I always think of the Pro Evolution series as the newcomer, gate crashing EA's market dominance party, but then I realise that Pro Evolution has been around in various guises for a good long while now. It stands the testament of EA's high production values and ability to know what the consumer wanted that FIFA has been able to fend off competitors (sales-wise at least) for such a long time. But things have changed, and now EA are having to increase their efforts each year to stop FIFA becoming just another one of the pack. It has meant that over the last five years EA’s football game has changed out of all recognition – the glossy, slick presentation is still there, but the game behind it has changed for the better. I have to admit that I've never been a fan of FIFA, but this one has really won me over.
For those that are either (a) new to football games, (b) been living on Uranus for the past decade, or maybe just (c) took their brain out and left it somewhere, FIFA Football 2005 is a straight up and down simulation of the beautiful game. The game has more licenses than you can shake a badger at (more than any other game by a margin), a whole load of player likenesses, and a huge selection of competitions to play in, including a massive career mode that does a good job of aping, and even improving on PES’s Master League thanks to all the real teams you can be “manager” of. The game looks good, although not quite as refined from a distance as it is up close, and the sound effects are pleasing enough for a football game, not to mention the reasonable, if slightly random commentary provided by John Motson and Ally McCoist. It even sports online play. All the boxes ticked then.
As you'd expect, the play isn't revolutionary - you control a single player at a time on the field (although you can have limited control over other players' runs off the ball too – last year’s clever but too-fiddly gimmick), switching between players with a tap of the A button. The other main face buttons perform shooting, passing, tackling etc, with the triggers being kept for tactical needs. The controls are simple enough to pick up, but they do feel a little vague, mainly when passing. When you want to make a pass, you push a direction and pass, and wait for the player to orient themselves so that they can make the pass safely – all well and good when playing the ball around at the back, but it slows down play when you'd prefer passing to be quick and snappy while attacking – it's not unusual to find that you've changed your mind by the time your player has made the pass, and “remembered” button presses are still a problem. The newest addition to the control system is the 'first touch' ability, whereby you can make your player take their first touch in any direction by pushing the right stick in your desired direction - the better the player, the more audacious the first touch. It's easy to do, but adds a deceptive depth to the play.
My biggest problems with the game do all stem from the control system – not only the passing problem, but when defending and changing player, the control will often switch to players that are behind play, meaning that you have to keep on tapping the A button to get to a player that is going to be useful. Secondly, I don't think the default button configuration is very good – the delay on the control means that you will quite often find your player belting it into Row Z because the ball came free while you were trying to tackle an opposing player, and the button press was 'remembered' by the game. My final criticism of the control system is that the slide tackles seem to have a mind of their own – you can be lined up to take the ball away perfectly, hit the tackle button, and then your player changes direction slightly and hacks down the opposition. On the other hand, the game's pace is quite sedate by default (although extremely adjustable) and players seem to be out for a jog rather than a sprint even with the run button held down, so you get plenty of time on the ball, allowing you to score fantastic looking goals without too much practice. It's not quite as easy as holding down shoot and have it fly into the top corner, but you can hit some absolute firecrackers of shots at up to 40 yards.
One of my usual bugbears, the set play systems, are well thought out in FIFA. Shooting from free kicks is a mixture of skill and judgement, with you manually setting the direction and curl, before having to time your taps as an indicator moves up and down a bar to select your power and how accurately you hit the ball - it's a nice and tactile system – similar to that which golf games used to use. Most other set plays involve you picking a player to play the ball to, and then timing that player's movement to get to a set point to intercept the ball – again, a nice system where the player seems to have a reasonable bearing on what actually happens and really has to battle for good position, rather than a hit and hope approach.
But to be honest, it wasn't until I got online that the game took off for me. Like many games, playing against other real people in competition adds that bit of spice that can go missing otherwise, especially in sports games. The Xbox Live connectivity gives you some matchmaking services – either an instant hook up to an opponent, or you can visit a chat room (where chat is somewhat lacking thanks to having to use a joypad & virtual keyboard) and challenge people there. People can set up their own tournaments, and you can take part in matches that either do or don't contribute towards a world ranking. Once in game, the experience can range from absolutely perfect (as if the other player was on the sofa next to you) to a being-dragged- up-the-stairs-by-your-ankles jerky, although it rarely becomes unplayable. There does seem to be a problem with voice communications though – I had it cut out on me regularly - it didn't overly spoil the online experience, but I wouldn't rely on having voice coms there all the time. Nevertheless, it was nice to go online and bash Jonny Foreigner worldwide, or even just have a kick about with a mate while chatting about the news of the day (important note: PP couldn’t beat Diddly with AC Milan when Diddly was ickle Yeovil Town).
And that's what really sums it up for me about FIFA 2005 – it's not a deep game, and certainly not one that I'd play for hours on end. It's definitely more of a 'kick about' than a full training session. But it can be a lot of fun for half an hour at a time, and so I'd be happy to recommend it if you want to pick up and play a game of football occasionally without being too bothered about anything other than what the twenty-two men on the pitch are up to.
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