[Archived] Football Manager 2008

[Guest Kamy100]

According to Si Games (the developers) this is for all of Europe.

[Eddie]

Thanks Kamy, I'll go and check it out (not so easy today because of public transport strikes). Won't surprise me one bit if they haven't brought it forward here.

[Eddie]

Same old network problems, anyone have any solutions?

[Eddie]

Right, I'm trying to open the specific ports and things, if I turn my router's firewall will it then work and if I do so will it be bad?

Having trouble opening the specific ports.

[revolutionrock!]

Blahdvd,com say they dispatched it yesterday.

[Eddie]

I've forwarded the proper ports now and others can get in, but they are kicked quite regularly, any ideas?

[AndyH16]

Have you tried running it without the router to see if it's more stable? Then you might find where the fault is.

[bellamy11]

Bought it yesterday and have predictably started a game with Rovers. I'm really really struggling to stop teams creating a bucketload of chances against me. I'm actually twelvth but more through the fact that Friedel has been immense and McCarthy seems to score with 80% of his shots. Whenever we come up against a team who are clearly better than us we end up shipping 3 or 4. Any advice?

[Cocker]

Bought it yesterday and have predictably started a game with Rovers. I'm really really struggling to stop teams creating a bucketload of chances against me. I'm actually twelvth but more through the fact that Friedel has been immense and McCarthy seems to score with 80% of his shots. Whenever we come up against a team who are clearly better than us we end up shipping 3 or 4. Any advice?

Buy Kaka. No seriously, get a formation and stick with it. If you think you have gone pants for a couple of games still stick with your formation - that seems to work for me every year and the only time I swap things is if I have to many injuries and need to change or during a game and I need to attack more or defend.

If it helps I always go the predictable 4-4-2

[Eddie]

Fixed the problem it seems.

Few little bugs in the game, so I hope the first patch is out soon.

[revolutionrock!]

Fixed the problem it seems.

Few little bugs in the game, so I hope the first patch is out soon.

Ye, mine still not arrived, but i dont think ill start my Great Harwood game till the patch is released

[tcj_jones]

Bellamy, I decided to have some guts and attack Man United away. Went 3-0 down, then 3-1, then 4-1. THEN I nearly got a draw, pulling it back to 4-3. I did the same against Chelsea and they were 4-0 up after 30 minutes!

As I'm just experimenting at the moment, I decided to re-load the game and play defensively. I lost 2-0, both goals within the first 30 minutes.

In previous games, I have won the league by a clear 10 points, yet still lost to Man UTD, Arsenal and Chelsea by 2,3,4, or 5 goals! I hope this has been changed. Yeah, the Champions League teams usually win, but not by a crap load of goals every single time.

[Blueboy Downunder]

my footy manager 08 arrives on thursday and i am soooooo looking forward to it. ahead of time, can anybody give me any hints or tips??

[Kai]

I've been playing this game for the past few days. In my opinion, this is probably the poorest incarnation of FM yet.

The match engine is broken - the players don't close down anyone properly, which leads to loads of goals from distance. This also means that you cannot really rely on any kind of logic to come up with a successful formation - defending just goes out of the window. The only way to win with the match engine in this state is to go Kevin Keegan style all out attack.

There are numerous other bugs that annoy the hell out of me such as not being able to accept negotiated prices. For other bugs, check out the SI Games forums - there are loads!

Having said that, I've played one full season as Rovers and here are some tips (as a spoiler just in case):

We start off with about £3.2m - £4.7m depending on what you are chasing (Mid-table, top-half, europe or winners!)

Gamst is awesome as always - but retrain him to be able to play centre and have him like a supporting striker - he is almost God-like.

Roque, Roque, Roque is really good too! He may have average in-the-air stats, but his pace and all round play is great.

Bentley is quite good too, although his form is sporadic.

Reid isn't very injury prone and very solid.

Samba is great too even though he only starts off at £400k, at the beginning of the second season he is now worth £4.7m

Brad is still good for a season.

Nelsen is as solid as ever.

Benni is actually quite good too for 15 or so goals.

Love Bert Mk. 2 and he is listed as a right back this game round

I basically sold everyone else.

Got rid of:

Savage for £2.2m

Ooijer for £850k

Zurab £1.2m

Roberts £850k

Tony Kane £1.1m

Pete Enck £300k

Jason Brown £1.4m

Andy Taylor £300k

Keith Treacy £1.3m

Bought in:

Mika Aaritalo

Kristofer Haested (yes that joker who played for Wigan)

Eddie Johnson (yes that joker who plays for the US)

Peter Halmosi (cover for Warnock)

Loaned in Flamini

Bought a few other youngsters, but don't know anything about them yet as I've sent them off to Cercle Bruge to get a work permit.

You should really arrange some preseason friendlies when you very first start since we don't have any arranged dues to us being in the intertonto cup. - it's not a good enough preperation for the leaugue just playing in it.

I started the season off quite badly due to not having any proper preseason and also I figured out that playing cautiously and keeping things tight is a mugs game. Adopting an all out attack approach through the middle led to the might Rovers doing quite well after the players started to get fit. At one point, I thought that I could have finished in 2nd - but my last two games were away to Portsmouth and Arsenal which put paid to that. I finished the season in 6th place - with only 3 points difference between me and 3rd place! If only I'd figured out earlier! However, Man U ran away with the league on 82pts.

European games were strangely very easy and I actually won the UEFA cup! the only notable teams I beat en route were Everton in the Quarters (went through on away goals), Atletico Madrid in the Semis (beat them 3-1 at their ground after 2-2 at Ewood) and Zaragoza in the Finals (2-0 - Roque scored 92nd min from our own half after their keeper went up for a corner!)

It's very easy to make money - after my first full season from being -£3m (in the red) I was at about £32m! The next season's transfer budget was up at around £25m. But I still can't really afford anyone good - everyone seems to ask for ridiculous prices in this game - Stewart Downing went for £15m! Even players only worth £1m you'd end up having to pay about £2m for. Therefore I've gone for the scout the hell out of everyone and go for any promising youngsters since all the board want this season is a respectable league placing

Good luck with the game everyone!

[tcj_jones]

In something like 20 games total, I have to say that I have scored one long range effort and don't think that I have conceded any.

I've also managed to successfully defend leads on a few occasions by sitting back and being defensive.

I also don't agree about players never closing down the opposition. I always set my tactics to frequently close down the opposition, for the most part, they do.

I love this game. There were always going to be bugs, but it won't be long at all before a patch comes out.

[rog of the rovers]

Only 2 games in for me 2 wins though

Sold

Sav to Man City £2m

Roberts to Reading £2.5m

Treacy and Kane to Sheff Utd £2m

Got

van der Vaart for £10m

Team

-------------Friedel--------------------

Emerton--Samba--Nelsen--Warnock

-------------Mokoena------------------

Bentley--van der Vaart--Gamst Pedersen

-------McCarthy----Santa Cruz---------

Beat Spurs 3-1 and some Finnish team 4-1

Rigters is class on mine

[Bazzanotsogreat]

Tips

Re-Edit Rovers as too bring players real-life abilities into game

Edit needed as some players stats havent been updated since 2005

Player tips

Jeremy Menez- Monaco

Ignashevich Cska free

Sunny-Valancia

Pedro Leon Murica

Diego Capel Sevilla Loan

Denilson Arsenal Loan

Justin Hoyte

Pablo Piatti - Cheap but amazing

Ezequil Garay (Spl) Racing

Gioda (CB Argentina)

Danial Diaz

Daniel Sturridge (Man city)

Nedum Onuoha

Michael Johnson

kevin Doyle

Bikey (Reading)

Ceser Delago (Cruz Azul)

Falcao (River)

Daniel Dessana (Parma)

[Beta Ray Bill]

At 31st October 2007, bottom to the league (on goal difference) and just been knocked out of the League Cup. However, have won every match in Europe including away at Sampdoria in 1st group stage match.

Benni has had 4 goals disallowed for off side this season, and is offside at least twice a match. There's realism for you!

[Guest Kamy100]

FM2008 new patch is out, it is just the beta version which SI are asking for people to test:

http://community.sigames.com/eve/forums/a/...91/m/2622077453

[frosty]

Got

van der Vaart for £10m

Good signing there, didn't think he would come to Rovers! I'll have to remember him in the future.

[bellamy11]

FM2008 new patch is out, it is just the beta version which SI are asking for people to test:

http://community.sigames.com/eve/forums/a/...91/m/2622077453

Cheers Kam!

One of the general changes tickled me:

- Stopped players from occasionally disliking themselves.

[revolutionrock!]

The patch hs made this immense.

Put harwood in conf north(renamed kettering) and in 4 seasons ive got to league 2 and im now 5th in L2 with 5 games left. 3 promos in 3 years,Maybe?/!!

Also i got Junior Agogo , he scored 53 in 56 in the conf prem!

[Hughesy]

Whats the game like then? Better than 07, or just the same with updated squads?

[LeftWinger]

Whats the game like then? Better than 07, or just the same with updated squads?

There isn't a great deal of difference - but to me it is better. It just seems like they're improved little bits - and I don't think you can go wrong for about £20. I think the 2D match engine is better - but that's a matter of opinion I suppose.

I've not played so much - about 6 games in with Rovers in league (4 wins, 1 drw, 1 loss), out of league cup, but in UEFA Group stages having beaten Larissa along the way.

I play a 4-1-2-1-2 and my usual team is: Friedel, Warnock, Nelsen, Samba, Ooijer, Derek Boateng, MGP, Bentley, Aaritalo, Benni, Santa Cruz.

McCarthy is scoring for fun, Bentley is great, and we kept 6 clean sheets in a row before Nelsen got injured.

Mika Aaritalo is a must buy for Rovers. Pick him up for about 150k, which is good seeing as there is a very limited budget. Pablo Piatti is also a quality player that can be picked up cheaply. I bought Matt Hill from Preston as cheap cover for Warnock, and Derek Boateng (675k) is keeping Savage and Cristiano Zanetti (loan) out of the side. I've got Alex coming from Vasco in January (no WP) and he is dubbed the next Ronaldinho.

[bluebruce]

Anybody know if there is a readme version of the manual available anywhere?