The players walk out, greeted with the smell of cut grass, and the sound of jeers from the supporters. There’s no better occasion than this - the World Cup final. England’s chance for glory. Well, it won’t happen in real life will it, so why not pop Footy Manager into your disk tray? After all, it won’t be exiting it for a long, long time.

Football Manager always has been the number one management simulation available, taking the wind from Championship Manager’s sails when it was first released back in 2004. When the sequel was released in 2005 for the PC, an Xbox 360 showing was inevitable. We all knew it. What we didn’t yet know is that the console version would actually be superior to it’s PC brethren.

Firstly, Football Manager includes over 280,000 players and over 5000 teams in 50 countries. Phew. Now that’s football. Plus, you don’t just choose where they play on the pitch and then sit back, relax and watch them - you are required to use sophisticated tactics, and if they do not work well, change them around, over and over again, until perfection. It’s not a fun game, let’s get that clear, but when was the last time a simulation was fun? In fact, Football Manager can be a really frustrating game, often allowing you to see your team through to a major final, only to be jipped to the trophy in the dying seconds. Then, after much head butting the wall, you’ll sit down and carry on playing. That’s the problem. Football Manager is amazingly addictive, even to the point where your awful Sunderland (for David) side is still playing matches at 2.30 in the morning. All of us who own the game have been there.

If you’re looking for graphics, a management simulation is never the place to come, unless you love screens packed with text and numbers. In saying that, the 2D match engine actually works very well, suiting the game’s style perfectly. It’s all balanced out, because if there was a 3D match engine, it probably wouldn’t be anything special (see LMA Manager), and would probably affect the depth of the game (see LMA Manager again). But the game does have it’s bad points. The controls are difficult to get used to, probably because football management games are suited to a mouse and keyboard. Still, once you get to know these tricky button combos, it will probably have improved you DOA4 skills… what? I mean, navigating the menu’s will be second nature.

Another weak point is that the online modes are rather tricky to get into, with poor servers. The leagues really don’t work, as you are sometimes waiting ages until a member of the league finally decides to move onto the next menu. Cups can be a laugh though, at it’s prime with eight teams.

In the end, Football Manager is king of the simulations once again, and any true football fan will appreciate it’s quality… so if you consider yourself a true footy fan, mix some Red Bull, coffee and Lucozade together, and prepare for a long night.