Sports Interactive has delayed the launch of Football Manager 25 again – this time until 2025.
In a statement this afternoon, the developer said it had agreed with publisher Sega to postpone the game’s launch on all platforms until March next year.
Previously, the footy sim had been set to arrive on 26th November for PC, PS5 and Xbox (and on Nintendo Switch on 3rd December). Before that, it had been expected earlier this year.
“After careful consideration, Sports Interactive have made the tough decision to further delay the release of Football Manager 25,” the developer wrote in a statement released this afternoon. “Following discussions with Sega, our licensors and partners, we have agreed the best course of action is to delay the launch until March 2025. Specific platform release dates will follow once confirmed.
“In our last Development Update in September, we explained that we needed to push FM25’s original release back to give ourselves more time to deliver the best possible experience for this first instalment in a new era of Football Manager.
“This additional time has not been sufficient to ensure the game quality and experience meets your expectations and our very high standards. In the previous blog we explained that it has been a difficult development cycle for the studio. Many things have been moving slower than we had predicted – despite everyone in the team working at an incredible pace to try and get everything done.
“Timelines were already tight and, as rightly pointed out by many of your recent comments, we were simply rushing too much and in danger of compromising our usual standards. This has put an enormous amount of pressure on everyone working across the studio, who are all passionately committed to delivering the best game possible.
“FM25 is the biggest technical and visual advancement in the series for a generation. We simply cannot compromise the delivery of this crucial juncture in Football Manager’s history by rushing to release it in November. Of course, this is not where any of us expected to be seven weeks out from our release but, in the spirit of our studio values, we always consider the bigger picture – and the bigger picture here is that we need this additional time to deliver a game that we can all be proud of.
“For the large numbers of you who have already pre-ordered the game, we thank you very much for your trust and support. Given the delay, however, should you wish to claim a refund, please contact your retailer.
“Something you noted as missing from our announcement on 30th September was mention of Advanced Access on PC/Mac. We can confirm Advanced Access will be available ahead of the new release date and, when we are confident on how long that period will be, we will update you at the first opportunity. The new gameplay reveal will also now move to the end of January 2025.
“We are intensely aware that this will be massively disappointing for you. We share that disappointment and are extremely sorry. Thank you for reading and your patience. It means the world to us as we continue to work on creating a new era for Football Manager.”
Find out why “FM25 is not a continuation of FM24” in Chris Tapsell’s long-read interview with the boss of Sports Interactive, Miles Jacobson. “It’s been a difficult year,” Jacobson admitted to Eurogamer. “[But] it’s been a great learning experience!”