History

Hattrick was launched in 1997. At that time, Björn Holmér was the sole developer of the game. Its initial launch lasted only seven weeks (or rounds), and all changes to the team were made by submitting a HTML form with the user's username and password, meaning that the user never actually logged in to the interface.

Animated history of Hattrick's expansion (season 1 - 31)

The release was re-coded and Version 2.0 was launched. The new release allowed for a total of 680 teams and added a few features still available today, such as the transfer list and a league pyramid (though teams' positions in the series were determined by random selection during the offseason). Season two also saw the first ever international match, between Sverige and Danmark, with Danmark winning 1-2. This match was relatively meaningless, however, since the teams' players were clones of each other.

A new version was re-launched the following season, and this release marked the debut of friendly matches and cup matches.

The following season, Season 4, also added features such as training types beyond General, Set Pieces, and Stamina, and an expanded set of in-game skill levels. On February 2000 is launched the first translation of the whole game, from Swedish to English (future translations are done by LA volunteers).

Season 7, which began in July 1999, marked some real progress in the game. New tactical options were added so that teams could change their formation from the fundamental 4-4-2. Teams could also set their players' individual tactics, such as offensive or defensive. After Season 7, ExtraLives AB was formed and the team began development of Version 5.0. Roughly nine months later, Hattrick V.5 was launched.

Seasons

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Date is the first date of the season - the Sunday before round 1 in the series.

Season 1 (1997/08/30)

• Hattrick is born.
• 16 teams in Hattrick.
• Two test series are played in 7 rounds.
• This is how HT logo looked like

Season 2 (1997/11/23)

• HT2! A new and dynamic Hattrick wakes up after a long break due to re-coding and a move to the portal passagen.se.
• Hattrick expands to 680 teams, Allsvenskan, division 1, division 2 and division 3 are created.
• The first national team game ever is played. Sweden – Denmark 1-2. The Danish team where a clone of the Swedish player wise.
• A new type of transfer system is implemented (before you could bid on any player and if the owner accepted the offer the transfer was made.

Season 3 (1998/04/05)

• HT3
• Big problems with the servers during the silly season, Hattrick is down a few weeks.
• Hattrick expands to 1704 teams. Division IV is created with 128 series.
• Cup and training games are introduced, Zakrock Rooch are the first cup champions in HT.

Season 4 (1998/07/26)

• Special training! (Before the only training schemes where general, stamina and set pieces).
• Thanks to the new special training Per Emilsson (57216) in Juveby IF goes through the roof of the match grading system, and as the first and only player ever he gets the grade “saint” – it was a kind of impossible dummy value HT-Björn used if the impossible should happen.
• The week after Per Emilsson where declared a saint the grade system was changed !'s where added after the maximum 5 stars.
• The new grading system was; 0, H, HH, HHH, *, **, ***, ****, *****, *****!, *****!! And so on.

Season 5 (1998/11/15)

Nothing in particular happened this season according to the history books.

Season 6 (1999/03/14)

If something extraordinary really happened this season it didn't make it into the history books.

Season 7 (1999/07/03)

• HT4
• Individual orders with repositioned players where introduced! (Before you could only play 4-4-2 with “Normal” settings, but on the other hand you could choose between play cowardly/play it safe/optimistic/all out attack as an order before the game).

Season 8 (1999/10/24)

• Extralives were formed in the beginning of 2000 and quickly got pregnant with HT5, which where conceived, with remarkable small complications, about 9 month later. //HT-Björn

Season 9 (2000/02/13)

• The community are moved from passagen.se to Delphi forums.
• HTSCB, the first external site with automatic generated statistic, is created.

Season 10 (2000/06/04)

• Hattrick’s classic design is buried.

Season 11 (2000/10/05)

• The launch of Hattrick 5.0, with an all new graphical interface, shaped the game as it is today, adding features such as live matches, (which replaced the matches that previously occurred during downtime each night), instant transfer processing, 15 different player skill levels including the current peak level "divine", and the "stars" system for player performance rating.
• Hattrick added more nations beyond Sverige: Argentina, Deutschland, England, France, Italia, México (originally as Spain), and USA. Users who had previously played in Sverige and new users alike filled these nations' new leagues.
• At this time the game had a capacity of roughly 12,000 users.

Season 12 (2001)

• At the beginning of Season 12 teams were placed in the same series as they finished and the promotion/demotion system was established.
• Spain was renamed to México.
• New leagues: Nederland, Norge.
• Hattrick Supporter was launched before Season 13.

Season 13

• New leagues: Brasil, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Danmark, España, Hanguk, India, Ireland, Misr, Nippon, Oceania, Perú, Polska, Portugal, Prathet Thai, România, Rossiya, Scotland, South Africa, Suomi, Türkiye, Uruguay, Venezuela.

Season 14

• Conferences system and Hattrick mobile were added.
• New leagues: België, Ísland, Malaysia, Österreich, Schweiz, Singapore.

Season 15 (2002)

• The launch of Hattrick 6, in January 2002.
• The developers create the special events, a concept very familiar to every manager today.
• Also added the first official national teams, and with it World Cups and international friendly matches. The first World Cup was held in Nippon and Hanguk at the end of the season, with Sverige beating England 4-0.
• V. Division in Deutschland.
• Hattrick 6 did not solve the growing economic problems within the game, however. The developers resorted to giving out 200,000 Euros (or the equivalent in each country's currency) to each team to boost the in-game economy, which had entered the equivalent of a depression.

Season 16

• The first U-20 World Cup is played.
• New leagues: Česká republika, Eesti, Hellas, Hrvatska, Indonesia, Latvija, Magyarország, Philippines and Srbija (originally as Srbija i Crna Gora);

Season 17

• New leagues: Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong.

Season 18

• VI. Division established in España, Nederland and Deutschland.
• New leagues: Bulgaria, Cymru, Israel, Slovenija (because of an error their first season is called 'season 2').

Season 19 (2003)

• VII. Division in Nederland.

Season 20

• Hattrick 6.5 was introduced.
• VI. Division established in Italia, Polska and Suomi; VII. Division in Schweiz.
• New leagues: Bosna i Hercegovina, Lietuva, Pakistan, Slovensko, Vietnam and Ukraine.

Season 21

• VI. Division in Chile, France, Israel, Österreich; VII. Division in Argentina, België, Deutschland and España.
• For the first time, the Hattrick universe is restored from a backup: Black Friday happens before round 3 on November 28th, 2003.
• New leagues: Al Maghrib, Bolivia, Ecuador, Føroyar, Nigeria and Paraguay;

Season 22 (2004)

• New leagues: Saudi Arabia, Tounes, Costa Rica, Lëtzebuerg, Iran, Republica Dominicana, Cyprus and United Arab Emirates.

Season 23

• VIII. Division in Deutschland.
• New leagues: Northern Ireland, Belarus, FYR Makedonija, Panamá, Kenya and Jamaica.

Season 24

• IX. Division in Deutschland.
• New leagues: El Salvador, Honduras, Kyrgyzstan, Malta, Moldova and Shqipëria.

Season 25 (2005)

• New leagues: Al Urdun, Andorra, Sakartvelo and Guatemala.

Season 26

• X. Division in Deutschland.
• new leagues: Suriname, Nicaragua, Trinidad & Tobago and Kazakhstan.

Season 27

• Hattrick Manager License Challenge is launched.
• VII. Division in England; XI. Division in Deutschland.
• New leagues: Al Jazair, Hayastan, Lubnan, Liechtenstein, Mongol Uls and Sénégal.

Season 28 (2006/01/01)

• Played the first Hattrick master.
• New leagues: Bahrain, Barbados, Cabo Verde and Côte d’Ivoire.

Season 29 (2006/04/23)

• Announced more than a season in advance, the league reform was completed during the off-season prior to season 29, in April 2006. At this time, the game's membership was 800,000 strong and the largest countries had swelled to over 60,000 users each, or 12 levels. The league reform intended to solve the problem of league pyramid capacity, since the growth of larger leagues, such as Nederland or Sverige, had made it necessary to add a new pyramid level almost every season. Before the league reform, the league pyramid only expanded in size from division 1 to division 6; pyramid levels in division 6 and below were all comprised of 1024 leagues.

Levels 8 and 9 would now double in size to 2048 leagues, and 10 and below would increase to 4096 leagues. Following this restructuring, all bot teams at that time were relegated to the bottom division, replacing them by promoting extra teams from lower divisions.

• Between rounds eleven and twelve, there is a long downtime of about 70 hours. For the second time, the HT universe is restored from a backup (see the article on Black Friday).
• New leagues: Al Iraq and Azərbaycan.

Season 30 (2006/08/13)

• The stamina skill is changed: stamina levels fall steadily during the season and training is revised.
• Old players' skills decline more frequently, in smaller increments, than before.
• The non-existent skill denomination is added.
• New leagues: Al Kuwayt, Angola, Bangladesh, Crna Gora; Srbija i Crna Gora will be renamed into Srbija.

Season 31 (2006/12/03)

• New leagues: Al Yaman and Oman.

Season 32 (2007/03/25)

• Youth academies were introduced.

Season 33 (2007/07/15)

• Player birthdays are individual. Previosly all players had their birthday the same day (in the end of the season). Now all players have their birthday on one of the 112 days of the season.
• League extensions up to 10 levels: Polska, Portugal.
• New leagues: Ghana, Moçambique, Negara Brunei Darussalam and Prateh Kampuchea.

Season 34 (2007/11/04)

• FYR Macedonia renamed to Makedonija.
• New leagues: Benin and Suriyah.

Season 35 (2008/02/24)

• The new match engine is introduced for the regular matches.
• fan expectations for a match and the season were introduced.
• Uman renamed to Oman.
• New leagues: Dawlat Qatar and Tanzania.

Season 36 (2008/06/15)

• League extensions:
  • Up to 4 levels: Saudi Arabia
  • Up to 5 levels: Belarus
  • Up to 6 levels: Iran, Hanguk
  • Up to 11 levels: Italia
• New leagues: Republic of Uganda and Dhivehi Raajjeyge Jumhooriyyaa.

Season 37 (2008/10/05)

• The new design was launched.
• New feature: Indirect free kicks.
• Goalkeepers need set pieces to save free kicks, but can no longer be your set pieces taker.
• Play creatively tactic was made more efficient.

Season 38 (2009/01/25)

• Conditional substitutions was introduced.
• Long shot tactics was introduced.
• Transfer market regulation; you can't transfer list a player more times than he has played games for your team.
• Squad limit of 50 players.

Season 39 (2009-05-18)

• More accurate match ratings including the full effect from confidence, confusion and pulling back.
• The team confidence effect was lowered.
• A new HT-Live with Re-live was introduced.
• The possibility of managing your team by SMS was removed.
• For added security, from now users are able to have a login name different from their nickname.

Season 40 (2009-09-06)

• Hattrick launched a Facebook application.
• Managers can list their favourite teams with a small new feature.
• All bot teams from level six and below started to demote to the lowest division at season's end (and teams with active managers started taking their places to spice up the competition).

Season 41 (2009-12-28)

• The distribution of basic chances in the game engine is changed, making some chances exclusive for each team, to improve the balance and reduce the variance in the game. This also enabled a better handling of the counterattack and pressing tactics.

Season 42 (2010-04-19)

• A new match engine that is not based on 4-4-2 and can handle all formations without having to reposition players.

Season 43 (2010-08-09)

• Faster training on many skill levels, but also slower on high levels.
• End to longer injuries: when a player gets injured, +4 is now the longest the injury will be.

Season 44 (2010-11-29)

• General (form) training type is removed.

Season 45 (2011-03-21)

• Cameroon, Uzbekistan, Cuba and Palestine are new members of the Hattrick family, now grown to 128 Coutries!

Season 46 (2011-07-11)

• All users get access to the basic training report.
• Match order form is improved with a rating predictor.
• Letting two players swap positions on the pitch also becomes possible.

Season 47 (2011-10-31)

• The loyalty makes perform better the players in your team for a long time.

Season 48 (2012-02-20)

• Hattrick joins Zattika, a games publisher focused on social and mobile gaming.
• Hattrick Tournaments.

Season 49 (2012/06/11)

• New Hattrick Manager License Challenge.

Season 50 (2012/10/01)

• Autobidding for transfer market.
• It is possibile, through Offerwalls, to earn reward points to get Supporter and Credits without having to spend real life money.

Season 51 (2013/01/21)

• Hattrick Supporter Platinum, Gold and Silver.

Season 52 (2013/05/13)

• An alternative competition with a faster pace for those who want more action: Ladders
• To the relief of many, Zattika sells Hattrick back to the old owners, but unfortunately some well respected and known colleagues such as HT-Klas and HT-Tjecken has to say goodbye.

Season 53 (2013/09/02)

• The community in the anniversary vote requested and gets to dismantle the Golden Goal rule.
• Youth teams will no longer have a week off during the senior teams' season break.

Season 54 (2013/12/23)

• CHPP applications are againallowed.
• New Ladders for Federations tournaments.

Season 55 (2014/04/14)

• Introduction of the season friendlies (no more training advantage for teams playing qualification matches). More play-offs and play-outs added in the lower divisions to make more matches matter for a longer period during the season.
• Supporters can now play more than one tournament at a time, with no limitation to their own country tournament.
• Injury history of your players.
• New staff system.

Season 56 (2014/08/04)

• Redesigned of Cup system and additional Divisional Cups for the lower divisions (to let more teams enjoy the experience of a meaningful cup run).
• Is being increased the prize money for winning a tournament and also at earlier stages of the Cup.

Season 57 (2014/11/24)

• New mobile web and redesigned iPhone and Android apps.

Season 58 (2015/03/16)

• Revised Confidence.
• The training penalty for walkover has been removed.

Season 59 (2015/07/06)

• Match report shows all chances in the games after they have been played.
• Now you can chat with members of your series, with your match opponent or within a federation chat room

Season 60 (2015/10/26)

• Staff system gets an update and from now on your staff will be given contracts.
• At last, HT-Time is abandoned and now you can choose your time zone and finally being able to follow your matches without having to calculate how much time difference there is with where you live and Central Europe.

Season 61 (2016/02/15)

• Players and reports show levels above "divine".
• The mentor system is improved to make the experience even better for mentors and mentees.

Season 62 (2016/06/06)

• New Live Viewer (also added a chat) provides interesting and updated stats during the match.
• With the Team Analysis tool, you can quickly analyse the previous matches of your upcoming opponents.

Season 63 (2016/09/23)

• Match Replay
• Improvements to youth team, such as the training results available immediately. Scouts no longer present you 17 years old talents in youth academy or 19 year old players in scouting network.

Season 64 (2017/01/16)

• Hattrick International is a whole new league, it will crown themselves the first champion in some 6 seasons time.

Season 65 (2017/05/08)

• Match order page with new visual design and a lot of new functionality (such as being allowed to bench 7 substitutes) to help setting up a good lineup.

Season 66 (2017/08/28)

• Introduced Generation Trophies, an international competition where managers face off against other teams that got started in around the same time.
• New training page was launched, giving better planning tools and more detail about what factors impact training.

Season 67 (2017/12/16)

• New Framework for Specialties & Special Events: the key points of the change is a new, more transparent way to generate Special Events, big tweaks to the effects of all current specialties, two new unique player roles (Sitting Midfielder & Power Forward) and, finally, the introduction of completely new speciality.
• A new individual order: Man Marking.

Season 68 (2017/04/09)

Nothing happens.

Season 69 (2017/07/30)

• Instant matches were introduced.
• Updates to Transfer compare, Transfer hotlists, the Team of the Week.
• New leagues added to Hattrick for the first time in 7 years! The island nations of Comores, Curaçao, Guam, Sri Lanka and São Tomé e Príncipe.

Season 70 (2017/11/19)

• New leagues added: Ethiopia and Congo joining Hattrick.

Season 71 (2018/02/09)

• New player faces (more realistic-looking).

External Links

• Official Hattrick History
• Anniversary page about our first 15 years