FIFA 2002 Preview
EA Sports' next football--we mean soccer--sim is nearly here. Read our impressions of a nearly complete build.
EA Sports' latest look at football, international style, is on its way. FIFA 2002, this year's edition of the long-running series that has been entertaining soccer fans across the globe since the early 1990s, is set to debut within weeks. Development has entered the final stages, so expect to be kicking the ball around the virtual pitch not too long after you put away your Halloween costume.
Just don't expect too much in the way of surprises. A recent late alpha build shows that the design team members are spending most of their time fine-tuning the features that have made the game such a critical darling over the past few years. All the important options and modes of play can be found right where they were last fall. Friendly, season, and multiplayer modes top the list, with one new wrinkle joining them. World Cup qualifying play will be part of a FIFA game for the first time since Road to World Cup 98. You will be able to guide your favorite national sides (around 75 are included, from Bahrain to Belgium) from the AFC, CONCACAF, CONMEBOL, and UEFA regional groupings through the lengthy tournament that determines who gets a trip to South Korea next year. You will also need to manage your roster, a task that could prove to be pretty challenging in its own right since you'll often have to work around the availability of star national players.
Career play still won't be part of the package, although individual season play should be so encompassing of the entire soccer world that most will be too busy roaming the globe to care. Thousands of real-world players are again being modeled for the game, representing hundreds of club teams from the 16 included national leagues. Every major organization will be represented, from the vaunted English Premier League and the German Bundesliga to the less prestigious Israeli Premier League and the Norwegian Tippeligaen. So you'll be able to go with the big boys hefting the serious bucks, such as David Beckham and the rest of the crew at Manchester United, or scrape by on a limited budget with the likes of Shmulik Levi and his teammates with Beitar Jerusalem.
The look of the game appears to be better than ever. In its alpha incarnation, FIFA 2002 is almost lifelike when viewed from up close, featuring realistic player models that come complete with accurate hairstyles and skin tones that range from dark to pale and blotchy. Those with shaved heads appear so true to nature that you feel as though you could reach through the screen and feel their stubble. It's hard to imagine a more accurate representation of the wide range of human features present in races and cultures from every corner of the planet.
Animations are nearly flawless at this point in the game's development. Players already sprint, kick, and tackle much like their counterparts on a soccer pitch near you. Added touches include players' heads tracking the ball in midair and revamped kicking and tackling animations to add a little diversity to scoring opportunities and beating up the opposition. Stadiums come with animated crowds jammed with cheering supporters, many of whom are waving team or national flags (depending on the occasion), and dynamic lighting effects that occasionally cause reflections off the heads of male pattern baldness victims.
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- GameSpot Score9.3Editors' Choice
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FIFA 2002 Review
Fans of real-life soccer will find this the most enjoyable soccer experience on the PC to date.
- Nov 19, 2001
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