Football manager

That's right, its a video game blog post, those who aren't interested please look away now.

Before I begin I'll state that this isn't a review of the latest release, its more a reflection of the series.

From its early days on the Amiga, up to its present day multi format/handheld release, football manager has been a mainstay in most football fans collection.

It's original form 'championship manager' was a basic system. Text based match days, only able to manage a club in the English leagues and unable to sign any foreign players. A few updates on the Amiga including 'championship manager - Italia' saw the series go from strength to strength.
Inevitably the game made it to the PC, again numerous annual releases of Championship Manager helped it keep it's grip on the market.

Championship Manager 3 saw a whole new approach to the game loved, reportedly tested by Arsene Wenger himself, this was to be the hardest game to date. It did prove more of a challenge and with that increase in difficulty came a more addictive game. When this version came out I was working night shifts, so it was pretty much a case of work, sleep and game!

Present day sees a complete overhaul of the game, most notably is the change in name to 'Football Manager'. Also is the inclusion of a 2d match engine, which can be used to view the entire match or just the key moments.

What is it that make us play this game so much even if we're continually losing? Maybe its the hope that our next match could turn things around. Clinging onto hope that the next transfer window will bring in some inspired signings.

I'm 30 and I'm hooked on the handheld ipod version, helps make my commute to and from work quicker. You have to admit though there is nothing as satisfying as discovering a youngster who progresses through your club. Or steering lower league teams into the premiership.

Geek control pad appreciation

Well I woke this morning and a quick check on endgadget I saw this;

N-Control Avenger

After tweeting the link to Twitter a discussion began about controllers and which were the best.

In my eyes it has to be the original SNES joy pad.

The Daddy of controllers?

Initially released in 1991, the SNES standard controller added two extra face buttons to the design of the NES pad, and introduced the first appearance of 'shoulder buttons'.

As you can see from the picture the SNES pretty much designed the blueprint for controllers for years to come.

Aside from the number of face buttons, look at the layout, how many pads these days use the same 'diamond' layout.

The shoulder buttons, handy in games like Street Fighter II and Star-wing were never really used to their full potential in other games. Certainly not to the extent that we use them these days.

The main thing I liked from the pad though was the shape of it. It actually felt like it was designed to sit comfortably in the gamers hands, rounded edges and perfect size.

These days though most pads seem to favour the dual shoulder buttons, dual analog sticks as well as wireless capability. But we must not remember the importance of the SNES control pad.

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The World of Sensible Soccer

Back in the early 90's before the 'britpop' urge to learn a musical instrument, there wasn't really much for teenagers to do. Then Sensible Software released ‘Sensible Soccer’ on the Amiga and the Atari ST and the football gaming world was changed forever.

What was so different about this game was the simple control method, the same button for pass and shoot (tap for the pass and hold for the shot). It really was pick up and play stuff.
As well as this simple approach to gaming it also allowed the editing of national, club and custom teams. Friends always gathered round to play each other. 'The Black Swan FC' often competed against 'Netto Town' in their bumble bee style kits. With your class mates filling the numbers 1-11 (they didn't have squad numbers then)

As the years went on regular updates were released with minor tweaks and bugs ironed out.
But in 1994 Sensible World of Soccer or 'SWOS' as it's affectionately known was released, this wasn't just an update this was a complete overhaul. Not only could you compete as a team from near enough every division in every league across the world but it also featured a 20 season career mode which allowed players to manage and play as whatever team took their fancy.
Again in typical Sensible software style the management aspect was simple, user friendly options nowhere near as in depth as FIFA touches on these days and certainly not like what we've become accustomed to in Football Manager.

For many 'SWOS' was the best game on the Amiga and the only reason to own an Amiga.
Codemasters released the 96/97 version of SWOS on Xbox Live Arcade, it featured the retro styling of the game as well as more polished HD friendly presentation. As with 'Sensi Soccer' games it took a little while getting used to the feel of the game but it wasn't long before I remembered why I spent so much time playing the game when originally released in the 90's.
There have been a number of attempts of next generation versions of the franchise since the Amiga days but unfortunately none of them come close to the original. But with the presentation of FIFA and the playability of PES 'SWOS' is always going to look dated.

But really simple football and goals is all we want, Right?

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What got me started gaming

My very first experience with video games. Was it the SNES? No, was it the NES? No. It was in fact the 'Sinclair ZX Spectrum128k+2'

Aside from having a name that rolls off the tongue the Sinclair was the daddy of home computing and video games.

The Sinclair Spectrum +2 was the first Sinclair computer made by Amstrad after they bought the rights of the Sinclair computers products. Now I'm aware that there were other versions of Spectrum's available before the +2 release in 1987 yet as this is my article I'm talking about the Spectrum +2 (I'll touch on the others at another time)

I don't really know much about what the machine cost back then as it was my Dad who got the machine and brought it home, but from what I can gather courtesy of the Internet I believe it to be somewhere between £139-£149 crazily enough the same prize as a Nintendo Wii!

The redesign of the Spectrum +2 welcomed a proper typewriter keyboard and a built-in tape recorder and twin joystick ports.

Anyway that's enough about the technical side of things regarding the computer, lets move onto the Games.

There were tons of them, Popular game developers were Psion, U.S. Gold, Ocean and of course Codemasters.

The first game I ever played was an adaptation of the TV series 'Street Hawk' for those to young it was basically Knightrider but on a super bike. It was a simple top down view, riding a bike chasing bad guys cursor keys for control and space bar to jump.

Now as you can see from these graphics we're talking simple colours and actions on-screen. Sound effects were a minimum with the odd noise coming from gunfire from the vehicles you were overtaking, quite why every car was firing at you I never understood!

The next major game for me was 'Daley Thompsons - Decathlon' released by Ocean.
Now as the game savvy of you may be aware this game was one of several attempts to bring the arcade game 'Track and Field' to the Spectrum

The game consisted of the 10 events which make up the Decathlon (100 metre sprint, long jump, high jump etc) movement was controlled by either wiggling the joystick back and forth or pressing to alternate keys on the keyboard. Graphics were slightly better than Streethawk, with crowd cheers and scrolling 'Ocean' advertising boards in the back ground.

Now I'm not going to sit here and list every game I played on the computer as that would be endless given how easy it was to distribute copy games (as simple as using a two deck tape recorder and copying tape to tape) How simple is that, no need for cracks, or disc key's etc.

It wouldn't be right of me to talk about the Spectrum without mentioning the loading procedure. It really did feel like an age for a game to load, when in all seriousness it was about 5 minutes, during which we were treated to god awful squealing and scratching (what can only be compared to a similar sound modems used to make when they connected to the Internet) moving bars at the side of the screen as well as a cool attempt at a picture of the game.

Well I hope you've enjoyed this little trip down memory lane there will be more to come in the future, please feel free to comment about your favourite or memorable Spectrum games. If you would like to reminisce some more about the Spectrum then pay a visit to the guys over at the gamerdads forums