Intended for a niche market, but it's a game that will suit well fans of this sport, keeping them busy for quite a while
But the game turns out to be more than just a sports management sim, and I am glad. You don't just limit yourself to pick teams and strategies, there is a lot more interactivity than that.
The game is basically divided into two major parts, management and racing. During management, you get to take care of contracts, recruiting and train your racers, deal with sponsors, transfer athletes, manage finances. While in the actual race you have to manage your team's actions and strategies as well as individual racers. This all takes place in a real-time 3D environment that looks quite smooth.
There is quite a bit to this part of the game, since you have to look at everything from energy levels, feeding, attacking at the right moment to get ahead, sprinting, protecting a team leader. But you also have to take into account what your adversaries are doing, since the AI is quite smart and will propose different strategies to defeat you.
The interface seemed quite complicated at first and not very intuitive, but the tutorial stages do a good job at getting the player acquainted with the options and controls.
You can become even more engrossed in each race by viewing it from the different camera angles, including an air view from a helicopter or a motorcycle cam, and race highlights will be shown in slow motion after the race is over. What I found a nice detail were the spectators cheering, dispersing to let the platoon pass, or running along side their favorite riders, it adds an extra bit of realism to the race.
There are three gameplay modes available, which are all playable online: Race, Tour and Season. Race Mode is just a single stage race. Tour is a race composed of several. Season is a series of races organized for team gameplay. There is also a race editor where you can customize your own stages and create an exclusive tour.
Regarding the graphic aspect of the game, Pro Cycling Manager 2006 isn't too shabby looking, but there are several occasions where the landscapes seem too empty and plain-looking. The sound is decent, but the theme music gets pretty annoying after a few minutes, though you can turn it off and listen to whatever mp3 you want, which is a plus.
The major downside of this title was the horrendous loading time in between stages. I honestly could get up, go to the bathroom, grab a snack and come back in time to see the stage loading.
With high "shelf life" in its approximately 450 stages, Pro Cycling Manager 2006 is in fact intended for a niche market, but it's a game that will suit well fans of this sport, keeping them busy for quite a while.
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