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PFM
Where did PFM come from? What was it's origins? and how was it created?... Find out below. For those of you who do not know, PFM stands for Premier Football Management. And although PFM is promoted as a fantasy football game. It is far more than that.... Just ask our current and past managers. A lot of people have asked how and why PFM was created. Well, it's quite simple... Around the time of
September 2001 I had been working on an old role-playing football site
called SAS (For those of you who never had a chance to take part in it,
you missed one hell of a game). SAS was into it's 2nd month of it's 3rd
season (The first game of this kind to get this far). I was helping my
good friend Neil Dejyothin (Screamking) with the general everyday input
of the site (Along with another individual who I believe wants to remain
nameless Anyway.. after SAS closed down. A lot of managers felt disappointed that there was no SAS. So (With Neil's support) I decided to start work on PFM. To be honest, it was never meant to see the light of day. I basically just started on an index page to see how I would do things. But after about 3 hours of work one night, I had managed to create about 20 pages. I still didnt really feel the need to run my own site, but after going this far I simply carried on.. and within a few days I had the basis of a web site and a game. I learnt a hell of a lot helping Neil with SAS, so I felt I had learnt enough to run my own site. So I discussed it with Neil, and asked if I could literally steal some of his ideas from SAS. Thankfully Neil was more than happy to help me, and before I knew it, and in less than 2 weeks, PFM was created. I'd created almost all of the pages that were needed, worked out a plan of action, and even started emailing possible managers. I can't thank Neil enough for the support he gave me. He really was tremendous in those first few weeks. I started working on PFM just a week or so after SAS closed, but within a month PFM was ready to open. All the managers had been contacted. Over 25 of the 32 managers were in place, and so role-playing was almost ready to begin. As this was a new project I was keen to do everything myself. But Dean Birkett was in a position to help out, and more importantly he wanted to help out... so before PFM had even started, I agreed to have on board a more than capable partner. We were still in September at this point, but Dean and myself decided that it was time to start PFM. So we sent out an email to the waiting managers... and PFM was underway. The RP's poured in during the opening weeks... and I think that we were averaging something like 15 RP's a day during the end of September and the whole of November. Myself and Dean had a real sense that we could not only continue where SAS had left off, but also expand on the football role-playing genre. Although we knew we could not do it without hard work, and more help. The game started very well and took off even more as we approached Christmas. Unfortunately I suffered major problems at home and was forced to take a back seat from PFM. So at the end of November we brought in Cory Skilton to help out on the site. This turned out to be a wise move, as by the new year I was unable to do anything where PFM was concerned, which left Dean and Cory to run things. Soon after they brought Aiden Brack into help, and I tried to help out when I could, but in all fairness to the others, I did very little. The hard work was put in by Dean, Cory and Aiden. Despite a few minor hiccups, we finished the first PFM season in April/May time. Most of the managers were kind enough to send us very favourable comments regarding the whole season... but even before the season had ended, we were looking into expanding PFM. Due to a lack of confidence, a lack of time and family problems, I would have closed PFM at some point after the new year. Although Dean could see it's potential and felt it was a site worth putting cash into, to improve in time for season 3. After long discussions, and working out what we wanted from the new site, Dean agreed to front the bills, whilst the rest of us agreed that we would all work together to make PFM a much bigger success than it was. Anyone who gets involved with something like this will understand how time consuming things like this our. The database we had planned was a massive task, and it took almost a year to set up. We tried to keep the managers amused for a lot of the time, by allowing role-plays to continue, and by organising a failed reserve league, and to their credit most stuck around. At the beginning of 2003 Dean received word that the new site was almost ready. Ex SAS creator Neil Dejyothin was also now on board, along with Ben McCabe (Who joined back in March 2002). Unfortunately we still faced delays, but by March 3rd, the new site was open. Much to the delight of managers and board members. The initial feedback was fantastic... both from managers, ex managers and newcomers. The first month saw us receive something like 400,000 hits to the site. Most of these came from managers and ex managers, but myself and Dean were still a little shocked at the interest in the site. And most of this came before the season had even kicked off. The 2nd PFM season finally kicked off on the 22nd March 2003. With the new non league, which consisted of 20 new teams we had not had in season one. To our knowledge, we had the biggest football role-playing league (With 52 clubs). The season started with a lot of success, although as we were also populating the database, it meant very long hours (For Dean, Cory and myself in particular). Unfortunately the extra work needed on the database side of things meant that we had to postpone the season for about 4 weeks during April and May. The break allowed us to plan an update on the site, which allowed for a simpler tactics form and other nice touches, and one again PFM was in full flow. Dean spent a lot of time getting to grips with cold fusion and is now using what he knows to update a lot more than we were able to before. PFM now consists of 7 board members (With the recent appointments of Dominik Kolacz and Mark Cross) and more updates are planned soon. It's still unclear how quickly, or how much PFM will grow at this time. We have around 3200 players already entered into the database, and without advertising the game we have more than enough managers to cope with. The next year will see a lot of time, effort and probably money go into PFM. We are confident it will grow to become a huge fantasy league in time. Just how big is uncertain.
Copyright - Kevin Porter 2003 |
). Unfortunately due to all of
us having other commitments, Neil felt it was best to take a break from
SAS and close down the site (And who can blame him... he spent everyday
for several years, building up and maintaining the site).