FMS FM Thread - Traditional Play

[CFuller]

Here's the thing. Sometimes defending in real life is hair-raising. It can be in this game too. I think sometimes people expect players with high ratings to play perfectly. And they don't. That's real life. Welcome to it.

Yes, but that's why we all love Football Manager. It's so realistic.

I certainly see what you're saying about some FM players thinking the best footballers should always be perfect. I read a lot of posts on GD from users who had that one-dimensional outlook and were wondering why they weren't winning every game. If they want perfect defending and 11-0 scorelines, they should play FIFA on beginner mode.

Mini-rant over.

I'm looking forward to the challenge that Arsenal will pose to me in FM15. We've got loads of top attacking players, so strengthening my defence will be the priority in the first season.

[tenthreeleader]

Yes, but that's why we all love Football Manager. It's so realistic.

I certainly see what you're saying about some FM players thinking the best footballers should always be perfect. I read a lot of posts on GD from users who had that one-dimensional outlook and were wondering why they weren't winning every game. If they want perfect defending and 11-0 scorelines, they should play FIFA on beginner mode.

Mini-rant over.

I'm looking forward to the challenge that Arsenal will pose to me in FM15. We've got loads of top attacking players, so strengthening my defence will be the priority in the first season.

I hope you'll write about it. I'm really enjoying my Bolton save so far which is a bit surprising.

I think the balance SI has between playability and realism is a fine one. Managers can and do get fired but if they do it too often on the computer game then it doesn't get bought or played. People have to approach it with a thick skin to really get the full experience.

[CFuller]

I hope you'll write about it. I'm really enjoying my Bolton save so far which is a bit surprising.

I might just do that, you know. I've still got (at least) five seasons of my Romford story to post up, plus a spin-off (I'm not saying any more at the moment), but I might find time to do an Arsenal story if the save goes well - or indeed if it goes badly!

[WLKRAS]

My wife bought me FM15 for Christmas, but I still haven't played it. Too stuck into my FM14 game with Hartlepool. Have them in the Premier League in the 2017/2018 season and we're going pretty well to stay clear of relegation, 15th at the start of February, six points clear of 18th placed Swansea.

[WLKRAS]

1 point clear of the drop now with Pools with 9 to play, it's going to be close.

Meanwhile I have finally started an FM15 game, with Elgin, but still winless after 8 or so games. Seems a lot harder than FM14 lol

[tenthreeleader]

I am starting to dig FM15 pretty intensely. I've spent the last couple of weekends downloading Steklo for a new skin, better logos and kits and a mega face pack and it's a very nice game ATM. And I have a tactic that appears to be working reasonably well.

[CFuller]

I played my first FM15 save with Arsenal this week, and I think I'm going to knock it on the head already. It's been such a disaster that I won't even turn it into a story, but I'll give you a round-up of what happened:

Surprisingly enough, defending wasn't too much of a problem. Trying to fit most of our top attackers into a team, and getting my centre-forwards to score regularly, was. I struggled to find a system where a lone CF such as Welbeck or Giroud could flourish.

Apart from a shock loss to Cardiff, pre-season wasn't too bad in terms of results. When it came to the competitive matches, though, things went pear-shaped pretty quickly.

Manchester City ripped us to pieces in the Community Shield, as we lost 3-0 and had Koscielny sent off. A week later, we started the Premier League season with... a last-gasp 2-1 defeat away to Crystal Freaking Palace. We also failed to win our next two league games at home, as Man City and Hull both drew 1-1, leaving us about 14th at the end of August.

The Champions League almost turned me into a psychopath. We were 2-0, 3-1 and 4-2 up away to Lille in the first leg of the play-off, but somehow contrived to draw 4-4. We barely won the return leg at the Emirates, as Ramsey's solitary goal put us into a group that contained Zenit, Anderlecht and Besiktas.

Then, to top it off, I had my first FM15 crash-dump... before I got round to saving the Hull result. Maybe it was my laptop telling me to stop this dismal saga before I got myself sacked!

Clearly my forays with Arsenal and Millwall (from the demo) suggest that I haven't got the hang of FM15 yet. I think I'll stop playing for a while, and instead concentrate on the editor (with which I'm creating something that I hope to release by the end of this month) and my 'Welcome To Romford' story (Season 6 begins tomorrow!).

I am starting to dig FM15 pretty intensely. I've spent the last couple of weekends downloading Steklo for a new skin, better logos and kits and a mega face pack and it's a very nice game ATM. And I have a tactic that appears to be working reasonably well.

Adding logos and faces to FM certainly make the experience much more immersive to me as well. I prefer the bog-standard logos to the more popular shiny or metallic ones. What about you, 10-3?

[tenthreeleader]

I'm a metallic fan. I can't help myself. I'm an American, we love shiny things

[WLKRAS]

Secured another season of Premier League football with Hartlepool, with a game to spare. Going to have to dismantle the side a bit though, still have the likes of Duckworth, Franks and Agdestein who came up all the way from League 2 and they're just not going to cut it for another season.

Kinda devastated though, those players did so well for me

[tenthreeleader]

Funny how that works. You do get attached to some players. I had that happen to me with Peter Clarke when I managed Blackpool in FM06. Sometimes I see players who I had in previous versions of the game and can't help but smile.

[Hairycull]

Any time I play in the lower leagues I always get attached to my first youth player that I bring into the side. I try and keep them for as long as possible but I either lose them to bigger clubs or I get fed up with my coaches hassling me to drop the player from the side already.

On another topic, I had to force myself to look at Henrik Larssons leg break in 1999 due to my Elgin Story. I feel sick

[CFuller]

I've just got back into playing my FM15 Arsenal save, mainly as a bit of practice before I start a story save post-patch. After a few weeks away, I seem to have found a system that works, as I'm currently on a good winning streak.

I did, though, have a real scare in my opening Champions League group game with Anderlecht. They went 1-0 and 2-1 up, and then scored an equaliser at 3-3, before we eventually ran out 5-3 winners. That wasn't even the whole story, because my substitute defender Chambers had to go off injured, so I played the final half-hour with Danny Welbeck as a makeshift centre-half!

[Makonnen]

This sure sounds like Rob

[tenthreeleader]

This sure sounds like Rob

That Ridgway, cuts right to the chase!

[Makonnen]

The only thing missing is the full quote of then he can bloody well leave.

[chesterfan2]

I have a bit of a fresh story idea, inspired by a song as most of my story ideas are, and I'm looking for a team to implement the story with. Has to be a team who has bigger support than their league position would suggest. Ideas I have had include Middlesbrough, Sunderland and Millwall, but what do you guys reckon would be good ideas ? Any overseas teams fit this bill ? Not that I'm promising to use any of them, obviously.

By the way, it's not this song, though it is good.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnEDSBriVXk

[BenArsenal]

I have a bit of a fresh story idea, inspired by a song as most of my story ideas are, and I'm looking for a team to implement the story with. Has to be a team who has bigger support than their league position would suggest. Ideas I have had include Middlesbrough, Sunderland and Millwall, but what do you guys reckon would be good ideas ? Any overseas teams fit this bill ? Not that I'm promising to use any of them, obviously.

By the way, it's not this song, though it is good.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnEDSBriVXk

Leeds?

Overseas now seeing that Serie A is in such a bad shape, either of the Milan duo might fit.

[chesterfan2]

Thanks Ben, Leeds is a fabulous shout, as long as they don't come with a dodgy chairman as in real life !

[tenthreeleader]

I have a bit of a fresh story idea, inspired by a song as most of my story ideas are, and I'm looking for a team to implement the story with. Has to be a team who has bigger support than their league position would suggest. Ideas I have had include Middlesbrough, Sunderland and Millwall, but what do you guys reckon would be good ideas ? Any overseas teams fit this bill ? Not that I'm promising to use any of them, obviously.

By the way, it's not this song, though it is good.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnEDSBriVXk

In England, I'd say Sheffield United. On the Continent, Dortmund.

I love writing stories based on songs.

[EvilDave]

Spartak Moscow? Self-proclaimed people's club, best-supported in Moscow, probably in all Russia, but no title since '01 (the last of 9 in 10) and these days are a Europa qualifier at best.

[chesterfan2]

That's a good idea there Dave, but a good one from you too, 10-3. So much choice.......

[Ferni]

CM 03/04 CL final, my team Gala, losing 4-0 H-T vs Real Madrid.. During H-T, I swapped GK & ST's positions, after clicking continue suddenly score came to 4-8. Win! For a minute there I let myself drop to floor with 90 degrees angle from the chair..

[BenArsenal]

Not a story. Sorry.

[mark wilson27]

Ferni this would be ok in the Community thread we have running not as a main thread. Have a look around this forum to see what counts as a story.

You could do a long a match report for this and make it into a short story, plenty of people have done this before

[tenthreeleader]

Transferring to the FM thread.

[CybrSlydr]

I'm an MLS guy, specifically the Columbus Crew. They're who I always play as in FM first. Typically, I'll go a few seasons into the future, maybe 5-6 years before an update or roster update comes out and I start over to take advantage of it. Sometimes I'll get hired on at Manchester United, I've gone to AC Milan, etc. But moving on to those bigger, better clubs never captured me the way that it does playing with MLS rules.

In MLS, you don't have a whole lot of money, so for me, where you make it or break it in MLS is in finding those players and getting them on your team. Granted, it's far easier on here than in real life - but it's still a challenge and one that I relish. It can suck seeing your discovery grow and become a monster in MLS and see them dream for bigger and better and shuffle off to Russia or Germany or Netherlands to further their career because now you've got to find another replacement.

In my current save, I was with the Crew for 5 years. I won the MLS Cup 5 years in a row. I won the Supporters Shield 4 times, US Open Cup 3 times, Club World Championship twice, runner up once and the North American Champions League 3 times. I had a great career and I felt it was time to move on - I'm a Club Legend with Columbus.

So after our 5th MLS Cup and 2nd Club World Championship win, it's the off-season and I'm wondering what I'm going to do next. I'm in a contract year. I get a job offer from a team I can't quite recall... I attend the interview and the Columbus board aren't happy about it. So they offer me the option to resign with my reputation intact or apologize and withdraw my application for the other job. Since it's a contract year and I'm looking for something new to do, I resign at Columbus. Shortly after this, I find out that I didn't get the job at this club because I asked for a bigger transfer and payroll budget. Oops! Now I'm out of a job.

I go a couple months, looking at the job openings available. That's when I see Celta fired their head coach and need a new one. Intrigued, I look into them and like what I see. They remind me a lot of Columbus.

They're a smaller team in the Liga BBVA. They don't have the budgets of Real Madrid or Barcelona, they don't have a massive stadium. They have a proud history, not stellar in accomplishments, but they have awards to their name.

This sounds perfect for me - a team with a small transfer budget, but a LOT more payroll than I'm used to (going from $59k/wk to over $800k/wk is incredible). So I'm going to have to use what I learned getting players on the cheap here to have success but actually have the payroll to keep them.

So I apply for the job and, requesting a slightly larger payroll and transfer budget, land the position!

When I arrive, the team are in Liga BBVA fighting against relegation. I join on 22 March 2019 and we're in 19th place. Not a whole lot of time left in the season to turn things around and avoid relegation.

I institute my system from Columbus - a 3CB, 1 DM, 3MF (L/M/R), 1AMC and 2ST system. I sell off some players and bring in a few free agents and things worked out well - we finished 16th thanks to a sterling run of only one loss in the last month. One of my biggest expenditures was bringing in a Spanish M/AM(L) I adored from my Crew team for over $10m. He turns out to be a great addition to the team, especially his abilities from the free kicks.

Next season comes around and I think it's time to really assert myself. So I make some pretty big changes to the roster, selling off some older players that make too much and bringing in some young talent. The board is just happy to avoid relegation and obtain a respectable finish. I'm aiming much, much higher.

When I look at my roster, I see we've got a lot of good, domestic talent - so I set out to sign even more. By the time I'm done, I only have 2 non-Spanish players on my roster. I'm amazed how cheaply you can get good players on transfers - they cost more in weekly pay but great players for $2-4mil.

We make a decent run in the Spanish Cup that year, making it to the Semi Finals before we're obliterated by Real Madrid. But the special thing is our League performance.

When the dust settles at the end of the year, I'd managed to take a team fighting relegation the year before to 6th Place in the league and securing a Euro Cup qualification (I would have finished 5th as we were dead equal with Valencia on all stats but the tiebreaker was they beat me in the season). We were 9-11-18 with a -14 GD in our 16th place finish and improved to 18-9-11 with a +15 GD. 38 points to 63.

It's still easy to see the vast gulf in talent between the likes of my Celta team and those of Barcelona, Real Madrid and some others, but I was extremely proud of my guys.

So in my current season, it's just prior to the Winter transfer window in 2020. We're playing a new formation (4-1-2-3 DM) and it feels like things just "clicked" with the players. In the last 4 games, we've romped over opponents with a minimum of 4 goals scored. We've also qualified for the knock-out stage of the Euro Cup after winning our Group (Olympique Lyonnais, Stuttgart and Celtic were in my Group). We're playing Sevilla next and if we beat them, we play the winner of Real Sociadad v Wolfsburg. So, right now we're sitting in 3rd place in the League after 17 games played. We have a 10-3-4 record with a +11 GD and 33 points. This puts us only 5 points out of first place with both Real Madrid and Barcelona ahead of us.

The future for Celta Vigo looks bright indeed!

----------

If you folks are looking for some great players for middle-level league teams, I have a few to suggest.

Juan Muniz - M/AM(L) Spanish: He's 28 years old in my game right now and is a 4-star player. He's not as dominant in play as he was in MLS, but his match performance averages to 7.33. In 23 starts, 2 subs he has 11 goals and 6 assists.

Juan Munoz - ST Spanish: He was outstanding last year, scoring 9 goals and 8 assists in 19 appearances with an average rating of 7.31. I've used him as a CF and P. He's not quite as good this year as I'm running a single striker formation instead of two, so his production has dropped off (only a 6.81 rating so far this year) but he's decent and worth a good bit of money.

Anders Konradsen - M© Norweigan: A 6'0" natural BBM. His stats don't indicate it, but he's got a pretty good shot from the top of the box. Decent speed, great workrate and extremely fit (18), he's 30 years old now and I forsee keeping him for a few more years. Currently averaging a 7.59 match rating. 5 goals, 7 assists in 23 starts, 2 subs.

Sergi Roberto - M© Spanish: 5'10" right-footed central playmaker. He's my central playmaker - I like to pair him with Konradsen in the CM. His teamwork rating is outstanding (18) as are his first touch, passing, vision and work rate. As he's only 28 so far, I'm hoping to keep him for a few more seasons as well - one of the things I like to do is dominate the midfield and he helps do this. He's only made 13 apperances thus far this season as he's been out with a torn hamstring, but his performance last year and this year show him to be of outstanding caliber.

Ricardo Esagio - D/WB/M/AM ® Portuguese: Natrurally a AM/M® but accomplished at WB/D®, this man has been a total revelation in my game. I picked him up for under $2m to play him as my D® as I was desperately in need of one. However, I found another D® before the season started and he's played as my AM® and has been a monster. 24 apperances, 12 goals and 7 assists with an average match rating of 7.72. He's fast, he's technical and a joy to watch - he just did a coast-to-coast counter all by himself and finished with a beautiful shot to the top left corner. So often you see people tackled at mid-field or miss the shot, but he buried it.

[mark wilson27]

Welcome to FMS CybrSlydr. This would make an excellent story if you fleshed out the season a lot with a few match updates etc. This is more suited to the Community Thread

Have a look around the forum and the Archives to see the stories we have hear

Would love to see this made into a story we don't have many MLS stories here

[CybrSlydr]

If you wouldn't mind, could you move this thread over there then?

Thanks for the info/input!

[mark wilson27]

As requested transferred to the appropriate thread

[gavrenwick]

Made my way back into a career game to go alongside writing Tina again, so figured I'd start somewhere obscure and where I've never been. Bulgaria... and it is extremely hard in the first few months playing a new country. Especially trying to find out the standard of quality so you can sign and try to sign the right players.

Season     Team                   Country     League        Position       Achievements
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015/16    Pirin 2002 Razlog      Bulgaria    "B" Group     11th           Stayed up by 3 points, won on final day

Anyone else playing a non-story game at the moment?

[tenthreeleader]

I wish I had the time. One of my favorite saves was back in FM10 playing in Brazil. That is one country I would like to revisit in game terms in my dotage.

[Panpardus]

Made my way back into a career game to go alongside writing Tina again, so figured I'd start somewhere obscure and where I've never been. Bulgaria... and it is extremely hard in the first few months playing a new country. Especially trying to find out the standard of quality so you can sign and try to sign the right players.

Season     Team                   Country     League        Position       Achievements
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015/16    Pirin 2002 Razlog      Bulgaria    "B" Group     11th           Stayed up by 3 points, won on final day

Anyone else playing a non-story game at the moment?

Yeah, I'm playing a game with QPR which was interesting got to the 10 year mark where I was semi pushed to leave, thinking of doing a short story, but I want to write the whole thing before I post.

Currently at Sampdoria

I doubt I will do anything with it though, but enjoying the save, it's probably one of the only times where I have continued after doing mediocre with a team for so long.

[gavrenwick]

Yeah, I'm playing a game with QPR which was interesting got to the 10 year mark where I was semi pushed to leave, thinking of doing a short story, but I want to write the whole thing before I post.

Currently at Sampdoria

I doubt I will do anything with it though, but enjoying the save, it's probably one of the only times where I have continued after doing mediocre with a team for so long.

Saves that last are great, how is it with Sampdoria?

I wish I had the time. One of my favorite saves was back in FM10 playing in Brazil. That is one country I would like to revisit in game terms in my dotage.

I have never been in Brazil. Is the league structure complicated down there?

[BenArsenal]

Was wondering where you've been Sir Gav.

I started a game with Arsenal (who else) on FM16 but only got to August in game so far.

To say I'm a slow player is an understatement...

[tenthreeleader]

I have never been in Brazil. Is the league structure complicated down there?

It is. The local and regional cups make for a very interesting flavor. Also the pressure to win is immense. They all want attacking football and flair players are everywhere. It's quite different from Italy, for example.

[gavrenwick]

I can only imagine the high quality of attacking players down there. Definitely need to try one time, as I'm enjoying playing through divisions I've never had the experience of.

Season     Team                   Country     League        Position       Achievements
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015/16    Pirin 2002 Razlog      Bulgaria    "B" Group     11th           Stayed up by 3 points, won on final day
2016/17    Pirin 2002 Razlog      Bulgaria    "B" Group     1st            League winners

Having won a surprise promotion to the top division, it's going to be a real challenge to stay there.

[Panpardus]

Saves that last are great, how is it with Sampdoria?

I have never been in Brazil. Is the league structure complicated down there?

Sampdoria is interesting, they finished 17th in 2025, struggled a lot, have a lot of ageing players and the good young ones wanted to leave.

Sold 1, kept the rest.

Same tactic as QPR (4231)but I'm currently sitting 4th and dropping in and out to 6th half way through the season.

Just had a nasty run of injuries where I could only manage 4 subs out of the 23 players I had to chose from, which seen us drop some points, but overall enjoying the save.

It could be first season over reaching so see what the second season is like.

With QPR though won the Championship to get promoted and then had a real steady save moving up the tables. Go to the EURO Cup two years back by finishing 7th, managed to get 3 exceptional players thought I had it easy, but just couldn't string the results together, got to the knockouts in the Cup which the board loved, but got called into the office for the 12th placed finish.

Was pretty annoyed I had to attend after everything that I had done, we had great finances, stadium expansion, youth and training facilities etc etc and it was my first real disappointment and I seen that little box that said well maybe I should quit then.

And then it was over, was expecting them to say well maybe not that drastic but you need to get EURO's again next season, but nope, goneski !!

[gavrenwick]

So, been playing another long term game and it got quite addictive, especially when the success came. So after 900 matches, thought it time to share.

Season     Team                 Country    League                            Position       Achievements
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2015/16    York City            England    League Two                        6th            
2016/17    York City            England    League Two                        14th          
2017/18    York City            England    League Two                        17th           Sacked in January, club finished 16th
2017/18    Port Vale            England    League Two                        23rd           Relegated, but had no time to save them
2018/19    Port Vale            England    Vanarama National League          1st            League winners
2019/20    Port Vale            England    League Two                        1st            League winners
2020/21    Port Vale            England    League One                        2nd            Automatic promotion
2021/22    Port Vale            England    Championship                      12th           
2022/23    Port Vale            England    Championship                      9th            Left in October to move to Watford
2022/23    Watford              England    Premiership                       16th           Port Vale ended up getting promoted to Premiership
2023/24    Watford              England    Premiership                       16th           Sacked in February
2023/24    Port Vale            England    Premiership                       18th           Relegated on final day in place of Watford
2024/25    Port Vale            England    Sky Bet Championship              2nd            Promoted back to Premiership
2025/26    Port Vale            England    Premiership                       11th           Solid finish, no major happenings
2025/27    Switzerland          -          -                                 -              Achieved nothing with these, poor national pool
2026/27    Port Vale            England    Premiership                       10th           Capital One Cup winners
2027/28    Port Vale            England    Premiership                       7th            Capital One Cup winners, Euro Cup winners
2028/29    Port Vale            England    Premiership                       1st            Premiership winners, Euro Super Cup winners, FA Cup winners
2028/30    Belgium              -          -                                 -              Another international failure
2029/30    Port Vale            England    Premiership                       1st            Premiership winners, Community Shield winners
2030/31    Port Vale            England    Premiership                       6th            FA Cup winners, Community Shield winners
2031/32    Port Vale            England    Premiership                       5th            Capital One Cup winners, Euro Cup winners, Community Shield winners
2031/-     United States        -          -                                 -              Third time lucky, aiming for World Cup
2032/33    Port Vale            England    Premiership                       -              New season

[BenArsenal]

So, I've recently started playing FM (16) again, just to get myself back to grips with the game after so long.

Boy have I made a mess of things. Of course I wouldn't take the easy way out and just plump for Arsenal, so I took Crystal Palace instead. And led them straight to relegation. 

I'm having a second go with Watford now. And for some reason I've inexplicably filled up the youth team with a bunch of Norwegians. 

Damn Norwegian boys. 

[CFuller]

About a month ago, I started playing a new international management save on FM16. I was inspired mainly by my own World Championship story, and also by a challenge on the CSE sub-forum - the 'International World Cup Challenge', where the aim is to take a team into their first ever World Cup.

I chose to manage the Uzbekistan national team. You can follow my progress here, although the thread seems to have died a death.

Here's a quick round-up of how things have gone so far. We breezed through our first 2018 World Cup qualifying group, winning six out of eight matches. That put us through to the final round - and into a group that contained China, Iraq, Japan, Kuwait and South Korea. (Gulp.)

I then left the save for a few weeks, but returned to it tonight to start the final round of World Cup qualifying. We made a terrible start, going behind away to China after about 30 seconds, but we managed to salvage a 1-1 draw.

We then hosted South Korea... and went 1-0 up within six minutes.  Then Lee Chung-Yong ruined everything, scoring twice and winning a penalty as we went down 3-2. That was my first ever defeat as Uzbekistan manager. 

And so, after the first two rounds, we're in 4th place. Only the top two qualify for Russia 2018 automatically, while 3rd place goes into a play-off. With Japan and the Koreans already 2-0-0, it looks like we'll have to settle for a play-off at best. It's going to be rather difficult to qualify, but I've got to keep the faith. 

[tenthreeleader]

Still never tried international management. Maybe someday.

[CFuller]

15 hours ago, tenthreeleader said:

Still never tried international management. Maybe someday.

I would certainly be very interested to see how you would write an international management story if you ever found the time to do so.

I see this Uzbekistan challenge as preparation for an international career that I have in mind for FM17. I would love to give England a real go for the first time since the CM3 era (I'll never forget winning the World Cup and Euro double on CM99/00), and end Mark's England story monopoly on FMS.  (I jest, Mark. Your England stories are always great to read.)

Right now, I'm torn between that and a League of Ireland career as far as my big story idea for FM17 is concerned.

[tenthreeleader]

Honestly, I've always wanted to try one but the way I write, it's easier if one of my characters was offered an international position. Ridgway would be the most likely of all of mine, but FM08 will not play on Windows 10 so that poses a problem. But thanks for your kind words

[BenArsenal]

On 8/5/2016 at 07:32, tenthreeleader said:

Still never tried international management. Maybe someday.

You should. It's quite a different challenge and dynamic.

[CFuller]

20 hours ago, tenthreeleader said:

FM08 will not play on Windows 10 so that poses a problem

Have you tried setting up Compatibility Mode for FM08? It may take some trial and error, and it doesn't have a 100% success rate, but I have managed to get some old games to run on Windows 10 using this method.

[tenthreeleader]

I did try the compatibility mode. It didn't work. Brought the issue up in the mods area and was told to basically give it up. Which is annoying, but surely understandable.

[edtheguy]

 

3 hours ago, tenthreeleader said:

I did try the compatibility mode. It didn't work. Brought the issue up in the mods area and was told to basically give it up. Which is annoying, but surely understandable.

That is annoying, we all miss the Ridgways - and I bet you do too.  I've never had much success with compatibility mode myself but my son was able to use it for the KOTOR games with some help from their online forums.  It was Win 8 and it definitely wasn't as simple as just using compatibility mode, there were some other things he had to do, then it worked like a charm.  I'll try to find out what he had to tweak for that, and if it still works for him on Win 10.  It won't be until at least this weekend but if I learn anything useful I'll let you know.  It's a longshot but you never know.

[tenthreeleader]

Would love to know what you find out. I have my old laptop which I can still use to play FM08 but don't know how long that will last. If there is any way to play that save again on Windows 10, let me know.

And yeah ... I do miss the Ridgways even if the old-timers on the forum might not   I had the next season's story arcs outlined too. And still do.

[edtheguy]

On 8/8/2016 at 21:38, tenthreeleader said:

Would love to know what you find out. I have my old laptop which I can still use to play FM08 but don't know how long that will last. If there is any way to play that save again on Windows 10, let me know.

And yeah ... I do miss the Ridgways even if the old-timers on the forum might not   I had the next season's story arcs outlined too. And still do.

 

I cornered my son earlier than expected. Sadly I don’t expect this to be much help, but here is the info I got from the next generation when I asked him about Win 10-

To make KOTOR work was complicated but there was a lot of online help, unlike for FM08, and since I think much of it is very game specific that is probably not good especially since KOTOR is a good four years older than FM 08.

Anyway, here’s an approximate list of what he had to do-

• Change it to run in Win XP/SP2 compatibility and to run as administrator by right clicking both the .exe file and the desktop icon (he thinks he had to change one in each place but doesn’t really remember, it might have been both for each.) Somehow just selecting them in the game icons options setting wouldn’t work.
• Set it to run in windowed mode by adding “ -small_screen -windowed” (without the quotation marks and starting with a space) after the target in the properties section of the desktop icon. This was because of the generation gap in display settings causing graphics related crashing (right at startup) when run in fullscreen.
• Lock the game to running on one core (by selecting it once it loaded in task manager he thinks) - somehow the multiple cores caused game crashing during cpu processing
• In addition to all of that he had to delete some game specific files from the games folder.

He thinks that was it, but of course he didn’t pay much attention once he got it working, played it for a weekend or so and moved on.

That’s a lot of work, I see why compatibility mode hasn’t worked for me before.

I was just going to PM this to tenthree and not bother everyone with it, but I figured crowdsourcing might be a good idea in the likely chance that there are people around here that know more about programming than me - maybe one of them can pick out or fix something useful from all that gobbledygook.

[tenthreeleader]

Thanks so much for the help!  I will try it and see how it goes!