The evolution of football, simulated
Having recieved the demo about 2 weeks back, I was overawed with the graphics and the new engine that the game was given. This made me eagerly anticipate its release. It arrived yesterday morning whilst I was at work. I just had to take a 1 hour dinner break to try it out!!
Wow, am I glad I did this. I was completely blown away by the level of depth in the game. Coming from Hartlepool England (Where??? You say!!) I was buzzing to hear that my local team was on the game. So I put them in a friendly, vs some Irish team (wow, Irish teams are even on the game!!). Right from the off, it just felt like football. Some sloppy passes, dodgy positioning, terrible shooting - just like real life!! Thats not a negative review, its great that it was accurate like this! The commentary was smooth, the stadiums and player graphics looked exceptional, all in all I was very pleased.
I tried then a game with Man Utd to see if the skill levels increased - wow do they, hugely! Ronaldo was able to burst past three or four players with pace and close control, Rooney and Vidic strong on the ball - it was just a magnificent feeling to play it.
Aside from gameplay and graphics, I had a brief spell on manager mode last night. They have real currencies on, but its naff in the sence that player values are all over the place. They had Patrice Evra valued at £1 million, he is arguably the best left back in the county and would demand at least £10 million if United were to sell. Also, the Charity Shield was played at Stamford Bridge - erm its usually WEMBLEY fifa!! As such I havent had chance to see whether the rumours about the dodgy FA cup dates were right, however I simulated an FA Cup and I can confirm sadly that in the Semi Finals it was Man Utd v Wrexham and Liverpool v Swansea (thankfully United and Liverpool got through) so Im a little dissappointed in Fifa for this.
Be a Pro mode at first was fun, but I must admit I got a little bored of it after a while. The fact that you can ask for a pass from anywhere on the pitch and your players will punt the ball to you is just a terrible feature, and also things like challenging for headers is made near impossible, so for me its a work in progress. Also, why is it only available in friendlies?? I thought Be a Pro was all about Career football??
Online - fantastic. I played against a Birmingham City fan last night and he was a great sport. Seen the game out till the end, I won 2-0 with two cracking goals after some heavy pressure. There is no lag whatsoever. My only gripe online however was that whenever I tried to play a ranked or unranked game, I was faced with the message "You must update the squads" over and over again, followed by "The Game Sessions Isnt Available". Im sure a patch will fix this in time.
Overall, pleased so far. A few glitches that are annoying, but overall the gameplay is good enough.