Sports Interactive has released their Football Manager 2018 early access beta.
New This Season
Dynamics – A harmonious squad produces better results on the pitch. By building partnerships amongst your players – both on and off the pitch – and maintaining a good dressing room atmosphere you’ll get the best performances out of your squad.
Matchday Live – A brand new graphics engine produces the best lighting, stadiums and player models in the series’ history, alongside a sleeker match interface and modernised presentation that bring your fixtures to life.
Real World Scouting System – A true-to-life representation of the techniques used by the world’s biggest clubs including more detailed data analysis that, combined with a wider range of scouting options, give you a better overview of any potential signing.
Sports Science – The new Medical Centre gives you a more complete overview of your squad’s injury situation, with your medical team providing advice on feedback on individual players’ injury risks and how to avoid injuries occurring during training.
Tactics – A redesigned tactics screen puts analysis at its heart, giving you a clear view of whether your tactic is working. The new pre-match briefing allows you to be better prepared for your upcoming fixtures, while new player roles give you more ways to exploit your players’ abilities.
Fantasy Draft – Redesigned with a new interface that is perfect for streaming and with several new setup options that help tailor the Fantasy Draft experience to you, including a bigger squad budget and a Quick Start option.
Football Intelligence – A realistic transfer market that reflects the inflated transfer fees and contract values, more clauses to help finalise that blockbuster deal and the more intelligent transfer and board AI that take into account more contextual information from the game world.
Since it is beta, you will encounter some bugs. Some of the issues they are aware of and working on, are seen below.
GAME MODES
- Fantasy Draft mode disabled
- Online Career mode disabled
- Steam Workshop disabled
GRAPHICS & UI
- Generated player & staff portraits disabled
- Launch may hang on a white screen
- Game may hang on black screen after splash screens
- Text on Retina Mac display not sharp
- Processing panel can occassionally appear blank
- Fixtures can occassionally overlap on processing panel
- Social feed can bleed if scrolling
MATCH
- Default attacking corner routines lacking variation
- Some red & checkered flags showing in crowd
- Camera height can reset on game reboot
GAMEPLAY
- AI sometimes offer £0 for a player offered to clubs with an asking price
- Too many loan rumours in the social feed
- Player can incorrectly receive Dynamics boost due to incorrectly registered international appearance
- Assistant may not arrange youth team friendlies when instructed to do so if there are no competitive matches
