FIFA Manager 09 Review

BY Rabie Hassoun | POSTED: 09 December 2008

More than just football.



Exactly one year ago FIFA Manager 08 exceedingly impressed us. The game felt like it had it all. After playing every version of the Football Manager series for the past 10 years, FIFA Manager 08 felt like a fresh breath of air. We were sucked in into the game’s massive options list and original licensed teams feature. You even had the option to talk to your players and plan the whole preseason. Sooner than later however, things started to get boring fast. FIFA Manager 09 comes out this year with even more options and a short list of improvements. Will that be enough to punch Football Manager 09 off the throne though?

After effortlessly installing this game, you will have a ton of options to choose from. You first need to choose what team and league you want to be playing in. We are given the chance to lead a club in the UAE or KSA this year, but don’t expect any authentic logos or player’s names. The league the developers paid most attention to is the English premier league, a league we believe you will be playing and enjoying the most. After you pick your team, you now have to decide how much time you are willing to invest into this game. You need to figure out what responsibilities will be held by yourself and what tasks you want the game to simulate automatically for you. The basic set up will have you manage your team members and tactics. If you feel like you have more time on your hand, you can take care of the marketing department as well. Setting prices for merchandise and sending your players on promotional tours and so on. Those options might sound great but truthfully speaking they are unsuccessfully executed. All you get is numbers and a message explaining what just happened in your inbox.



The game, like last year, takes care of your personal life as well. After filling in your own information you can upload or choose an avatar. After that you need to inform the game if you are in a relationship or not. Yup, this weird option returns this year as well. You will have to input some more information about your wife /girlfriend if you do choose that option. One of the ways the game will integrate that into the gameplay itself for example is by asking you if you would rather scout the youth team or take your wife on a date for the night. If you go scouting on that night your managing stocks will go up. Make sure you have an extra blanket on you however, because you surely won’t be sleeping at home for the night. The personal screen has even more options for you to mess around with. You can choose to learn a new language or even arrange a bowling night. All of that sounds just great, but all it does is pull you away from the main idea behind this game, which by the way is managing your own team. We are sure some gamers will enjoy the massive personal interference. But many others will prefer to get on with the managing itself.

If you choose to take care of every aspect of your club, the game will present you with a ton of options. The financial screen will present you with the club’s present status, accounting journal, bonus fee and budget controls. And you thought you will never hear those terms after barely passing your accounting class. The list of options just goes on, choosing your stadiums seat colours, building a new youth camp and even financing the construction of a new stadium. The game is so detailed and accurate here that we believe some professors can teach a course using it. Again, and like we mentioned earlier, how the football fan will receive such options can vary. Just keep in mind that once you get into the whole managing director part of the game, you will be talking numbers and profits rather than tactics and goals.

The first screen many people playing this game will check out first is the transfer screen. You will be able to choose from any form of negation you can imagine. But we still feel this is the weakest part of the game. Take this as an example: you will not be allowed to make an offer at times because of how the transfer will affect the team’s chemistry. Excuse me, but who is the manager here? I think a little note on the screen telling you to be careful should have been sufficient. But to forbid you from making a bid is just absurd. After repeatedly failing with every bid we made, we decided to cheat. Yes, we were that desperate to strike a deal already. We added a 2nd manager and tried to buy some of the players on that team. Surprisingly however, we struggled to complete a deal here as well. Some players will reject the move right off, but why cannot we make our offer first before getting the answer? Take the Robinho transfer from Real Madrid to Man City as an example. If the player was simply told to move to Man City, he surely would have rejected the whole idea. But when he was told that he will be one of the highest paid footballers on the planet and that the club will be adding more stars, he agreed. Sadly, this scenario cannot happen in FIFA Manager 09.

When you first start the game, you will be asked if you just want to scroll around with the mouse making decisions or participate in the matches as well. You can choose to be a player manager or simply choose a star on your team to control. The 3D matches look amazing compared to the 3D matches FM 09 presented this year. In FIFA Manager you can even control the players on the screen, but yet again this defies the whole point. You sign a young player, train him and send him on loans so that you can watch him perform not play as him. In our own humble opinion, this option should be removed next year. After all we do have the FIFA series to take care of that part of the game. The other ways of viewing a match are nothing compared to the classical 2D and commentary views in the FM series. While the presentation of each mode is great, you will get turned off by the lack of information or long loading times.



After completing 8 seasons of FM 09, FIFA Manager 09’s presentation style was a welcome change. The game offers a ton of pictures of players and stadiums for you to enjoy. We were especially satisfied by the availability of the original team logos for every premier league club. Due to the large amount of options and data on the screen, you might struggle with the menu navigation for a while. Depending on what role you are handling with the club, you will quickly adapt to the avalanche of information flowing your way. FIFA Manager 09 comes with a built in MP3 player. The playlist is solid, but it will surely not beat your own playlist running in the background. Sound effects wise the game is solid here and offers a few impressive effects in the 3D matches. It is important to note that we rarely mention music and sound effects while discussing a football management game, so what the developers are trying to do here is highly appreciated.

It is slightly unfair to compare both the FIFA Manager and Football manager games. If you look carefully you can sense that each series is going in a different direction and aiming at a slightly different segment of gamers. Football Manager already has the realism aspect down and the developers are now trying to improve the presentation side of the game. In FIFA Manager the presentation is very well done with the developers working on adding even more options to the game. In a nutshell, FIFA Manager 09 is more of a life manager than a football manager game. You will enjoy messing around with every aspect of this fine game, before losing interest and going back to the real deal in Football Manager 09.