FIFA 15 is the first game in the series that was built primarily for the new generation of consoles
The day has finally arrived. FIFA 15 is now available in stores throughout North America. Over the last five years, the FIFA series has established itself as one of the most consistent and highly regarded sports video-game franchises in existence. Last year, FIFA 14 received a Metacritic score of 87. With that recent history, expectations are again high for the newest version of the game. With the Xbox One version in hand for over a week, it's time to share thoughts, impressions and to score the latest game in the FIFA dynasty.
"It brings our award-winning game to new levels of authenticity and realism, and enables fans to immerse themselves in the drama and emotion of the league. "And as a life-long Liverpool FC fan, I know exactly how that feels!" Lionel Messi will be the cover star of the Xbox One, PS4, Xbox 360, PS3, PC, Wii, PS Vita and Nintendo 3DS game once more, which has a release date of 26 September in the UK and 23 September in the US.
FIFA 15 is the first game in the series that was built primarily for the new generation of consoles, but if you are a veteran of the series, you might have a hard time noticing it. FIFA has always been one of the most polished of the sports games, so this iteration begs the question: How much more beautiful can The Beautiful Game get?
Those that have not played the series in recent years are in for quite the surprise. No sports series has incrementally improved as smoothly as FIFA. The controls are daunting at first, but it is not difficult to learn the basics and slowly layer your game with the minutia of the sport. Dribbling is precise, and whether you are sprinting or protecting the ball while you advance has a tangible impact on your success. Similarly, the differences between passing, crossing and sending a through ball are all subtle, but you quickly learn which to use in each situation.
Perhaps the biggest change, at least under the skin of the game, is the way momentum and strength come to bear during each on-pitch encounter. This is perfectly indicative of a small tweak that has wide-ranging repercussions in how the game plays. As a defender, it has become significantly more difficult to successfully make a tackle. Sliding tackles were altered in a previous version of FIFA so that the square button basically became “push-to-foul” unless you got the positioning and timing absolutely spot-on. FIFA 15 makes a similar change to the circle button. It’s no longer the button to mash when you’re challenging for the ball – that results, nine times out of ten, in shirt pulling, an unceremonious shove or a clumsy entangling of legs and the resultant foul. Circle is also less useful when you need to stick a leg in to win the ball.
EA Canada can’t win in that respect, because whichever angle they cater toward, they’ll always be upsetting someone else. It’s a shame Career Mode has seen such little love this year, but regardless, there are enough changes overall that FIFA feels a very different game this year. They’ve not reinvented the wheel, just put shinier trims on it, and perhaps this isn’t the year that the presentation needed to take centre stage. The ball feels looser here, as well. Often in previous FIFA titles no matter how hard you hit the ball, it always felt like it was pre-ordained to arrive to the target. Here, the ball is a physical object. You’ll sky it over everyone for a throw-in, but because the players are physically realistic, you’ll also miss that last ditch attempt to keep the ball in. But there are anomalies, and I lost count of the times the defensive AI would hit a huge panicked clearance that bypasses the entire midfield and coincidentally lands at their attacking man, who is now in a one-on-one with my last defender.
Harder, faster and stronger means FIFA 15 is a better reflection of modern football than ever before. The above quoted comments clearly shiow that the reviewer has not spent any time playing any version of FIFA 12, 13 or 14. The above described features are gameplay scripting features that have not only been present in the past three versions of the game, but have been the subject of a huge amount of debate within the gaming community. So much to the point that EA have tried at various points to cover up the fact that they exist, publish a press release designed to look like a interview regarding the subject, and finally ban the discussion of the subject on all EA forums. We’re taking into account that there a vast amounts of FIFA 15 Ultimate Team players who are not having problems, but there are evidently plenty of users who are really having trouble with the app and they should not be ignored. A new more thorough update is required to resolve these issues once and for all, but whether EA is listening is anyone’s guess.
