FOOTBALLSUP » What to Buy

Battle of the Apps: CM v FM

Matt — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 20:47:41 +0000

Battle of the iPhone apps: Championship Manager vs Football Manager

Let me say first of all that both are really good. It’s a triumph for the developers that such data heavy behemoths can be ported to phones. Alongside Tiger Woods and GTA they are probably the most impressive achievements to date in mobile gaming.

Both are smaller versions of the bigger game so I won’t dwell on the CM v FM debate – here I am looking at how well they transfer to the iPhone (or the iPod Touch). Here we go…

Interface

Firstly Champman is portrait and FM is landscape, a huge plus for the latter – it just feels more natural holding a gaming device that way (although in fairness that might be because I am used to playing a PSP). In terms of buttons, scrolling etc. FM also has the advantage – continue, back and so on are bigger and more responsive, and it’s easier to drag and drop players, squad numbers, formations, and everything else you would expect.

Reliability

I have played Champman more – but to me it seems a lot less reliable. There is nothing worse than winning a crucial game only to be forced to replay it, or worse a couple of weeks of game time. This happened a few times in the season I played (finishing second with Newcastle to a ridiculous Crystal Palace side). On FM, a few games in, it’s yet to crash… (touch wood)

Match Engine

Again FM wins – both are good, as good as a few versions ago on the PC. But FM’s is more versatile and more realistic, you can see what is going on, and players seem to be in the right place more often. It’s not uncommon on Champman for all the players to be around one goal only for the other team to score.

Speed

This is where FM really comes into its own. It’s REALLY fast. Saving and loading games take a few seconds at most, background games happen in a heartbeat, and load times are minimal. Champman is quick too – but not AS quick. As is becoming a running theme, FM is just that little bit more streamlined, that little bit more polished.

Realism

Here we get to comparing the games themselves rather than the mobile port but it has to be done. And again FM wins, hands down this time. 8-0 wins are not infrequent on CM, I’m yet to see a Spurs-Wiganesque result on FM. Also you have to go through the ballache of press conferences on CM which are really badly thought out and executed, and basically just a pain in the ass. Transfer proceedings are much smoother on FM whereas CM is largely blind and just a bit shit. Navigating between training and team selection on CM is clunky and clumsy and though it takes a few more clicks than I’d like it is still far more user friendly. Also I’ve heard reports that transfers sometimes ‘go wrong’ on Champman – a friend said he signed Fabregas only for him to appear as a goalkeeper and double the funds taken.

Cost

CM comes in slightly cheaper at £2.99 as opposed to the £6.99 FM costs. But at less than a tenner you can’t complain at either.

Conclusion

As I began, both are good. I loved CM before FM came out. But Sega have raised the bar – FM is better in real life and it is better on the iPhone/iPod Touch. It’s essentially a port of the PSP version, ‘FM Lite’ – great to pass a tube ride or other moments of boredom. For £6.99 is really is exceptional. If you really must save that £4, Champman is good too…

Champman – 7/10 – It’s good but it’s not the one…

FM – 9/10 – Brilliant

You can buy them both in iTunes. I would set up an affiliate thing so you could buy them from here but I can’t be bothered.

REVIEW: Why England Lose and Other Curious Phenomena Explained

Matt — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:52:59 +0000

I nearly wrote a review of this before I had finished it – it was so good. I’m glad I didn’t though. Read on for an explanation for that somewhat weird comment…

OK – the good bit. This is one of the best football books I have read. High praise indeed. It is excellently researched, well written, engaging and above all really interesting. It is essentially ‘Freakonomics for Football’ (hence the initial release as ‘Soocernomics’) – that is, a book that ties real-world micro and macro-economic factors into football. I appreciate that sounds a bit (very) dry; but in reality it’s not dry at all.

Take some of the topics they examine – of course the eponymous ‘Why England Lose’ (which is actually a little misleading and I suspect chosen as the title to shift copies) but also why a London club has never won the European Cup, why Lyon are freakishly successul (relatively), which country is most successful relative to GDP, which country has the most loyal fans, why major tournaments aren’t actually economic boons, what are the best transfer strategies, how upbringing affects ability, etc. The way it is linked back and forth with real footballing events and stats makes compelling reading.

However – and this is why I am glad I didn’t write a eulogy half way through – the book does trail off somewhat. The first 200 or so pages are an absolute pleasure, but then it does begin to drag – whether it’s boredom with the novel (as in new) approach to writing about football, whether it’s that the points become less and less interesting (i.e. they used up the good ones at the start) whether the repeated veneration of Arsene Wenger and Billy Beane becomes tiresome, I’m not sure – but I definitely enjoyed the first half of this more than the second.

That said, I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to any (slightly obsessive/geeky) football fan, as there is a lot of interesting material and intriguing analysis.

Certainly a good book, perhaps a great one – all I can say is read it and make your own judgement. 8/10

Cult Zeros

Matt — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 14:46:11 +0000

A nice little site we stumbled across – get your hero/zero emblazoned on a t-shirt. They have Jan Aage-Fjortoft…

We like it because it is different. And because of the staggering range of ‘cult zeros’ they have. You can visit their site here – all t-shirts can be customised by colour, wording, etc. Do it.

Inverting the Pyramid

Matt — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 14:25:28 +0000

It’s about time we reviewed something – you can visit our shop to see what we recommend. This time it’s the cerebral ‘Inverting the Pyramid’ by Jonathan Wilson – the thinking man’s football book. Read on to see what we thought…

This is not your average football book, let’s get that clear. There is none of the usual emotional recounting of winning goals, or eulogistically sycophantic reminiscings of players past. There is no phoenix from the flames story, no rags to riches tale, no boys in the bathtub banter, no Clough-isms – you get the idea. This is a book about football tactics, plain and simple. Consequently, while being interesting, it’s also very dry. There is nothing cathartic in here – nothing except cold hard fact and chronological storytelling. Nothing romantic, nothing emotion inducing, nothing tragic or amusing. Nothing that you would associate with football in fact.

What there is, in spades, is information. The evolution of the game, the innovative teams, players, managers, and systems – the development of football from the 2-3-5 of Corinthians to the modern day 4-5-1 (hence, ‘Inverting the Pyramid’) and everything in between. It looks at the scholars who documented the first Association Football rules to colonialism and the spread of the game to the Austrian coffee shop thinkers to the Russian innovators to Graham Taylor… and much more.

There is much of interest – particularly tracing the evolutions of playing styles, English pressing and high tempo a legacy of wide open playing fields, Brazilian skills and close control a legacy of tight, compact, crowded games in the favellas, and direct, powerful driving African football a legacy of the short narrow pitches and tiny goals made from stones.

Wilson throws name after name at you and expects the reader to remember them (cross referencing people throughout) which can make for confusing reading – and he also dwells for too long some tinpot theories; pages are devoted to one flawed thinker in particular (I won’t spoil it for you).

As is plain, this book has its downsides. But it has its upsides also. It’s best seen as a history book that happens to be about football. But if you can take it as that, have a great memory for names, and an anal fascination for line-ups, formations, and playing styles, this is the book for you. If you expect cathartic accounts of exploits on the football field, it’s not.

Overall, as a bit of a football nerd, I will give it 7.5/10. If it appeals to you, you can purchase it below:

Football Manager Handheld

Matt — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 11:04:18 +0000

Are you a fan of Championship Manager? If so, Football Manager Handheld (PSP) is for you. It’s Football Manager lite, stripped of the superfluities; a nod to the old days, the original Champmans, where you picked and managed a team, chose from a set of formations, and bought and sold players. You could rattle through a season in a few hours, tweaking and changing, moving positions, dropping those out of form and giving youth a chance, resting your stars in the cup, and gradually bleeding your latest starlet into the first team.

Football Manager in its current incarnation on the PC – Football Manager 2009 – is a far, far more in depth proposition. Interaction with players and the press, training, prolonged transfer negotiations, hiring and firing non-playing staff – for an immersive managerial simulation it is perfect. But it’s too much for some people. Some people just want to manage a side and play matches.

FMH (Football Manager Handheld) does include a very basic version of the 3D match engine but it’s not to the detriment of the game; and you can interact with players on a very basic level. There is a training module; but you can leave that to take care of itself. Aside from that, it is essentially Champman 2 with updated players.

And for me, that’s brilliant. I can’t be bothered with all the finite tweaks and intricacies of the PC version – sometimes it takes a few hours to get through just a handful of games. Get FMH for the PSP, and play a few games in just a handful of minutes. It may not have the immersive longevity of the full Football Manager, but for a bit of gratuitous fun, it’s brilliant. Especially for travelling on planes, trains, and automobiles.

If you already have a PSP, buy FMH below (from Amazon):

And if you don’t have a PSP, buy one now – thn buy FMH…

A Season with Verona

Matt — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 21:29:18 +0000

I have just finished this book, and though I am coming horribly late to the party (it was first published in March 2002) I want to shout about it to any other football fans it has passed by. The book tells of the author Tim Parks’ travels with Hellas Verona throughout the 2000/01 season. He originally published details in the Guardian, but the novel really works…

About Serie A and Hellas Verona in particular (mostly their away games) A Season with Verona is also a travel , cultural and social work, analysing Italy, the Italian people, and their devotion to the beautiful game. The novel’s subtext is Travels around Italy, in search of illusion, national character and goals! which summarises it nicely – it’s not just the football side Parks covers.

However, it’s obviously a major part, and there are many familiar names – Martin Laursen and Alberto Gilardino for Verona, while such luminaries as Roberto Baggio and Sinisa Mihalovic (for my money the greatest free-kick taker ever) pop up – and I have to admit to an affection for Verona after reading it.

If you want to read an intelligent football book, that doesn’t just commentate on the action but perspicaciously examines its wider sociological and cultural effects and implications, this is the book for you. Buy it now (below).

FIFA 2009

Matt — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 20:29:23 +0000

I’ve played Pro Evo since its first incarnation on the SNES – the first 16 bit console game to have full commentary. Then under the moniker ‘International Superstar Soccer’ (or as some die-hards still refer to it, ISS), it was a quantum leap in football sims, bringing realism, speed and authenticity where before you had Super Kick Off and Sensible Soccer (great games in their own right, don’t get me wrong, but not realistic football sims).

Then I was loyal through the Pro Evos, latterly on the PS1, PS2, then PS3 – when it all started to go downhill. Laggy and slow, it was a regression by Konami. They should never have released it, it was that flawed. Turning the crowd, commentary, pitch effects and pretty much everything else off improved the lag, but it was still nigh on unplayable.

So it was with great anticipation I played Pro Evo 2009. A great improvement – but still far from perfect. Players feel like they are running on rails (the 9 point sprint is infuriating), it’s still too easy to get behind the full back on the flanks, and the cut back is still mightily effective. Plus when players turbo off the pitch in a straight line it’s just laughable.

So it was with heavy heart, as if betraying a long term partner when the spark has gone from your relationship, that I purchased FIFA 09 for my Xbox360.

And what a revelation! I’d not played FIFA since Road to World Cup 1998 (a great game), and had found intermediate editions far too slow – players felt like they were walking. But FIFA 09 is in another realm – player movement is incredibly realistic, the games are fast paced and natural, deflections, challenges, mishits, tricks, headers – all feel and look brilliant, all are superior to Pro Evo. The overall realism is just fantastic – it feels like you are controlling a footballer, not a computer game sprite.

I’m not one for online play, so I can’t comment on that, but EA do offer live updates, where real-life form is uploaded onto your console and reflected on the game. A nice touch.

Verdict:

FIFA 09 is the most realistic football game I have ever played. If you’re a FIFA fan, get FIFA 09. Now. And if you’re a Pro Evo fan, get FIFA 09. Now.

From being a Pro Evo fanboy, my only remaining loyalty to Konami is the changing of the control configuration on FIFA. I just can’t get used to ‘cross’ being ‘shot’…

Football Manager 2009 (PC)

Matt — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 12:57:01 +0000

A few facts about a true phenomenon:

1. Football Manager (or Championship Manager as it was originally known) has been cited in 35 divorce cases.

2. SI, who produce the game, have the biggest scouting network in the world (over 900)- several non-league and lower division clubs have admitted to using FM/CM to find talent, and they’re currently working with a Premiership side looking to do the same.

3. The latest version has over 350,000 players in its database.

4. SI employ 15 in house game testers – these people are basically emplyed to sit and play FM all day. Amazing!

5. The two creators are brothers Paul and Oliver Collyer, whose few lines of code written in 1985 became the first full game in 1992. They starred in original versions (obviously becoming amazing).

6. The 2005 and 2006 editions combined racked up sales of £1.5million

7. The most recent (2008) edition topped the gaming charts for an incredible 22 weeks

8. Retailing at just £30 (the price of 2 DVDs), considering the amount of hours you will get from the game, it represents amazing value.

9. Click here to read an interview with the Collyer brothers and co-creator Miles Jacobsen from Shortlist.com

10. Sold? You can buy it here…