DEVELOPER Sports Interactive has finally confirmed that the next entry in the Football Manager series has been cancelled following delays.
Football Manager 25 was set to launch in March 2025, but will no longer be released on any platform.
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The last entry in the Football Manager series, FM24, launched in November 2023, and players have been begging for another entry.
This last entry made modest changes to the series alongside the roster update, but FM25 was supposed to be a complete overhaul.
However, Sports Interactive claimed that FM25 was going to be a new era for the series, beginning with the change in engine to Unity.
In contrast to previous entries, the next game in the Football Manager series was supposed to make substantial changes with new modes, women’s football, and quality-of-life updates.
A statement from the developer about the cancellation reads: “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.”
“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.
“Thank you for reading, your patience and your continued support. Our full focus now returns to creating a new era for Football Manager.”
Football Manager 25 was originally set to launch in November 2024, but was initially delayed until March.
However, in October Sports Interactive announced that there would be a six-month delay for FM25 until March 2025.
Fans have been asking why it wasn’t cancelled at this time so that customers could get their money back sooner.
Sports Interactive said: “At the time of the decision, based on the data available, it was our strong belief that we could reach our quality target level and deliver a game our players would be happy with, despite the delay.
“The challenges encountered beyond this point meant we were unable to achieve that.”
Those who pre-ordered the game will be automatically refunded via the payment method they used.
FM25 was scheduled to be released on Xbox Game Pass at launch like how FM24 is currently available on the platform.
People were hoping to play FM24 until the next entry’s launch, and asked whether it would remain on subscription platforms until the next game is released, but the answer was not entirely positive.
It reads: “We are currently in discussions with our various platform partners and licensors and hope to extend our FM24 agreements. We will provide an update on this in due course.”
From the statement it is likely that Sports Interactive will continue working on the game but that it will be released as a separate Football Manager title.
If you want to read more about game cancellations, check out how Netflix cancelled six games.
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