For those unaware SI announced overnight that FM25 is now cancelled

Development Update: Football Manager 25 Cancelled

A Message from Sports Interactive, An Update on Football Manager 25

Sports Interactive regret to inform that, following extensive internal discussion and careful consideration with SEGA, we have made the difficult decision to cancel Football Manager 25 and shift our focus to the next release.

For the large numbers of you who pre-ordered FM25, we thank you enormously for your trust and support – we’re very sorry to have let you down.

We know this will come as a huge disappointment, especially given that the release date has already moved twice, and you have been eagerly anticipating the first gameplay reveal. We can only apologise for the time it has taken to communicate this decision. Due to stakeholder compliance, including legal and financial regulations, today was the earliest date that we could issue this statement. 

We have always prided ourselves on delivering the best value for money games that bring you countless hours of enjoyment, that feel worth every moment and every penny you spend. With the launch of FM25 we set out to create the biggest technical and visual advancement in the series for a generation, laying the building blocks for a new era. 

Due to a variety of challenges that we’ve been open about to date, and many more unforeseen, we currently haven’t achieved what we set out to do in enough areas of the game, despite the phenomenal efforts of our team. Each decision to delay the release was made with the aim of getting the game closer to the desired level but, as we approached critical milestones at the turn of the year, it became unmistakably clear that we would not achieve the standard required, even with the adjusted timeline. 

Whilst many areas of the game have hit our targets, the overarching player experience and interface is not where we need it to be. As extensive evaluation has demonstrated, including consumer playtesting, we have clear validation for the new direction of the game and are getting close – however, we’re too far away from the standards you deserve. 

We could have pressed on, released FM25 in its current state, and fixed things down the line - but that’s not the right thing to do. We were also unwilling to go beyond a March release as it would be too late in the football season to expect players to then buy another game later in the year.

Through the cancellation, every effort is now focused on ensuring that our next release achieves our goal and hits the quality level we all expect. We will update you on how we are progressing with that as soon as we are able to do so.  

Thank you for reading, your patience and your continued support. Our full focus now returns to creating a new era for Football Manager.

Sports Interactive

SI will take a big hit on this and its been a PR disaster

interesting that the announcement doesn't mention FM26 it says our next release -

great that footygamer has this going-

https://sortitoutsi.net/content/67149/fm25-delayed-until-march-2025-our-fm24-data-update-will-continue-being-updated?page=2#comment_810617 

There’s. Surprise.

so FM27 then?

keep up the good work @Footygamer 

There will never be another FM game released.

We will see

But seen a lot of comments on other forums saying that si are finished 

The handling of the pre orders knowing the game wouldn't be ready has not gone down well 

they lost 2.5m in 2024 accounts (to 31 March 24) with little cash to hand. interesting how they manage the refunds, hopefully they have ringfenced the cash?

its a real shame, as greed and arrogance has replaced innovation and respect for the fanbase

at least we have SUSIE

corporatism killed FM, when SI were a smaller studio in previous 1-2 decades, the game was so much better, now they have biggest monopoly and publicity, huge funding and resources, can't make a FM on unity for over 5 years

Unpleasant news. Will downloads of updates, logos, stadiums, faces and more for FM24 continue?

should do, nothing to do with SI

dreading loading up the game, expecting all the licensing to go 

I think your right and to be honest I think it's had it's time. 

Every year it's gets put further and further back and not much changes to make it worthwhile.

Lets see what happens.

It will be a massive disappointment if there are no more FM games. I am 61 and have played it since the very first release. 
 

it has its faults but if it goes for good there will be a huge gap to fill. That sounds a bit dramatic for a game , but I think for me it’s true. 
Why are people saying it may never be released again. Is it all just unfounded rumours? 
There is still a huge market for it and that surely makes it a viable product 

I think SI's biggest problem is that for years they kept adding features to the game. These features way back say in 2003-2015 were great and worked for the most part pretty well. Then after 15 they started adding what I would describe as ‘bloatwear’. Stuff that added no value to excitment to the game. The press conferences became pointless, the news articles repetitive and irritating, the annoying scouting system etc, the click click click of utter garbage just to get to something interesting. They added so much code that the game started to break. Player ineractions that clearly havnt been fixed for years, players wanting transfers because you congratulated them on player on the month or some other illogical nonesense, that, luckily for SI the player base just laugh off. In reality, its lazy broken code, that fans of other games would not put up with.

Now they are in a situation whereby in order to make a brand new version of the game they have to actually remove stuff to make it better. And thats a hard sell. Effectivly they are trying to make and sell FM 2010 or something with a different engine. Fans will feel ripped off.   

I think they are in a real pickle, a pickle that fans of the game have seen and warned about for years.  If you use skins on FM24 there really is no need for a new game to be honest, as all its going to be is a reskinned watered down version of what we already have, with god forbid, FIFA graphics!

agreed, my FM24 game bears no resemblence to the base SI game, its vastly improved

basically SI have a database, which they dont own

SI have no future, and the sooner an alternative is available the better

Have any of you seen this new Sega game apparently powered by Football Manager, it looks absolute garbage in my humble opinion.

If this is the future I will be happy staying in the past.

https://youtu.be/_6rfDVJydWc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_moUUugtWfU

YEP  men its shiiit i agree!!  old scholl always