International Cricket Captain 2006 (PC)

...there should be. The International Cricket Captain series has been running since 2000 with annual updates to squads, statistics and rule changes that may have come into place. Commentary is provided by the BBC's cricket correspondant Jonathan Agnew.

There are a number of game styles you can play on startup. If you are playing with a friend you can opt for the 2 player mode which will allow you to play a one-off match with each of you ...
...a county, any of the international sides or play an entire Ashes series to see if you can win the cherished ern.

All the major domestic competitions are included in the game, though not by their official names due to licensing. It is your job to pick the right squad for the right match, depending on current form, the state of the wicket and player fitness and morale levels. It is also worth keeping an eye on the weather conditions ... more

Every time a sports management sim is released, it is always compared to the brilliant Football Manager. This is probably one of the main reasons why there arent as many 'minority' sports sims out there as there should be. The International Cricket Captain series has been running since 2000 with annual updates to squads, statistics and rule changes that may have come into place. Commentary is provided by the BBC's cricket correspondant Jonathan Agnew.

There are a number of game styles you can play on startup. If you are playing with a friend you can opt for the 2 player mode which will allow you to play a one-off match with each of you playing as a team. The most popular option will probably be the one player mode which will allow you to either take charge of any of the first class county sides, the England side plus a county, any of the international sides or play an entire Ashes series to see if you can win the cherished ern.

All the major domestic competitions are included in the game, though not by their official names due to licensing. It is your job to pick the right squad for the right match, depending on current form, the state of the wicket and player fitness and morale levels. It is also worth keeping an eye on the weather conditions too as this may influence what kind of bowlers you need to deploy and may make you change the agression of your batsmen if you need quick runs before the rain sets in. There are varying highlights levels you can choose. These vary from watching every single ball, to no highlights at all. Personally, I like to watch all wickets and boundaries whilst I'm batting and just the wickets and chances whilst I am bowling. A whole array of states are available during the match such as partnerships, batmen and bowlers run charts, scoring rates etc to name a few. If you are only playing county mode then, should you be successful, you will have the chance to manage the England team though I find that this gets in the way a bit with the county management as I was tempted to just pick my own players all the time.

This game is not very heavy on resources and will run on almost any computer used today. My machine is over 5 years old and plays it without any problem whatsoever.

The official minimum specification is as follows

CPU: Pentium 200MHz processor (or equivalent), RAM: 32MB, Video: Direct3D compatible graphics card with 4Mb ram, HD: 150MB of free space, Operating System: Microsoft Windows 98/ME/2000/XP

If you are looking for a quick and easy to follow management sim then this could well be the one for you. It is nowhere near the realism of Football Manager but it certainly deserves a look. 

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