Thanks to Feral, Eidos, and Sports Interactive, last summer was officially
shot. With the release of Championship Manager 4, I may be the
worst football manager on the planet Earth, but I can still revel
in the fact that I am managing the Red Devils of Manchester United
as I speak. Who cares if I have already lost two of the opening
three friendlies? Oh, I guess I should care since one of the
main objectives in CM4 is not to be sacked by the governing board.
Oh, the joys of European football (what the yanks refer to as soccer)!
CM4 runs either in Mac OS 9 or 10, but the recommended requirements
ask for 9.2.2 or Jaguar (10.2). Any G3 at 500 MHz and 256 MBof
RAM should
run the game sufficiently, but depending upon if you wish to run
multiple leagues hard drive space may be an issue. With only one
league in my database, I have already used close to 500 MB in disk
space.
Once
the game begins, hardware is not much of an issue. The databases
for the leagues are considerably large, so available
hard drive space
may come into play, depending on how many leagues you wish to run.
Now, for the faint of heart and graphically challenged CM4 may be
a shock to most sports gamers, including the small population
who play on the Macintosh platform. This is a game that is rich
in football intricacies and nuances. To be blunt, if you’re
unsure of what the entire ruckus was over David Beckham’s £24.5
million transfer fee, then this game is not for you. However,
if that sort of stat is what you fancy and you’re able
to keep your Ronaldo’s from your Ronaldinho, then CM4 is
what you crave.
In
CM4, you become the manager of whatever club you wish and your
side takes on the best of the Premiership,
Serie A, Bundelisga, or
anyone one of the 39 national leagues. If you have the heart, you
can even manage clubs in different leagues at the same time. Who
knows? Presumably you may even run up against your other team in
European competition.
 One
big difference from games heavily marketed in the states is that
CM4 is a managerial simulation. You make
the decisions all
season
long, but once the match begins, you do not control the players
beyond substitutions and tactical decisions. This game definitely
goes beyond
who has the fastest fingers. You are able to set team instructions,
individual player tactics, even switch formations to a more defensive
posture if your club gains a second-half lead. CM4 measures knowledge,
skill, and decision-making and rewards those who succeed, and
lets you know quickly if you should return to one of the lower
divisions
before returning to the cream of the crop.
Of course, in testing the game, I jumped right into the fray
and dispossessed Sir Alex Ferguson of his manager’s position
at Manchester United (Note to self: Never replace a gentleman
with the
title of “Sir”). As you will see there are many decisions
to be made -- positioning the players either on the first team
or reserve squad, negotiating contracts and salaries, and, of
course, perusing the transfer market to see who’s available
and possibly, a la Beckham, who’s interested in paying
a tidy sum for one of your players.
Now, game play is intensive and time consuming. Most teams have
a full slate of preseason friendlies, European qualifying matches,
and then, you finally get into the league’s fixtures and
Cup matches.
 While
playing matches, you have varied ways of watching the events
transpire, such as a running commentary (which you can limit
to key moments in the match or have a full commentary); you can
opt
for
an action-zone screen which gives a percentage of the run of
play broken down into defensive, midfield, and attacking thirds
of the
pitch; or the new 2-D Pitch (seen at right) that gives a manager
a view of entire field and players are represented by colored
circles, much
like a coach’s play board.
The
Match Stats (seen below) window is key during halftime and fulltime
to give you a full
recount of match events.
For most gamers, CM4 may seem almost archaic in its non-use
of graphics. The best example of a Mac game like this would
be the
now-defunct
Strat-O-Matic game series.
Not a bug, but the start time for loading a game is incredibly long.
Start the game and go change into your favorite teak kit. It
will take a while.
CM4 is the game for soccer fans who value the art of player management,
not splashy graphics.
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