circlewalker

New owners, same situation. Sega can't throw twice the budget at a game with only half the projected income.

retired_Balanchinegal

They should leave it a year.
At the minute they must be working on the final patch for FM08, whilst laying the ground work for FM09. They don't exactly have much time to make a whole new game.
Why the hurry to shpill the beanz? You should wait a while.... Let us rough you up a bit...

SI should look to Rockstar for a good example: They've been developing Grand Theft Auto 4 for the past 3 years and they're still not anywhere near finished, when that game is released it'll be a Play-tested-to-death Gaming Gem.
And the good press it's guaranteed to get would be enough to make SI green with envy....

Rosco

Rockstar do develop other games as well If I recall correctly, they dont only have one title for incomes?

retired_florentino

Absolutely not.

Obviously there are financial reasons for this (already mentioned) but lets not forget that the game is a brand. If there were no new features in a released game a year from you the chances are that a good chunk of the player-base will transfer their loyalties to another game in the genre.

Championship Manager is only going to get better and next year might be the year that they really get their act together. I think they stand to lose more in the loyalty stakes than not.

At the same time - I find this version of FM to be very underwhelming. There are improvements, and they are noticable. But these chances lack the glitz and "wow-factor" which makes the game feel like it's progressing.

To summarise my view: SI should not take a year off - but should concentrate on getting major new features into the game.

circlewalker

Rokstar have the luxury of choosing their development time. In a game such as this it has to be seasonal.

GTA is also full of bugs and glitches. Some that make it impossible to complete the games 100%.

retired_11xgirl

I think they shouldn't make much groundbreaking new introductions into the game untill they have a stable enough base to stand on. There are plenty of ideas and improvements around but to program it and make it work in less than a year, as a few months goes to patching the latest version doesn't seem very realistic. There has been a few nice introductions the past couple of years, but they don't seem to work 100% which make them rather cosmetic things instead of groundbreaking features. I think that they could put in a lot of effort developing the exsisting things for a year and start thinking on what to make of the version after.

I don't know about others but I would probably buy FM09 if it contained upgraded interaction with players, board, media and such. A finetuned matchengine, database, confidence and scoutingsystem. All great features in the game that doesn't seem to work properly. Get those developed, tuned and working in a realistic and proper way. That way they would have a stable and tuned product to build the version after on and perhaps some better time to add some of the great ideas.

retired_gkapitso

I reckon FM08 will be the last ever FM due to them using this engine for FM Live.

Once Live is introduced it gives them guaranteed money flowing in regulary, money which will probably accumulate to a far greater level than simply releasing a new FM every year.

But given that Live uses the FM08 engine, I doubt they would release an updated engine for FM09, leaving people who are still paying them (for using LIVE) with an old engine.

retired_rustcoat

If that gets extended, then there'll likely be even less time for new development.

The year is pretty static timeframe between releases. I expect that during patches, some of the same resources that'd develop new stuff would be allocated to work on the patch (although maybe not all, and maybe not as much). But I'd be suprised if there's more than 6 months of development for new features, with the remainder going to testing, & gold time. That's not that long to make major changes, which I think is why we're getting the dribs we are now.

retired_clement

Not gonna happen. Not because SI can't "afford to" - FM tops the bestseller lists every year and probably costs less to produce than a regular game. I'm guessing that their contract with Sega obliges them to release a new iteration each year, and anyway, since FM sells so well despite few major improvements, who would want to kill a hen that lays golden eggs?

retired_2symonds

If FM gets a year off then I want one too