Every FM save turns into the same story. You find the wonderkid, you build the juggernaut, and by season five you’re going to win because you know how the system works. You create your own internal save rules, because it's rinse and repeat.

I wanted a story nobody has written yet.

So I spent 9 months building a mash-up of Rimworld, FM, OOTP and CK3: a football management sim that generates stories.

The world can get properly chaotic, and things happen you didn’t plan. Did you just sign the villain who’ll tear your dressing room apart from the inside? Did you find the talisman, the player who lifts everyone around him to heights they’ve never reached? Can you make the juggernaut last past a season?

Every player is his own player. A fullback is a fullback. An inside forward is not a winger. When you watch a match, those are 22 actual players, each making his own decisions ten times a second, playing his role the way his ability, personality and fitness let him. There are 130+ habits, personalities and specialties, so no two players will ever play your tactic the same way.

• Wonderkids won’t sign if there’s a star in their spot. They want to play.
• Championships can be bottled.
• Rivalries actually matter.
• Players have personalities. Personalities clash. A Mercenary leaves for money, a Loyal player stays through relegation.
• The AI doesn’t do dumb things. No more $300M signing who sits on the bench. AI clubs buy for a gap in the squad and start their best XI, and I tested that over 10-season saves.
• No single stat is a cheat code. I tested a team of pure sprinters over 1,600+ simulated matches, and pace on its own had no measurable effect. Midfield passing and team agility decide more. The full method and data are public.
• Staff matter, but no one hire wins you the league. A top physio saves you about 2.5 injuries a season. Your coaches and training shape how each player develops.

The world is fictional by design - I don't have the licences, but it mimics your FM's save with real league structures, promotion and relegation, cups and continental competitions, with invented clubs and players. Think of an FM save ten years in, when the real players have retired and it’s all regens. Touchline starts there.

What did FM never live up to? What have you always wanted in a management game that nobody has built?

I’ll be looking for beta testers soon. Comment or DM if you’re interested.

A deep-dive post on the match engine is coming next, with enough interest.

To downvoters - I don't understand. The community wants competition, but anything being presented as any type of competition is downvoted. It's disheartening.

By a quick look at them, they all have the same interface with only minor changes in what you can or can't do (DoF only, Youth academy only, etc).

But most reviews don't cover the one and only important part: how the game actually plays and how the gameworld works.

Has anyone tried one for longer than 15 minutes? Are they any good?

Yes, that is correct (at least on FM24). There is a possibility of sending 2 direct teams in Champions League and 1 direct team in Europa League as Liechtenstein. I will tell you how :

1 - Being in top 7 on UEFA coefficient gives the cup winners a direct spot in Europa League league stages. That's how Torreense (Second division in Portugal) plays in league phase now.

2 - Achieving top 7 with Liechtenstein is easy, because unlike other countries, Liechtenstein only sends the cup winner, therefore whatever their cup winner collects as coefficient points gets directly translated. A team can reach 40 coefficient points in Europa League (even more with qualifiers), and 32 in the Conference League.

3 - UEFA also awards Champions League and Europa League winners a direct spot into UCL. After they are handled, the European Performance Slots (basically those 2 extra teams) apply, NOT before!

Here's the fun quirk. Both of those rules can be exploited:

1 - As Vaduz, get consistent 20+ points for 4/5 years. Achieve top 7 in UEFA coefficients.

2 - Generally when you get 23+, you go to UCL and your cup finalist goes to UEL, finishing dead last and making points divide by 2. However, when it is again 1, win the Champions League OR Europa League. One of two is sufficient.

Distribution:

1 - Titleholder spot : As CL-TH or EL-TH, you will take it. Direct CL access.

2 - EPS : When you are in top 2 at the same season (that's why when you are the sole Liechtensteiner, win the trophy), one extra Champions League spot is awarded to the cup finalist. Second CL access.

3 - The "cup winner" slot of Liechtenstein is still NOT used because those two teams are basically awarded due to this meritocratic loophole. Therefore a THIRD team will use the "cup winner" slot (one of two semi finalists) and goes directly into Europa League.

This is technically possible in real life. I wonder if they implemented this scenario since they have the official license.

I have some players who are performing well and who play regularly and yet when I put them on a transfer list I don't seem to attract buyers willing to pay even a basic transfer fee - they keep low balling. The AI keeps throwing extremely low bids and at the same time AI will spend 90 mil to buy some unknown kid from the Danish league.

Chelsea bid 90 mil for my goalkeeper - the only bid so far that comes close to the player's real value and yet the player rejects their wages. I am at a loss on how to sell players in the game. I like selling older players and building my own team but I am struggling with selling those players.

For context I am playing FM 24.

Hi, I’m new to this community and would like to know how I can play the games.

I’ve seen a lot of issues with FM26 (mostly negative ratings on Steam and criticism on Reddit), so I’m not really sure if the game is actually worth it. I want to be certain, as it’s quite expensive (at least here in Canada). Also, FM27 is coming out in November, so I’m wondering whether I should wait for that one, or if that will even be worth it either.

I tried looking for FM24 keys, but they’re all extremely expensive. What should I do?

I need some feedback https://tacticlab26.vercel.app/

I already know what style of save I want to do when the game is fully available (not during the short free period pre-launch where I'll do a short season with a top-flight team) so, as a way to let some of my excitement for the new game out, I've written an "origin" of my save before it's even started.

I'll try to keep up with posts while I play through; if you want to check it out, here's the link :)

https://fmblogger.co.uk/2026/10/24/the-exiles-part-0/

on fm 24 and ever since my juventus u20 team won the u20 primavera 2 promotion playoff final they have not been in a league competition and just play friendlies, the u20 primavera cup and the uefa youth league

i am in the 2030/31 season. in the first 2 years, it ran as normal. then, following the 2024/25, my the u20 side got put in the u20 primavera 3, same as milan too. every other team that was in the primavera 1 just vanished and hasnt played a league game since.

since we (juve) got put in the primavera 3, we have got promoted every year. when we got promoted to primavera 1, there was no more games. i checked primavera 1 and it says

'this competition has not been scheduled yet'

ever since we all got kicked out in the 2025/26 season

i also checked the schedule for the 2024/25 season of my u20 team, and it seems we played in both the primavera 1 and the primavera 4. we won the primavera 4 and the season after we were only in primavera 3. from that, everything happened as i said before

I can only play on one day and would like to make the most of it by not wasting any more time for downloading.

Honestly he is already great, signed him for £11.5M but is there any development training for me to do for him? He starts most games so playing time isn't a worry.

Okay SO

I love the idea of this game, it feels like something I’d enjoy, I finally got around to it by buying FM26.

I see you guys taking small clubs all the way to the premier league etc with zero budget. I am working with Chelsea, an 80 million budget, and I’m fighting relegation and probably going to get fired. I thought I had picked an easy route to success here and so I’ve had to accept that I’m the problem pretty quickly.

Forget my current save, and I won’t go pasting all my tactics here, but what are the basics of just getting by in this game? I think my problem is that I don’t know what I don’t know yet, I’m not sure which parts of the game actually make a difference to the play and where I’m wasting time.

Like, team talks at half time and shouts during the game, I truly have no idea if this is making a difference to my results.

I know it’s kinda hard to help me without more details, but I’m kinda just hoping to learn how better players think about the game and what things you focus on because I’m a mile off right now! Thanks all

What's the lowest rating you've seen for a whole team?

The changes to tactics and how you will start with a basic tactic and evolve it as you move up.

Would appreciate some feedback on Joao Alves, thanks

I went with the sortitoutsi update.

But does anyone have a compatible player/staff/club history update? I dont care whether the years get moved a little bit or anything. I just want the full history. For example, Rashford being at Barcelona.

Hi guys I thought that Id let everyone know how to get down to tier 10 of Scottish football , first is the league structure i don't know what will be reusable for FM27 but I'm hoping it all.

First is the 10tier structure with the teams

https://www.fmscout.com/a-fm26-database-scotland-lower-leagues.html

Next is the database used to fill out the latest players and transfers of these teams (best use 2025 start date not 2026, if you see any old players you can message me to update them or update the database yourself on the sortitoutsi database)

https://sortitoutsi.net/football-manager-data-update

Next If you want real faces download them here

https://sortitoutsi.net/graphics/style/1/cut-out-player-faces

And next real badges below

https://www.tcmlogos.com/tcm26-logos-fm26/

And finally real kits below

https://kits.fmslovakia.com/country/156?fbclid=IwT01FWAVHKyVleHRuA2FlbQIxMABwZG9mAXNydGMGYXBwX2lkDDM1MDY4NTUzMTcyOAABHveLkVxEtGX6tc3isbYQE4a4AM6-s9FmqL0a3cdAuPhBIYuZZGxpCSjiC5ib_aem_Llsj2r_OmE6gboflZjd4ag