Football Manager

2022 | UX Research | SEGA / Sports Interactive

Providing the makers of Football Manager with enhanced insight into their gamer archetypes and the the complex relationships that exist between them and the game.

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A spiritual successor to the popular 90s Championship Manager series, Football Manager was a hit that broke records as one of the five fastest-selling PC games ever when it was released in November 2004.

BBC

Project Overview

FM is a cult classic video game that enraptures a whole host of audiences despite its complex and data-heavy nature. In this game, players can build and train their own football teams based on real-
life players and run match simulations with the aim of winning the league.

SI engaged with us over multiple occasions to research and present insight into their existing user base, which consists of 5 million active users. The reasons behind different users’ playing behaviours were largely unknown, which is why we were tasked with identifying the different types of gamers that existed within the FM-sphere and answer questions such as:

SI engaged with us over multiple occasions to research and present insight into their existing user base, which now consists of 5 million active users. The reasons behind different users’ playing behaviours were largely unknown, which is why we were tasked with identifying the different types of gamers that existed within the FM-sphere and answer questions such as:

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“What types of users decide to play on PC versus those who predominantly play on mobile?”

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“Why did some users stop purchasing the game and then resumed annual purchases a few years later?”

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“Why do new users tend to drop off if they haven’t played the game for over 10 hours?”

1. Desk research and hypothesising

Immersing myself in masses of data from secondary FM and desk research, I was able to build a picture of the existing audience’s behavioural traits, goals and motivations. It was already becoming apparent how factors such as device type, region and age were influencing these factors.

A collaborate session allowed us to categorise these behaviours into distinct groupings. We discovered that certain behaviours were unique and archetypal whereas others were common among most players.

My love for visualising data and concepts through diagrams helped us to frame our thinking and converge on eight proposed archetypes. We also identified gaps in the data that we wished to dig into through primary research.

I presented these findings back to Miles himself, who was extremely receptive to my storytelling and eager to know what our primary research would reveal.

List of common behaviours and unique behaviours uncovered from the research

2. Semi-structured interviews

Following the previous phase of work, a survey was sent to over 25,000 FM players aimed at identifying which of our 8 archetypes were most dominant over the existing user base. Using the data, we converged on 5 hypothesised personas which we planned to validate via 40 semi-structured interviews with survey respondents.

My role was to build our discussion guide in collaboration with the client with a focus on uncovering player behaviours, motivations for playing the game, frustrations and opinions on specific topics provided by the FM team.

As each of the 40 interviews were scheduled for 60 minutes, we took it in pairs to conduct interviews with one moderator and one note-taker who manually inputted insights in real time to Optimal Workshop’s reframer tool. We selected this method as it allowed contextually-insightful and nuanced findings to be captured and ensured we were actively listening during interviews. The reframer tool allowed us to tag and cluster insights which was a power tool for analysis.

I was involved in almost every interview as either a moderator or note-taker and had the opportunity to speak with people of all ages, regions, personalities and internet stabilities; learning to adapt my approach with each participant. This was extremely insightful and a joy to be part of!

Select quotes extracted from the interviews

3. Research analysis and persona development

Through analysing the tagged insights captured through Optimal workshop, our team were able to refine the hypothesised personas to to produce five well-evidenced personas equipped with in-depth insights to typical behaviours and interests. Through this synthesis, I began to notice an evolution that some users go through during their long-term relationship with Football manager. It seemed that personas were dynamic and could move fluidly from one ‘state’ to another. I visualised this interesting phenomenon through diagrams to feed back to the FM team, to help them anticipate changes in user behaviour over time.

My favourite part of the research came from an extra phase dedicated to a special group coined the pragmatists. These are players who engage with Football manager over many years but do not update their game with each annual release unlike most users. We conducted 8 further interviews and I developed a visual storytelling diagram to communicate their purchase and playing histories paired with insights around this engagement behaviour.

Diagram showing player behaviours over time

What I enjoyed most from this experience

Through this research, I had the opportunity to uncover unique and surprising human behaviour. I enjoyed being able to engage directly with end users via interviews, visualise playing patterns in my own ways and present findings back to senior stakeholders.