LMA Manager 2005 (Xbox)

In general it is a very good game

I started a career in football management in the 1990's with the very first Championship manager on a basic PC. That game and the next were great games until CM went a bit mad and in-depth. Since those days I'd bought an Xbox due to my frustration of PC's, and the ease of a 'put the disk in and play' console.

I bought the LMA Manager 2005 Xbox game about a month ago; at about the same time LMA 2006 came out, and this was the reason why I was able to pick it up for a fiver!

Br>The first option you will be offered after loading the game will be to player 1 player or two. I'd recommend you try the game with 2 players, as it is a lot more fun! After choosing the number of players you will be offered the chance to manage an actual team, from Manchester United in the Premier division to Bristol Rovers in the 2nd Division, or even a Non-league team! You can even choose the 'Fantasy Team' option, which allows you to pick and choose your entire team, depending on what division you choose to start in will reflect how much money you will have. For example myself and a mate decided to create our own teams starting in the basement division of the conference.

We created our own stadium, badge, team name and location. We were then asked to sign players, all of which will happily play for you team, but you may not be able to afford their wages! We were only given £3 million to buy the 18 players needed, which is harder than you may think. You are also given a wage budget, of which you need to adhere to at all times. Once players are bought and are ready to get into the thick of it, an investor may come in and want to invest in a new stand or stadium.

When playing the game, you may wish to watch the whole match. This is an excellent way of monitoring your players, but can be time consuming although you can speed the match up. I recommend you decide not to watch the match and view highlights afterwards, and listen to match analysis by Gary Lineker and Alan Hanson (superb)!

The transfer system isn't as good as CM, but nobody expected it to be. It lacks depth, and you are unable to view players previous seasons stats, and it is acceptable. You can use scouts to search for players, and you can keep tabs on players by adding them to a shortlist.

I would recommend this game to anyone as it's a 'pick up & play' football manager game without the complexities of CM.

I do warn you though, you will become as addicted as me. I have found myself leaving work early, lying to my girlfriend, who I'd dump and pack my job in if I could play this game more.