FIFA 09 - Gameplay Review - Part 1

I've got my FIFA 09 and I've been playing it over the weekend. There is so much in FIFA 09 that it is not fair to review the game after just a couple of days of playing. But you don't need to play for too long to understand the game play improvements and features. So I'll review the game play aspects of FIFA 09 in this post. See, I haven't played much of Be A Pro seasons, Manager Mode or even the online games. All I've done is to play the offline exhibition games and quick custom tournaments.

The most striking thing in game play is the pace of the game. It is noticeably faster than FIFA 08 and almost the same pace as Euro 2008. I can assure you this much that it is no way pacier than the actual pace of the premiership or la liga. Serie A? Yes, it is pacier than the Serie A. See there are three settings for pace - slow, normal and fast. What I refer to here is the 'slow' pace setting only. Some gamers like slow pace because that allows them to take time to think to weave attacks. Same with me. All of us should learn to play the quicker game, think on the fly and play more intuitively. As get used to the pace, it doesn't feel fast at all.

The quicker game play would have been terrible if it was not coupled with the high player response rate. Luckily for us, deliberately by EA, the players response it very quick which complements the quicker game play. The gap between the button press and the player performing as per your instructions is very very less. There is still some lag at rare scenarios but that's ok because that's the price you need to pay for realism. In FIFA 08, there was considerable lag in player response which made you accustom to a certain timing when it comes to button press. If you want to shoot from 15 yards, you gotta hit the shoot button when you're at 18-20 yards itself. I'm kind of so used to this timing that I used this in FIFA 09 as well, unintentionally. The result: the player shoots from 18 yards with the power and direction that suits for 15 yards.

If you want to enjoy FIFA 09, you should unlearn your FIFA 08 wisdom and play FIFA 09 to its merit. Make a list of all the do's and don't's of FIFA 08 and ensure to forget them and start afresh. Then how should you play FIFA 09? Just play like you would play football on the pitch. Just play it like real football. The players can do a lot of things, individually and collectively. It's only your ability to tap the full potential that would make the difference. In FIFA 08, I had this problem of the players on the pitch playing with a different mentality than mine. While I'm in a hurry, they would display no sense of urgency, because of the inherent lack of quality and capabilities. Now in FIFA 09, when I want them to play like their life is depended on it, they really do. They get tired, they get upset, they give their best, they're more human than ever. That's what I like best about FIFA 09.

The next key thing you'd see is the new animations. There are hundreds of new animations that the players perform that didn't in FIFA 08. Thanks to the new set of animations, the players' off the ball capabilities have improved tremendously. Defending is now a pleasure. Our defender can do some harmless shirt-pulling, constant jockeying, some body checking - all this without or before resorting to the hard tackle. So before you go for that risky hard tackle, you have multiple options to unsettle the ball carrier as much as possible, which is a great thing.

The jumping and heading animations are all fantastic. Now it's all about timing the jump and the header. Sometimes, you'd see an attacker and defender go up for a seemingly 50-50 high ball only for both of them to miss the ball because they mistimed their jump. The ball would fall a few yards away as a possible loose ball. Amazing animation, that one. The desperate dives, the last gasp defensive headers, the sliding shots, the in-the-air collapses - they are all here, making the game look as close to the real thing as possible.

The best new feature award should go to 'custom tactics'. FIFA has introduced this very serious and complicated feature with some gusto. You can now determine the playing style of your team. Custom tactics define how the rest of the AI players in your team play in the match. You can now determine if your players should prepare for fast set up or slow set up, prepare for short passes or long passes, prepare for lots of shots or less shots, prepare for lots of crosses or less crosses etc. The key is the word 'prepare' because they can only prepare and be in positions, only you make the pass or shot. You can also play narrow or wide. You can ask your players in the final third to be organised or play in free form. You can also set how your chances need to be created - from shots from anywhere or from crosses or from passes.

When I was playing Inter vs Milan at the beautiful San Siro at dusk, me and mate (playing co-op for Inter) thought that it's all getting too congested in the centre (middle vertical third). It was getting difficult to pass or to keep possession as the Milanese defenders were closing down on us vigorously. All that we had to do was to go to the custom tactics and increase the playing width slider from 35 to 75. The difference was bloody obvious. When you're leading with 10 minutes to go, and if you want to hold your lead at any cost, you can set custom tactic set up to slow set up with short passes.

The other time, we found that our back four is pushing up too far up front. Reduced the pressure slider from 65 to 10 and the aggressiveness from 60 to 15. The defence started doing what I want them to do. The custom tactics works like a charm. The more you understand and exploit this, the better you'll be at this game.

(CONTD)