many to believe (us included) that the overall depth of the game had been sacrificed.

Whilst there are certainly issues (which weâll move on to later) with the game itâs certainly not the travesty that many were fearing and indeed many were predicting before its release; the improvements made to the tempo of the game are certainly welcome thanks largely to the code re-write, although a feature known as "Constant Gameplay" also plays its part. This essentially works the same as the glitch in previous Champ Man titles, allowing you to continue playing the game while the processing occurs in the background; based on your specification and the number of leagues youâre trying to run concurrently there will be times when youâre sat there waiting, but on the whole itâs a nice touch and will please those who think the experience is far too slow.

Whilst the first impression is definitely that of the speed of the game, the second thought that drifts into your mind is just how similar this is. The interface has been re-jigged and is very much going to be down to personal opinion coming across as similar to the FireFox Internet browser with its multiple tabs; some touches I enjoyed such as âScreen Historyâ which allows you to easily navigate to previous screens, but occasionally the design can seem a little cumbersome and leave you searching for where you need to get to.

Beautiful Game Studios have wisely decided to stop short of making massive changes to the formula, which is both a blessing and a curse. For their first stab itâs perhaps makes sense to try and get it right without shaking the boat, however much like Football Manager 2005 we find ourselves disappointed by the inability of both titles to utilise this opportunity to truly push the genre forwards.

Thatâs not to say there is a complete lack of new ideas; I particularly enjoyed the new Tactics section with the ability to send players into runs and also select who or where they want to feed the ball into â“ perfect for playing the ball into space for a speedy winger to latch on to. Itâs also worth noting that the Training feature is adequately useful, with schedules easily created, tinkered, assigned to various players and a good sense of variety and number of training options available to you. Itâs perhaps a little too easy to assign your assistant manager to this category and watch playerâs attributes get better and better with few side-effects, and in the future we still long to see a more personalised experience that easily allows you to get the best out of every individual player â“ safe to say it sufficient, but nothing to get excited about.

Perhaps the biggest criticism to be levelled at Championship Manager 5 is that the whole experience feels as though it was released too early (despite the delay) and a complete lack of testing, marked poignantly by the release of a significant patch on the day of release! Glitches, bugs and crashes frequent the experience, so much so that we havenât got the time or space to list in full, but to highlight a few examples these include memories of a scout passing a âpoor performanceâ on a player, only to find out on my own investigation that he never actually played in the game or made the subs bench; or perhaps the player who was âhappyâ to be at the club and a regular within the team only to suffer no loss in morale whatsoever when he was selfishly slapped on the transfer market and told the club no longer needs him.

It touches such as this that do suggest the gameâs depth has been sacrificed in certain areas or more hopefully just a glitch that can be sorted out with yet another patch; further examples will be scattered throughout your experience such as players coming back from international games and suffering no loss in condition or fitness â“ we know Sven likes his substitutes but surely playing a game would see a player tire slightly???

The one thing that management simulations need to nail is the sensation that your decisions have a profound impact on the team and club around you, whether it be a new training schedule or a change of tactics ten minutes from the end of a match; sadly the points described above lessen the impact, leaving the feeling that either youâre not in total control; itâs badly bugged or the series has just gone downhill in terms of depth and sophistication.

Iâll try to move away from the condemnation surrounding the relative "unfinished" state of the game, but just to highlight a few other points. The game features an extraordinary amount of embarrassing spelling mistakes, something that surely could have been fixed by enrolling a handful of the local school pupils; while forums are ablaze with angered descriptions of various quirks and glitches that have become apparent - 800k a week for Van Nistelrooy is too much even for a Utd fan!!!

But enough with the criticism and onto the actual matches. Championship Manager 5 sticks with the 2D match engine, although shifts the view to a slightly odd isometric viewpoint and features icons for the players that are probably a little too big in terms of scale to the pitch. The game presents you with a variety of options to view the game, ranging from just picking up the highlights or choosing between watching the game at a variety of different speeds; but unfortunately this is yet another area that hasnât been thought out properly. The options allow you to watch the game in Real-Time, x2, x6 or x60, however the rigidity of these options means that thereâs no setting that allows you to comfortably be able to watch the game but at the same time not take a year to complete a season; as a result youâll find yourself swapping between the various options continuously, switching up to x6 when you donât think anythingâs going to happen and down to x2 when a goal looks certain or you want to gain an understanding of how the match is shaping up. It might have been labelled as blatant plagiarism, but a sliding bar similar to that featured in Football Manager 2005 would have been far more effective.

The actual match takes place with a moderate degree of accuracy with players making semi-intelligent runs and a loose sense of conviction, although nowhere near to the style of CM4 or FM2005 before it. Thankfully the balancing issues that saw score-lines of 14-3 have been eradicated although there appears to be a significantly huge number of set-pieces throughout the game. One aspect that I did enjoy and allows you to get a better understanding of where the game is being won or lost is the fact that the Action Zones have been split up into nine different areas, easily allowing you to see how your team is performing in different areas or sides of the pitch. However the biggest issue is that once again your tactical decisions donât appear to have a great deal of effect actually on the pitch, with players assigned to making runs not necessarily doing so and the feed system being slightly ineffective.

As weâve said before thereâs a worrying absence of anything that even borders on stretching the boundaries. Both in Football Manager 2005 and now this weâre left disappointed by the lack of options available to the player to interact with other "characters" at a personal level be it players, agents, the chairman or the media; I want to be able to discover whatâs wrong with my star striker and find out whatâs stopping him scoring, praise my hard-working midfielder or perhaps lecture a youth player who likes the fast life a little too much.

Even handling the media is done with little effort and leaves you longing for previous titles in the series; largely because of the general lack of interaction and also the frustration of media reports coming thick and fast and refusing to die down as soon as a club shows an interest in a player, despite your insistence that you have no intention of selling him. Another aspect that irritated us by its absence in Football Manager 2005 and again with Championship Manager 5, is the inability to issue Half-Time talks whether it be bringing out the sliced oranges and commending a strong first half performance or lashing out and kicking the boot at your star player; exactly why both BGS and SI refuse to incorporate such a simple yet effective feature is beyond us.

Itâs this type of interaction between the various "characters" within the game that represents the future of football management games for us and the most significant area that brings innovation, but sadly Championship Manager 5 adamantly refuses to evolve in any shape, way or form.