The Greatest Football Management Sim Ever

Football Manager 2010 is the latest installment of the successful football management series from Sports Interactive, published by Sega.

Until 2004, Sports Interactive produced the Championship Manager series for Eidos until an acrimonious split that saw them use the Football Manager title while Eidos pushed ahead with a new development team for the Championship Manager games. Sports Interactive retained their code, resulting in the majority of football management gamers moving on to the Football Management series.

Championship Manager had been considered a dead franchise but their latest release (reviewed last month) has proved that there is life in the older title - can Football Manager 2010 hold off the challenge?

It’s an impressive piece of work by the developers - Football Manager 2010’s system requirements are barely different to the previous version and the game also runs in Windows 7 as well as XP and Vista.

Windows XP requires a 1.4 GHz or faster CPU while Vista and Windows 7 both require 2.0 GHz or higher; similarly XP requires just 512 MB of system RAM while Vista and Windows 7 users will need 1 GB spare.

To get the most from the game and enjoy the Football Manager 2010 3D match engine a decent video Card with at least 128 MB should be used, although the game can still be played without the 3D match engine in 2D mode.

This game is huge. It features clubs and leagues from around the planet and these can be added to with custom leagues and competitions – the developers rightly boast that this makes Football Manager 2010 the first game that lets the player take part in every tier of the English football league, down to the amateur level.

Football Manager 2010 goes beyond this however – whether it’s player stats (pretty much every professional player in the world is in this game), the immense tactical options, training, or even the improved press conference feature, the game impresses at every level.

There is a complete gaming experience available in Football Manager 2010, one that engages the player in a way that other football management sims cannot match.