The king of management games has hit the iPhone in the shape of a $ 9.99 app. Football Manager 2011 tries to provide a rich football experience to managers on the go, but is this attempt noteworthy?
Football manager 2011 supports 11 competitions and 34 divisions, which should satisfy most players. All the big leagues are included including the Barclay Premier league, Serie A and the Primera division. So it's finally possible to relive the intensity of a Barca – Madrid match anywhere you go.
Possibilities
Unlike its PC-counterpart, the iPhone version has been made accessible for players of all levels using a simple layout. The big buttons and dropdown-menu style makes it easy to find all the possible options without scratching heads or searching the ever-wider interwebs for guides. This is also also a con, because Football manager 2011 for the mobile market is in no way comparable to the real thing.
This becomes especially appropriate when managing off-pitch decisions for the club. Scouts for instance can not be bought and can only be send to curtain regions, a far cry from the PC version. And finance control is even further dumbed down, here there's no way to improve the club's treasure chest or even read into the numbers, instead the game offers a simple budget and leaves it at that. On the flip side the game does account for unusual events, in my game a rich owner took over, granting over 60m in transfer fees, a limit of depth.
To end this part on a positive node, thanks to the easy access modes (though bare basics), football manager operates at lightning speed on an iPhone 3GS or 4. This made it very encouraging and addictive to keep going, despite the lack of features found. I finished 4 seasons with my local club in under a week – a feat I never managed with the PC version before.
Tactics
Luckily the team's tactics go pretty deep despite the lack of firepower from the iDevices out now. Players can quickly shift between intentions, passing styles, pressure or not etc. Dig even deeper and a host of endless formations are available at the comfort of your fingertips, pretty good stuff for a mobile footie!
The matches are shown on the series' trademark map with dots system, as used for many years earlier in the decade. Each dot represents a player and the movement and passages are displayed realistically for the most part – though some silly moments have definitely popped up every now and again. More of a downer is the fact that the game will only display highlights, dumbing down any remaining hope for a defender more football football experience.
Conclusions
Football manager 2011 for the iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad is a great pilot for the series. It's simply great to be able to enjoy the FM experience on a mobile device. Gameplay moves swiftly and some features do offer a glimpse of the feature-rich big brother that has provided to PC-managers for some years now. Thanks to this Football Manager for the iPhone is a recommended buy for a light-manager experience when on the go.