
Goalkeepers, long the bane of criticism from sectors of FM’s fanbase, have had a revamp and are now reliable shot-stoppers. To prevent an unrealistic goal-fest, FM developers had to bring defending up to scratch too, and marking is now more realistic, collective and effective. The minute details of whether you instruct overlapping or underlapping runs, or pick an inside forward or raumdeuter, have never had such an influence on your team’s pattern of play and attacking results.

Players combine with each other convincingly, and movement off the ball is both intelligent and rewarded. Here, the hundreds of hours put in by staffers and researchers into watching games and updating programming really shows.Īttacking and defensive AI has been vastly improved to reflect real-world decision-making. The whole feel of the game is slicker and crisper than ever.īut improvements to the match engine go far beyond its glossy look, and the increased intelligence really stands out. The realism of the manager avatars has improved massively from FM19 – now your creation (which you can also customise with a far wider range of clothes than before) genuinely looks like a virtual better-looking version of yourself. In fact, FM20’s improved graphics are evident from the very start of the game. Fine details, such as the way weather visibly interacts with the pitch and players, have been introduced and nudge that real-life feeling on even further. There’s been a step up in graphics, with stadiums and players now a far cry from previous iterations.

It's more realistic than ever, in every sense. FM have poured a lot of their manpower into improving the match engine experience – and it shows.
