Football Manager 25 video game cancelled after series of delays
Sports Interactive (SI) announced that FM25 had been scrapped, with the game's makers turning their attention to FM26, which is due for release in November. SI, which is owned by the gaming company Sega, apologised to fans after making the 'difficult decision' to cancel the game after a number of technical hitches.
'We know this will come as a huge disappointment, especially given that the release date has already moved twice, and [fans] have been eagerly anticipating the first gameplay reveal,' a statement said.
The game's makers said they had planned to 'create the biggest technical and visual advancement in the series for a generation' but that had proven impossible.
They said: 'While many areas of the game have hit our targets, the overarching player experience and interface is not where we need it to be. 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.'
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SI will not update the 2024 version of the game with 2025's squad and transfer information, but said it would provide full refunds to fans who ordered FM25.
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Developer Lizardcube talks reinventing SEGA's classic Shinobi series for a new age of players
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After playing roughly an hour of the game already and dubbing it a 'stunning and confident retooling' of the series in my preview, I have every reason to believe that the team is stepping up to the challenge and that Shinobi fans won't be disappointed. Sure, Lizardcube had already achieved great adoration for its work on Streets of Rage 4 previously, but sketching out various street-level environments to fight across is one thing, and creating a whole suite off attractive locations set within the Shinobi ninja universe another entirely. The key, says lead background artist Julian Nguyen-You, was to significantly increase the number of art assets created for each level. The hope being to provide players with much higher degrees of detail and variety, which should make living out their kunai-throwing ninja fantasies all the more enjoyable. 'Shinobi has more huge backgrounds,' says Nguyen-You. 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The Guardian
20 hours ago
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Punch bags, penny pushers and Hillbilly shootouts: the 10 best classic seaside arcade machines
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The one I most remember playing – I think in Blackpool's Coral Island arcade – was called Hillybilly Moonshine and it had several mannequins dressed in overalls as well as a big copper distiller and various barrels and critters. If you hit the hillbillies they fired water pistols at you. You can still find these dotted about in surviving coin-op houses and they're really worth a go. Invented by Ramsgate-based manufacturing firm Cromptons in 1964, coin push games are the kings of the seaside arcade, dominating the floor space and enticing players with their piles of sparkling treasure surely ready to fall at any second. The original was called Penny Falls, but there are hundreds of variations now, including virtual coin pushers, which move the action on to a screen with lots of special effects. Oh, the hours I spent during summer holidays wandering the arcades of Blackpool and Morecambe, a plastic cup of 2p coins in my hand, scrutinising these seductive machines. 'Penny pushers are absolutely pivotal to the success of the British amusement arcade,' says lecturer and historian Alan Meades, author of Arcade Britannia: A Social History of the British Amusement Arcade. 'Alongside the fruit machine they are where the arcades made their money – penny pushers could last for decades – retooled with currency changes – and recouped their costs time and again.'
