Football Manager 25 given November release date

There was a point earlier this week, while managing my second-tier team in the Scottish leagues Falkirk, that I just had to laugh. After nearly 2 years of unbeaten league play and a side sitting top of the table despite the odds saying 25-1 on me ending the season in 7th, just beating relegation, a news article circulated that I was to be sacked. Not only that, I’d be sacked and replaced by Wayne Rooney. To put it lightly, I’ve fallen down the Sports Interactive and SEGA rabbit hole of Football Manager, and yes, that’s the one where you use your feet to kick the ball.

After initially being delayed due to some complications with switching engines and the removal of international management, we’ve finally got the first whistle of the FM25 season, as it were. Announced yesterday, Sports Interactive and SEGA revealed the new Football Manager 25 (away with your whole year, I guess) is coming in November, and not a whole lot else. Everything else we either knew following interviews and such or otherwise was known due to features carrying over. This is what the press release had to say:

“Fresh off a record-breaking year for FM24 with more than 14 million players across platforms, the latest release in Sports Interactive’s and SEGA’s iconic franchise puts players at the heart of a deep, authentic football universe where only they define their destiny. Powered by the switch to the Unity engine, FM25 marks the biggest technical and visual advancement for the series in a generation.

FM25’s UI has been completely revamped, using insights [into] how different types of people play our games to produce an experience that’s slicker and smarter in its navigation without compromising on detail. Enhanced graphical fidelity and new volumetric player animations taken from real football matches brings players closer to the action on Matchdays.“

Yes, if you go over to Steam right now, you’ll see a much-revamped UI that looks a bit more in line with the console ports. Not one-for-one, but certainly aimed more in that direction with a sleeker, neater, trimmed down, ultra-modern look to it rather than what many of us think about the former PC-centric title. With no hands-on experience, I won’t say it is good or bad, but it does have me concerned after getting used to the basic Football Manager 2024 UI over the last 100-ish hours.

However, one thing that somewhat abates my concerns is one of the additions this year that has been long-awaited. “Women’s Football makes its long-awaited series debut in FM25, seamlessly joining the men’s game in one world, one ecosystem. Players can break new ground with the women’s game or immerse themselves deeper in the beautiful game than ever before thanks to [Sports Interactive]’s new multi-year partnership with the Premier League.” Yes, another addition for FM25 is a fully licensed English Premiere League, so one less for modding this year.

Studio Director for Sports Interactive, Miles Jacobson, said: “It’s a great honor today to be confirming the forthcoming release of Football Manager 25. As I’ve mentioned in interviews and development updates, the FM25 cycle has been challenging for the entire [Sports Interactive] team.

FM25 is just the starting point for the studio’s next 20, [to] 30 years. It’s also the point where the world gets to see two of our multi-year projects come to fruition: the switch to the Unity engine and the introduction of Women’s Football. It gives us a real sense of achievement to begin sharing our hard work with you and we’re really looking forward to showing you more of the game in the weeks before the game’s release.“

Football Manager 25 is set to release on November 26th, 2024 on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam and Epic. At the time of writing, there is a pre-order discount of 10 percent, though there is so little to go on I’d personally hold off on that right now. Currently, you can get Football Manager 25 for $53.99, £40.49, or 53.99€, or regional equivalents.

After jumping in on the deep end of FM24, I’m excited to see more and maybe get hands-on later this year, but I have to say the announcement and reveal somewhat fall short. In prior years pre-ordering got you early access, as is common with recent releases of sports games. If you go onto the website for FM25, there is no mention of early access for one, and for two the roadmap which is seemingly unlocking weekly (give or take wiggle room), there will be more shown off.

In the roadmap, we’ll get an introduction to Women’s Football sometime next week, “unlocks week of 7th Oct.” I don’t want to say that’s going to be a deep dive given what is mentioned later, but I’ll certainly be looking out for that one. The rest of the roadmap is TBA (that wiggle room I mentioned) with the following section being a showcase of the new interface proper, not the work-in-progress screenshots on Steam (hopefully), soon after it is tactics, followed by match experience, then your manager. A couple of changes to those all around, it seems.

Then on the backend of the roadmap, you’ll get a look at FM25 Mobile, followed by a “Deeper Dive,” an FM25 console recap, and capped off with a touch recap. At this rate, if I were the pre-order type (I’m not), I’d be holding off my purchase until the deep dive a short while before launch. Even then I’d be holding off about the early access thing since SEGA and Sports Interactive trained the Football Manager audience to expect it.

As I say, I’m excited but trepidacious. We’ll find out more about Football Manager 25 in the coming weeks leading up to its release on the 26th of November.