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The Football
Manager series may be the newest Football Management Sim on
the market (excluding the recently released Pro Evolution Soccer
Management), but it’s certainly got its heritage. Being
developed by the ex-developers of the Championship
 Manager
series, a parting-of-ways allowed SEGA to pick-up-the-ball, as it
were, and run with it. For the first time, a Football Management Sim
has received a console port under the watchful eyes of the original
PC development team.
Many legends have fallen under the weight of Football
Management Sims, and not least the stat-heavy, Menu-System nature of
such titles. Football Manager 2006 deviates little from this
path; inherently following the construct of its PC sibling. A click
of the L Button brings the Home Menu into view, allowing selection
from a series of Situation-Menus; going more in detail on your team,
the League and other such frequently viewed options. From these
Menus further details can be secured from simple player statistics
through to their training sessions, contract details, recent
play-form and even their favourite personnel at your club.
The sheer level of detail available from a few button presses
is very impressive, but positively daunting to the inexperienced
player. Having added options to allow much of the in-depth
management to be handled by the AI and often interference from
present-absentees in order to prevent your crippling yourself, 
Sports Interactive have taken into account the console nature of the
title, however, it seems almost crippling for a title striving for
mass market approval on the Xbox360 to manage it’s HUB system
through only a text-based Menu. While this play-take will be inline
with those moving away from the PC gaming and looking for a little
recognisable comfort on their console, for those borne of the
PlayStation-era a HUB system incorporating image-profiles for each
action - i.e. nine selectable images representing player options,
match options, transfer options, stadium/staff options, League/Cup
profiles, Fixtures, team tactics, manager options and the latest
news – would have bridged the gap no-end, and would’ve limited
the quantity of the title arriving in the Pre-Owned bin, not because
the player didn’t enjoy it, but because the player didn’t have
the patience to fulfil the basic knowledge requirement demanded to
even simply begin playing the title.
The structure of the title is commendable. Once the player
has become accustomed, flicking between Menus on the constantly
re-negotiated  positioning of the Face Buttons is very intuitive.
Some time has clearly been spent aligning the title for a fanbase
moving from PC to console and has achieved many of its goals. Little
has been lost in the translation and to the avid fan promoting Brighton
to the Premiership remains as addictive as the First-Person Shooter
finds achieving his 10 Headshots, 100 Headshots and 1000 Headshots
Achievements in Perfect Dark Zero.
Obviously, the title’s graphics are far from pushing the
Xbox360. As far as Football Manager 2006’s next-generation
presence is concerned, it has benefited the ability to push through
the frankly ridiculous amount of calculations needed when running
four Leagues in four Nations simultaneously. The match engine
remains the top-down discuss-based interpretation of a Football
Match that fans of the genre will have become accustomed to. The
title’s sound effects also, are clearly not its selling-point, as,
for the most-part, they simply don’t even exist.
Football Manager 2006 may not have attempted anything
new, but it’s accomplished an achievement which very few
competitor’s have seen fit to; a comparable port to the console
audience. There is very little to distinguish the title from it’s
PC counterpart – both it’s failings and it’s blessing – and
it’s reliance on knowledge of the genre is a little  short-sighted.
However, for fans of Football, it’s very easy to forgive these
failings once having dedicated the time to learn the title’s
functionality, and for fans of gaming the title adds an interesting
level of depth to your Action/Adventure heavy collection.
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