Football Manager 2005 breaks SEGA sales records

The latest game from London-based developer Sports Interactive, Football Manager 2005, has become SEGA Europe's fastest selling game ever - beating all of the publisher's previous title with its excellent first-weekend sales across the territory.

The soccer management game, which is the first to be developed by Sports Interactive since the studio's widely reported split with Championship Manager brand owners Eidos last year, has also entered into Chart-Track's top five fastest selling PC games ever.

"This is tremendous news and a fantastic reward for all of the hard work which has gone into creating this game," according to Sports Interactive managing director Miles Jacobson. "As far as I'm concerned, there are three groups of people who are responsible for this extraordinary performance — the team here at SI who have worked harder than ever to make sure we produced our best game to date, everyone at SEGA Europe (and their partners) and our dedicated fanbase, which has stayed loyal, active and patient throughout the whole process. Now... let's see about doing even better with the next one."

Promotion for the game will continue throughout the first month of release, with a seven-figure marketing campaign planned including massive radio and online advertising, national press and billboard advertising, and a demo CD giveaway with popular British weekly newspaper the Sunday Mirror.

"While it's very nice to be up there in the 'fastest-selling' charts, we plan to keep working on this title until we top the best-selling charts too," commented SEGA Europe managing director Mike Hayes. "We're only just getting started."