For the first-timer it’s still a lot to take in, but being able to quickly change your build-up play from ‘exploiting the middle’ to ‘pump ball into the box’ by moving an arrow and knowing straight away if it will make a difference is handy.
Instead of being just tick-boxes, sliders and text, it’s all based around visual diagrams. Take the updated Team Instructions panel for instance: a vital area any budding football manager will know all too well. Yet, the bevy of smaller additions make it much more inviting game, meaning Football Manager has hooked me back in after a year off.
You still create your profile – there is now a hilariously awful build-a-manager option that makes you look like a character from a bad PS1 game – choose which team to manage, sculpt your squad and hopefully lead them to greatness. In fact, there are only a few headline changes from last year. Options were moved, there was a greater emphasis on the universal search bar and it seemed like everything was altered simply for the sake of it, rather than to make it easier to move around the game.įootball Manager 2016 doesn’t try to rewrite the rule book. The complete overhaul of the UI was confusing to get to grips with.
