Football Manager delayed until March 25, fans suggest skipping a year

Somebody at EA Sports is sticking pins in voodoo dolls or something. Sports Interactive's Football Manager 25 announced a delay until March 25 in a blog post. That follows a September announcement pushing the game back to November.

This is the first game in the popular tactical series to use the Unity Engine and clearly, it's not going as well as Sports Interactive had hoped. It had already announced the removal of some key features including international management and player weight.

Several fans have suggested that since things aren't going well, Sports Interactive should skip this year entirely and focus on coming back strong after a year. The way things are going, that does not sound like the worst idea in the world.

As I've mentioned before, one of the reasons EA Sports College Football 25 is so good is that EA was forced to stop making it every single year. There's an opportunity for Football Manager here, but I'll be surprised if they take it.

Football Manager 25 is a completely different style of game than FC 25, focusing more on tactics than on the field gameplay. But it's no coincidence that the FC series is leaning more into tactical gameplay with its latest installment.

Another possible contender to the FC series throne is UFL, a free-to-play soccer game that isn't having the best development cycle either. Competition is best for the fans, and even the game companies in the long term. But right now, everybody coming at the king is missing.