Getting old is not much fun. Your reactions slow down and your fingers can get a bit fumbly. And quite soon, you can't keep up with all the modern fast-paced RTS sport sims that are out there.

All of a sudden, a game like this appears.

"Turn-based soccer, yeah right" I hear you scoff.

Pretty much what I thought initially as well. But I had some spare cash and thought, why not give it a try.
Over 500 hours later and the bug that bit me is still going strong. I bought this game not long after it came out, and as the time went by and the game picked up support, so the devs started adding and adding. In fact they haven't stopped adding. They are extremely passionate about their game and very attentive to everything put on forum, be it a bug report or suggestions.

Now for the game itself.

When you start the game you can play in 2 modes. Either normal start ( 3 difficulty modes ) where you get given a team in the lowest division or you can go into sandbox mode where you if you wish, you can create a team of 16 yr old Lvl 1 players or any other combination. ( Sandbox disables achievements for obvious reasons ). You can even create your own name, logo and strip in both modes.There is a comprehensive guide accessed from the main screen, which explains every move and ability available to the players.

As for gameplay, there is a setting for RNG in the startup menu which ranges from
"No way that should have happened." to
"Just as I planned."

The action is smooth and the animations are pretty good, as the players get on with the business of trying to get you promoted. There's nothing more satisfying than watching 1 of your players deliver that long pass, through a couple of the opposition players, right to the feet of your brilliantly positioned forward, who has to score. Right?
The UI is intuitive and very easy to navigate, and the game has quite a bit of depth to it.

All in all this really is a gem of a game and if you're still not sure, there is a demo you can download to get a taste of it.
Anyone who likes sports and/or TBS games will have an absolute blast with this one.
I could go on and on about this game, but I'm currently in a promotion race in the 1st division and I want to go and finish it off.

And I also need to mention that this game is NOT just for old gits like me, it's great fun for young and old alike.

P.S. There are workshop mods which can replace the base leagues with any other thats in there or you can mod any league yourself in game.

Edit: Football Stars DLC is out, bringing a heightened sense of realism to the game, making you feel more like a manager! Recommended, but just beware the play style is different from vanilla game.

A less demanding and cheaper XCOM2 for football lovers. Started off as kind of a passion project and is constantly getting better as dev keeps adding new features. The community is very welcoming, so please stop by the Discussion forum!

--{DLC}---
☑ Recommended
☐ Not Recommended

--{Graphics}---
☐ You forget what reality is
☐ Beautiful
☐ Good
☑ Decent
☐ Bad
☐ Don‘t look too long at it
☐ Paint.exe

---{Gameplay}---
☑ Very good
☐ Good
☐ It‘s just gameplay
☐ Mehh
☐ Staring at walls is better
☐ Just don‘t

---{Audio}---
☐ Eargasm
☐ Very good
☐ Good
☑ Not too bad
☐ Bad
☐ Earrape

---{Audience}---
☐ Kids
☐ Teens
☐ Adults
☑ Human
☐ Lizards

---{PC Requirements}---
☐ Check if you can run paint
☑ Potato
☐ Decent
☐ Fast
☐ Rich boiiiiii
☐ Ask NASA if they have a spare computer

---{Difficulity}---
☐ Just press ‚A‘
☐ Easy
☐ Significant brain usage
☑ Easy to learn / Hard to master
☐ Difficult
☐ Dark Souls

---{Grind}---
☐ Nothing to grind
☐ Only if u care about leaderboards/ranks
☐ Isnt necessary to progress
☑ Average grind level
☐ Too much grind
☐ You‘ll need a second live for grinding

---{Story}---
☐ Story?
☑ Text or Audio floating around
☐ Average
☐ Good
☐ Lovely
☐ It‘ll replace your life

---{Game Time}---
☐ Long enough for a cup of coffee
☐ Short
☐ Average
☑ Long
☐ To infinity and beyond

---{Price}---
☐ It’s free!
☑ Worth the price, but try the free demo first.
☑ Wait for sale. ANY sale.
☐ If u have some spare money left
☐ Not recommended
☐ You could also just burn your money

---{Bugs}---
☐ Never heard of
☑ Minor bugs
☐ Can get annoying
☐ ARK: Survival Evolved
☐ The game itself is a big terrarium for bugs

Turn-based football. You have time to think about your every move and feel the full control over your players. I am not FIFA fan, I don't even like football. But the way developers made the game totally won me over - it is a lot like chess (my favorite board game) but with elements of RPG like gaining levels of footballers and gaining skills and tallents for them. Moreover the developers are constantly improving the game to suit player's tastes (players can pick match duration in turns, will players playing on different position get a penalty for it, will there be injuries, how fast footballer's stamina will recover and more) and provide new options and additional content. And if there happens to be a bug from what I've seen they are fast to release a fix for it - usually within hours.

I don't know if all the FIFA fans would like this a bit slower and more tactical version but I recommend it to all who like turn-based strategies and RPG-type of games, at least for me it was a fun new experience that may not have as many resource types like in other strategies (fame, money in this case) but is just as fun.

TL;DR: If you like one of the two main aspect of this title ( football or turn based-games ), you'll love it. If you are sceptical over the concept, do as I did 3 months ago : try the demo, and you'll love and buy it. It's a pure gem. 11/10 in every aspects.

-------------------

After multiple tries over the last two decades, I wouldn't have thought a game about football would be the most important "one more turn" - here translated into "one more match" - impact I would have since civilization 1 & 2.

I bought it 3 months ago and I'm already close to reach the 1 000 hours of gameplay. It's a pure gem Creoteam is delivering here. ( And I don't even follow football sport events IRL )
First of all a big up to the devs. They are over reactive in all good possible ways : fixing bug in 1-3 days after being discovered, analyzing suggestions to implement in the game, and adding more and more stuff with every patch. In fact, most games I played, once out of Early Access, never reached the level of completion and polish of Football, Tactics & Glory.

But now to the game itself :

You're a young football player who get a manager job for an amateur football club, after having being badly injured, stopping your player career. The goal of the game is to climb the national leagues in the country of your choice ( 37 are actually in the game ). As an indie, they actually don't have the licensing for real club names, but the steam workshop is filled with mods that actually fix this point. You can also create your own club from scratch ( name, logo, jersey... ).
Each country is divided into 5 leagues: Amateur, 3rd to 1st, and Premier league. You'll have also 3 different kind of championships to fight for, depending the league you are in. So every season will be full of action, and you'll have to manage the mercato to find the players you need, while growing those you already have.

The game mechanisms are very smart and somehow intuitive to get your hands on, even if you'll need to experiment some moves if you want to master it. Every aspect is included in this game. Attributes, skills, age, level, contract renewing price, market price... Oh yes... Because the game has skills... Well it's turn based, and RPG, so it has to have skills ! And those are probably your most important tools to achieve victory in a match. You'll have to develop your team with an array of players and substitutes capable to face most of the situations, and you'll have to adapt your team to the opponent you're facing.

But then, you'll also have all the financial management of your team, and also a secondary resource, "glory", that can be spend in many useful ways. Some could say the management is a simplified version of football manager franchise, I honestly don't know, I don't recall which version of football manager I tried some time ago, but the million of mostly useless information the game throw at you and the unfriendly GUI always drove me away. Here, the management is perfectly balanced; by that I mean, you'll have to think twice, and a bit more, about key decisions of a living football club, but everything will be crystal clear, so you will surely enjoy it at the same level you enjoy playing the matches.

It's really a nice formula, depending on the lenght you chose in your campaign for the duration of the matches ( 3 different lenghts, for games that can take around 10-15 mins to 30-45 ), you'll have a nice alternation of field gameplay and manager gameplay.

And the challenge is real. Even if you can adapt to your prefered difficulty setting ( 3 different ones ) if you want an easier or an harder gaming experience.

Technically, the game is nicely optimised. I actually play on a notebook with Intel HD 4000 series and it goes very smoothly while being beautiful. The sound effects do their job, and the menu musics are over the top ( I recommend to go in the credits once in a while, it'll launch an original song composed for the game, the singer voice is just amazing ).

The game is so deep and complete, I'm pretty sure I'm forgetting some key points. In any case I would recommend you to try the demo, that's what I did and it totally convinced me I should buy the game.

My experience with the game was a bit bad at the beginning but after understanding a little bit more about it's mechanics, things got much better.

Let start with my first experience:

I played 5 seasons and managed to promote from amateur league just to be knocked back the next season (twice). After 15 hours of gameplay I got so frustrated that I just abandoned the game for a couple of weeks. My frustration came from not being able to resist to stronger teams: I felt that the stronger attackers could always score no matter how many defenders I put in front of them.

I decided to give it a second try. This time I did a bit of research about the core mechanics. Now I am having a much better experience. Here are some of the things I learned:

1 - Learn to use the special habilities! There is a very nice puzzle-like tutorial about then: during a campain, click on the question mark at the top right and then click "Test". Complete all the tests and your experience will be much smoother. IMO these tests should be much more visible to new players. I never noticed then during my first 15 hours.

2 - Prefer to develop players over buying expensive ones. As your players develop, they will improve their stats and also learn special habilities. The second one makes all the difference. IMO is much better to have a team with slight worse overall stats but plenty of different habilities.

On lower leagues it is not uncommon to find older players with nice stats (and no habilities) for an affordable price. During my first campain I relied too much on those players and ignored new player development, the result: boring matches with very few playing options where I got beated by clever strategies used by the AI.

3 - Do not be afraid to have your a** kicked. This is not the sort of arcade game where you will reach the Premier League within a couple of seasons. You will probably fight for mid-table positions on lower level divisions for some time, maybe even face relegation. You can have an perfect run and get promotion just to be punched on the b*lls on the next division. Stronger teams will give you a hard time. Sometimes the RNG will help, sometimes not. After understand the core mechanics, no matter the result, these experiences will be very fun.

I've been in love with football management sims since the days of One-Nil[www.myabandonware.com]. That's 1992, my friends.
I've never enjoyed one as much as this one.

This game is simple enough to play that you can jump right in and start playing. And if you want a casual experience, you can play this game like that. Don't think too much about your decisions, just pick what feels right. You can do that and have fun.

Or, if you want a more analytical experience, you can take your time over each decision.
You can put your roster into a spreadsheet, plan out which players you will develop and which ones you will sell, and when.
You can crunch the numbers over the tactical decisions in the match. Do I take a shot from long range with my ACC 52 midfielder against his DEF 67 keeper, or is it better if I try a layoff pass through his center back to my forward, who can then try to score with a rainbow feint? You can do the math and figure out which one has a better chance at a goal--and also think about what position you leave the opponent with if you do not get a goal.

In other words, you can play this game hardcore, and try to make the best decisions all the time (even though many of the decisions will defy exhaustive analysis), or you can play by the seat of your pants, and try to win by instincts. It is a remarkable acheivement to have created a game that can satisfy both types of play styles.

You will like this game if you like:

• Turn-based tactics and strategy. (Even if you aren't a football fan, you will like this aspect, if you like turn-based squad tactics at all.)
  
• Roster management--balancing the need to win matches now with the need to develop your next generation of players.
  
• Elegant game design--something simple to learn, but deceptively complex beneath the surface. Every decision that confronts you offers enough options to be interesting, but not so many to be overwhelming.
  
• The challenge of taking the worst club in the lowest league and slowly building it into a continental champion.
  
• Replayability--start over with a new club and try a different strategy.
  
• Real club names and logos. It takes only a couple minutes to download the user mods with real names and logos for all of the clubs in all of the leagues. After all, isn't it more fun to take over West Bromwich Albion, with the throstle-on-a-hawthorn-branch logo, than some club named West Bromwich FC represented by a generic green eagle silhoutted atop a soccer ball?

Things this game does not do:

• Pretty graphics. If you want eye candy, look elsewhere.
  
• "Realistic" simulation. Players have four attributes, there are 10 different special abilities they can learn, and the pitch is a 10x7 grid. It certainly "feels" like football, but it is not a "realistic" simulation.
  
• Complex player relations. Players do their best, all the time, no matter what. You don't have to figure out how to motivate them, whom they like to play with, etc.
  
• Player contract negotiations. When you acquire a player he has a 1-year contract. When a contract is due to expire you can sign a new contract (1-3 years), let the player go, or sell him. The cost of the new contract depends on the footballer's level at the time of signing and the length of the contract. There's no negotiation.
  
• Media interactions. No press conferences, interviews, etc.
  
• The threat of getting sacked. It's your team. You make all the decisions, and you never lose your job.

As of the date of this writing (April 29 2016), the game still has the Early Access tag, but it is really a complete game.
The developers are adding additional features, but there isn't anything missing.

The game was good, but with the expansion went to a whole different level! If you are interested in football, tabletop, turn-based or manager games this one is for you.
For NEW/RETURNING players: If you feel lost in the mechanics and how it all works start a new career and then click the question mark button at the top-right. After that choose Tests and play them all. You will have no more questions about the match mechanics. These tests should be in the main menu like an option which is my only complain. Great game, extremely addicting!

Really innovative and fun football tactics/rpg game. Even though dev team is from Ukraine they still provide consistent updates which puts a lot of other devs to shame imo.

I don't really like sports games, but I like tactical games like X-com, Battle Brothers, etc. So this football is the same almost like Battle Brothers only in a different setting. Highly recommended for fans of tactical games. You start with the Amateur League, gradually acquiring better and better players, train them, find suitable combinations and eventually win the most prestigious cups. It took me 120 hours and 17 seasons to take the team from the Amateur League to the Premier League and win the national cup, the championship and the European Cup. It was cool.

One of the most addicting games for me. If you are fond of SOCCER + TURN-BASED TACTICS + MANAGEMENT games im sure you will get tons of playtime out of it, i think it is worth full price.

Its almost like a usual Football Manager series game (no real names though) with player contracts, schemes & club budget, & you can even simulate matches just like there. But where it shines is the turn-based soccer field where you manually implement all the strategical plans & use the talents your players got through prescribed training (RPG element).

I remember like 20 yrs ago playing EA FIFA with friends ive dreamt of turn-based ball games & the guys were laughing at me, but i knew this would be the coolest idea in the world & it is!

Try demo to decide!