Tactical Manager 2

Tactical Manager 2 is a video game in the sports genre developed by Talking Birds and published by IncaGold Ltd. originally released in 2000. It is currently playable on Windows, Amiga.

Tactical Manager 2 is a solid soccer management game that its developer has recently converted to freeware.

Daniel Henriksen sums up the pros and cons of this game nicely in his review: '...Although this game is not simple, it quickly caught my attention and, once I got the hang of how the game works (or maybe it's more the way it's used), I really enjoy playing it. However, I tend to play for shorter periods, but this is mainly because the in-game training sessions are a big hurdle and this is one aspect of the game that programmers should concentrate on.

You can't just create a specific training program focused on shooting for attackers, for example. You have to 'open' each player (and you can't just double click, grrrr =) You have to 1) select him 2) click select and 3) click a couple more times to do his training ... and this with each player in your squad) and choose what he should train this time. It takes a lot of time and if you are like me, it ends up being funny halfway through your squad ... so you (me) blindly select the weakest points of the players and train them; a shame in a game like this.

Also, when you train your players, you get instant results - if the player gets injured during training you'll know right away, - and also if he gets stronger or weaker. Hmmm, normally a player develops over time and not right away like this (during a training session 4 of my (best) players got injured in a row. Damn!), but this is of course great if you run fantasy leagues and you have to do training right now and such, well: I guess so. But I can live with this, if necessary.

It seems that the game from the beginning was developed primarily to calculate data for online tournaments, and later the programmers decided to change it to be playable on a one-man basis. The game sequence is not overwhelming, but quite fun - fun in the same way I remember Giant Killers - Euro Manager being. You can't select how long the match should last, but you can turn on/off the commentary to speed it up. It catches my eye and I think it's fine the way it is.

My advice to the developers would be to work on the pictures and maybe make a sort of quick bar for beginners (ok, ok, the really dumb ones like me) and work on the player detail screen. It would be nice to have a bigger box, with more information instead of having 12 categories. I think the About/Skills/Photo/Roles/Stats should be on one screen - and you could decide their Role without having to scroll through 12 screens. The Training/Physiotherapist window could be better... maybe allowing the user to select all the training/the two visits to the physiotherapist and then press a Go button or similar and everything would then be calculated. Again, you wouldn't have to click as many times to get the job done and a message could allow you to review the changes. I had an injured player who miraculously healed because he went to the physiotherapist twice in the same week (!).

I also started a game with Kettering Town and as my goalkeeper got injured in the first training session, I was suddenly without a goalkeeper. I then tried to buy one without a contract, because I didn't have the financial means to get a club to loan me one. The goalkeeper I found was without a contract, but when everything was in place, the club didn't want to sell their only goalkeeper (I don't care if it's their only goalkeeper! =) ... and also I can't buy new players, because I don't have the finances (but I do!) =( ... the game changes the system colors before loading, - it changes it back when you leave it, though, but annoying and unnecessary and I don't like the buttons, which have no effect when you press them.

This review went the wrong way ... I started with the idea of praising the game (it's fun), but I've focused much more on its small but significant bugs than I had planned; it sounds much worse than it really is. Remember that this game is free (and not a huge download, so go ahead and download it - or better yet, buy the CD to get the whole thing (I think it also includes the commentary, all the badges and kits and whatever extra stuff there may be) and support the minimum number of developers who allow us to download free software.

A final conclusion: A good game whose strong point is its editable data files and its size (more than 1050 teams, more than 32000 players, 21 cup tournaments, more than 30 different leagues (both worldwide) and a great game to simulate online tournaments and fun to play in short periods of time.

It is possible that we have multiple downloads available when different versions exist.