Dragon User


Football Manager

Categories: Review: Software
Author: Jason Orbaum
Publisher: Addictive Games
Machine: Dragon 32

 
Published in Dragon User #028

As a person with very little experience of football I was rather perplexed as to how to approach this program.

The first time I played it I was not particularly impressed, but when my football supporter friend came round I loaded it up to show him, with the result that he was immediately engrossed, and, subsequently, I have become highly addicted myself.

The game lets you manage any of a choice of 32 football teams, with all the inherent trials and tribulations of the task.

This is not a quick game that you can load up when you want a break from the revision - load this one up and you won't finish till after the exam. Having picked your team, you can choose to sell any of your players, obtain a bank loan, save the game (which I have had limited success with!), re-load an earlier game, or go on to play a match.

Football Manager

If you decide to go into the match you are shown your team's average attributes, along with those of the opposition, at which point you can re-arrange your players, taking out those with low energy and so on, and inserting others. When you are happy with the changes that you have made the game starts and a running score is printed up as the game progresses (sadly there is no option to re-arrange the team at half time as there appears to be no half time in the game).

The league table and results of other league matches are shown, along with your finances for the week, and the game returns to phase one.

This process repeats for 14 league matches and however many FA Cup rounds you play. I have only won the FA Cup once but I can recommend doing so for purely financial reasons, I believe my share of the game was one hundred thousand pounds.

Players are denoted as attackers, defenders, or midfield players, and are allotted certain attributes under skill (1-5) and energy (1-20). They are then valued at a level based upon their skill, and all the information can be called up in tabular form by the touch of a button.

To sum up then, the game is a definite for anyone with a love of football. If you are not of that ilk, but still like the sound of the game, then I would recommend it as it is programmed neatly and plays well.

Jason Orbaum

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