Championship Manager 2008 review (PC)

Championship Manager was regarded as the best football management simulation available until the notorious split between Eidos and Sports Interactive. Eidos kept the name, but SI took everything else with them, meaning CM had to be started again from scratch.

Steady Progress

To be fair to Eidos and Beautiful Game Studios, the past few years has seen them making good progress, but still no where near the standards of the award winning SI and SEGA games. A real coup was made when CM got the rights to use the ProZone software. For those that don’t know, ProZone is a piece of statistical analysis software that several top clubs and managers use, with data such as distance travelled during a match, passes attempted, completed and failed, just some of the data that can be looked at.

So how does this work in Championship Manager? There are two forms of ProZone on CM 2008. Analyst Mode and Expert Mode. Analyst mode is the simplest form of ProZone. Your ProZone analyst will break down the game into several events. You’ll be given basic information such as player A did this wrong or this right, or your opponents scored because the left side of your team is useless. Basic things like that which also comes with an overhead view of the game, a ball trail and text to show exactly what happened at that point.

But if that information is not enough, then maybe you need the Expert Mode. You still get the basic comments and breakdown from your analyst, but this time you also have the breakdown of every single player that stepped over that white line, which ever side they belong to.

It can be very confusing at first, figuring out exactly what to do with it. But 5, 10 minutes of playing around and it will all click into place. And it’s easy to see how it will help. Every attempted pass, every shot, cross, run made, back pass and clearance made during the match is picked up and can be looked at. Being able to see all of this, you can tell where things are going wrong and where your mentality needs to be changed in certain areas.

What’s bothering you?

Another nice feature that CM 2008 has is the interaction you can have with players and management. There aren’t as many options and opportunities to interact with players as there are in Football Manager. For example, you don’t have an actual option to interact with your own players, but if something is bothering a player, you will have the option to respond. Everything you do will effect how a player thinks and feels. Dropping his squad status will cause concerns. Too many concerns and the player will need reassurances. If your response isn’t what the player wants to hear, then you’re going to have problems! It may be limited, but the effects it has with players and the squad work quite well. The only problem with it is you don’t always know if there is an option to interact with the player.

The ability to interact with other players is also very limited. You can declare an interest in a player and that’s about it. But if you are a national team manager, a few more options are available to you. I say a few, but it’s really only one. Thinking of calling up a player to the team, but not too sure if they can make that big step up or concerned about their current form. Ask the opinion of their club manager who will give you an honest opinion. Where the player lacks in ability, how much of a benefit they will be and other thoughts that may well help.

It’s all about confidence

All is looking rosy so far for this years instalment. Another thing that Beautiful Game Studios has got spot on this year, and all credit to it for developing it into the game, is the confidence levels of players. While playing, there is a view available that shows the confidence of the lads out on the park, again, for both sets of teams. Things like team talks, the position they have been picked for, opponents and mistakes made during matches, these all affect the confidence of the players. A red arrow pointing downwards shows a drop in confidence, a green arrow pointing up shows an increase.

The 3D match engine has been slightly improved as well. Movements of the players, their intelligence, just some of the little things. All fancy I know, but improvements are what the team need to do, to be able to one day take their crown as best management sim back.

But…

But yet, it’s still not as good as Football Manager. The team talk feature is pretty much hit and miss. You only have 3 options, and most of the time what you want to say doesn’t come close to what you have on offer. 2-0 down away at half time and you’re going to struggle. It also seems a little too easy at times. Find a formation that works and you won’t need to change it, as you can easily go on a long unbeaten run. Even down to 9 men I managed to keep my unbeaten run at 12 games, no changes in 10. Put the Club Benefactor option on when starting the game, and the amount of money you have will mean no other club will be really able to compete.

It also doesn’t feel like you can do as much as you can in Football Manager. It feels like the game pretty much relies on the ProZone aspect of the game. You can’t get a report from the assistant manager asking for what he feels is the best team. There is an option for the best team to be selected, but where as in FM, you can get an actual report giving a star rating for each player, which gives you some idea of where needs to be improved, there just isn’t that option in CM 2008. It’s pretty much down to you to figure out how each player will perform in the league, with no real help from the back room staff – something that wouldn’t happen at a real football club.

Sounds like…

The sounds are shocking as well. I know you can’t really expect much, but they remind me of something from a manager game back in the 80s. I couldn’t even explain what they sound like, but it certainly isn’t a crowd of football fans. Kind of electric, like they have been recorded off a novelty keyboard.

But something else, that is quite strange, is the speed of the game. It’s quite slow. I don’t have a top of the range PC. But I can run 2 countries with all of their leagues on Football Manager comfortably. Playing all of the leagues in England on CM, and at 8 in the morning, my PC is at stand still. But, the development team have done well in allowing the user to continue playing and doing things while the game is loading. Although, by the time the game has finished loading, you’ll have had enough time to do whatever you need to, and go and make a cuppa.

Eidos and Beautiful Game Studios are getting there. It’s a slow process yes, but they are getting closer. If they can concentrate on more of the basic stuff, team talks and being more interactive with players, rather than on the fancy stuff such as the 3D matches, then next years match could be a close one. The hardcore Football Manager fan probably won’t like this too much, but for someone fancying a change then yes, look no further. Championship Manager is slowly climbing up the leagues. This year, it’s division 1. Will next year be the Premier league?