Football Manager 26 announces comeback with first tease of in-game Unity engine footage
A ‘match day first look’ is coming soon, Sega and Sports Interactive say
Sega and Sports Interactive have given players the first peek at Football Manager gameplay.
Although the game’s release date has still to be revealed, it was announced that its title will be Football Manager 26, lending further weight to Sega‘s claim that the game will be released in Fall 2025.
Along with the announcement, a brief 30-second teaser video was also revealed, giving the first glimpse at the game engine.
The video features live action footage of a football match day, but this is interspersed with rendered footage, all of which includes a caption saying “actual game footage: not final”.
This footage not only gives the first look at Football Manager 26’s new official Premier League licence, it also offers the first glimpse of how the game will now look following its move to the Unity engine.
After multiple delays, Football Manager 25 was officially cancelled in February, with Sega and developer Sports Interactive saying its focus would shift to the next game in the series.
The game was set to be one of the most notable updates in the series’ history, mainly down to the inclusion of women’s football for the first time and Sports Interactive’s decision to implement an entirely new graphics system using the Unity engine, a move it previously said would mark “the starting point for the studio’s next 20 years”.
Meanwhile, as development on Football Manager 26 continues, Sega is bringing its own long-running Japanese football management series SakaTsuku to the West for only the second time.
Sega Football Club Champions 2025 is a free-to-play football management game coming to PS5, PS4, Steam, iOS and Android, and is “powered by Football Manager”, though to which extent is unclear.
