The upcoming Football Manager game has been postponed by several weeks, with studio head Miles Jacobson acknowledging the difficulties of transitioning to a new engine.
While last year’s Football Manager 2024 introduced numerous new features like positional play and intermediaries, it became apparent earlier this summer that Football Manager 2025 would be quite different once developer Sports Interactive began showcasing the sequel.
The switch to a new game engine has led to significant challenges for the developer, resulting in the removal of several existing game modes, such as fantasy draft and create-a-club, along with features like tactical shouts. Unfortunately, more features have also been cut in an effort to meet the November release timeline.
In a recent update, Jacobson shared that Football Manager 2025 has been pushed back from early November to “late November,” but no specific date has been provided.
“The FM25 development cycle has been challenging for the entire team,” Jacobson noted. “We anticipated that moving the game to the Unity engine would be complex, but as we delved deeper into the process, it has proven to be more difficult than we expected. The development team is facing numerous new challenges and is doing an outstanding job throughout this process.”
These ongoing challenges have also led to the decision to remove all international football from Football Manager 2025, with the exception of the Mobile version. This choice is based on the finding that only 5.6% of all FM24 PC saves utilized the international mode. While international teams will still be part of the simulation, they will no longer be available as a playable mode.
Women’s football is set to be included in FM25, but this addition is bringing its own set of challenges, as Jacobson has announced the removal of player weight due to the differing ways men and women fluctuate in weight.
With the recent announcement of several significant feature cuts and this week’s update, fans are becoming increasingly anxious about the game’s direction.
In a Reddit thread titled “FM25 is heading to be a hot mess,” one user expressed their doubts about the upcoming Football Manager title, stating:
“I’ve been a huge Football Manager fan since 2010 and have purchased every version except the last couple due to Game Pass. I’ve been concerned about some of the features being dropped, but each new piece of news seems more unsettling than the last.”
Another Football Manager enthusiast, Bec SPK, commented, “Given the current state of development, I might skip ‘25 but would be happy to get ‘26 if they manage to get everything sorted.”
“I think many people will stick with FM24 using updated databases. All these delays for a new engine without even releasing the specs,” added another user, Like Mike.
Jacobson mentioned that international football will eventually make a return, explaining that work on it has only been “paused” for now.
With just two months remaining until the originally scheduled release, Sports Interactive has decided to allocate more time for developers to prepare Football Manager 2025 for launch, which has led to the removal of several features.
A few additional weeks should allow the seasoned developer to concentrate on more crucial features, but it remains to be seen if that will be sufficient time.
