beautiful-game-studios posts

One of the few pro sports that still gets a PC game release is soccer (or football if you are European). Not only are there lots of pro soccer/football games available for the PC, there are also quite a few football management sim games. However one the longest running football sim games series is taking an indefinate hiatus.

The Championship Manager series, which started in 1992 at developer Beautiful Game Studios, is going "on hold" according to a new Eurogamer article. According to the developer's head Roy Meredith, the issue is with the declining PC game market in retail stores. He stated, "So we took the decision to put the PC game on hold and build up our business in other areas." So when will the PC version return? Meredith says, "I really, really couldn't say." So we guess PC gamers will have to deal with only Sega's Football Manager or EA's FIFA Manager series. Too bad.

Another day, another major layoff at a PC game studio. Today Gamesindustry.biz reports that the UK based Beautiful Games Studios who were in charge of making the Championship Manager soccer management titles, got hit with major layoffs from its new owner Square Enix.

While a spokesperson for the publisher has officially admitted to the layoffs they would not be specific as to the number of people affected. Gamesindustry.biz believes that 80 percent of the team was either laid off or had their positions moved to a dev studio in China. The newest version of the game, Championship Manager 2010, has gotten solid reviews from critics.

Download Championship Manager 2010 October Patch (118 MB)
Download Championship Manager 2010 Demo (720 MB)

Available in English, French, Italian, Polish & Spanish languages, enjoy 6 months worth of gameplay from July 1st 2009-December 31st 2009. Leagues available in the demo are as follows: England, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Scotland, Spain, Turkey

• Try the match engine featuring over 500 motion captured player animations
• Create and design intelligent dead ball moves using the set piece creator
• Invest wisely in the Scouting network (but keep an eye on balancing the books mind!) and see if you can unearth a raw talent
• Use practice matches & training matches to tweak your side and test your tactics in the run up to games

Continue reading after the jump for details about the CM10 Demo Challenge.

Download Championship Manager 2010 Demo (720 MB)

It's one of the most popular PC games in Europe year the development team behind the soccer management game Championship Manager claims that the game has a 90 percent piracy rate. In a story over at Computer and Video Games Roy Meredith, the general manager over at the game's development company Beautiful Game Studios, states, "That's not just a number in the air, we can measure it and we know that there are a huge amount of pirated copies."

So how can the team fight off the pirates? Meredith doesn't seem keen on putting DRM set-us in their games, owing to an experience with a rival game, Football Manager. "I spent about three hours trying to go through this registration process and I really want to play it but I've got other things to do with my life." He believes price competition might be a better way to combat pirates in the long run. In the meantime their next game in the series, Championship Manager 09, is due for release later this year.

If you like your soccer/football super realistic without a lot of graphical flair than the long running Championship Manager PC sports sim has been for you. This week the game's publisher Eidos announced plans to publish Championship Manager 2009 in April 2009

As you can see from the screenshots the game isn't supposed to be a graphical powerhouse but the press release states the game has gotten a "complete graphical and engine overhaul." The development team, Beautiful Game Studios, plans to release a demo in March 2009 and the game's general manager Roy Meredith is quoted as saying, "After 4 years of mid-table mediocrity, we're making great strides to become genuine title contenders. We want everyone to test this out by trying the demo which is out in March. Try the demo and make up your own minds."