JMThoughts

What I want to say re: FM25-gate (Long read so feel free to ‘I ain’t reading all that’ me) To me, it is so important and overtly positive that SI are introducing the women’s game to Football Manager. This is a move that’s been in the works for years now and we should be proud that we play a game franchise that is willing to be progressive and whole-heartedly commit to equality, inclusivity and acceptance. It’s a good thing that’s it’s not half-arsed and a token gesture. It’s also frustrating and in some cases genuinely disappointing to see game modes and features removed from the game for this year’s iteration. I understand that this happening, alongside the introduction of the women’s game, leads to conclusions that it’s because of women’s football that other areas of the game have been neglected or failed or whatever. Knowing how long this move to introduce women’s football has been in the works, it’s my genuine opinion that the two things are unrelated. Or at very least, certainly not solely responsible as seems to be the opinion of plenty. If you’re unwilling to separate the two and instead use the situation to push archaic and misogynistic tropes then, I’m sorry but I just don’t think you’re a great person. This is different to being frustrated and even annoyed about the perceived direction of the game re: game modes, features, development. The move to unity and the rebuilding of the game up, is - to me, at least - the complicating factor and it would appear from the outside that this has been a real issue inside the studio. This isn’t great. But the introduction of women’s football, a facet of the game that you can completely ignore if you want, is great. And I’m glad that they’re putting it loud and proud in their announcements. I’m also worried about a lot of FM25 and critical of the way that things have been communicated. I too would love to see the match engine and felt like some more good news and exciting new things should have been presented following the bad news vibe of the previous development blog. It’s still early days. And we’ve not seen anything yet. I’m hopeful - a sort of worried, desperate hope - that we will have some of our fears alleviated in the next few weeks. But women’s football being in FM is a really cool thing. I do genuinely mean that. Don’t let that get muddled in with general gaming concerns. I’m sure lots will have issues with my opinion on this as that seems to be the way of the internet, but it felt to me at least like something that needed to be said. If you read this far, well that is really weird. Love xx