The game cleverly knows if you’re trying to dink the ball over the top of defenders with the outside of your foot.
If you’re coming from PES, then things might feel a bit complicated. If you’re familiar with the slow pace, defensive focus and intricate button combos of FIFA 16, you’ll feel right at home with 17. For FIFA 17, EA has switched engines to Frostbite and while this could have signalled huge change on the pitch, it doesn’t. Of course, the sticking point for any football game is gameplay. Ultimate Team is still as addictive as ever, and the career mode is fun if you have plenty of time to put into it. The Journey is just one of the many modes in FIFA 17, but there hasn’t been that much added to the others. But they work well, and the cut-scenes are nicely done and look fantastic.Īt the most basic point, The Journey is simply a career mode with some fancy acting and a simple story. The doting mother, the busy-with-work dad, the gruffled flat-cap-wearing grandad and slightly seedy agent – they’re all present. The mixed bag of characters are very well voiced, but follow the most obvious stereotypes. There are reasons to stick with it, though. Next week, I scored another hat-trick and my reward was to be sent out on loan.
#Fifa 17 cover full#
The cut-scene that followed was full of dejection and disappointment. In one game, I played – if you’ll pardon my arrogance – an absolute blinder and bagged a hat-trick, but my team lost. But I get the impression that sometimes it makes no difference, and this is the mode’s downfall. The way you perform in the matches, and training, helps determine whether you’ll be on the bench or in the starting XI. You can either control the whole team or, like in Be A Pro, just control Alex. The games are self-explanatory, just typical FIFA matches with the odd tinker to make them fit into the story dynamic. The mode is broken down into three distinct sections: games, training and cut-scenes. We first meet Alex playing as a boy, on a muddy Clapham Common, before witnessing a vital trial that could make or break his career. You play as Alex Hunter, an up-and-coming ‘wonderkid’ and third-generation pro. The premise of The Journey is simple, and packed with cliché. WATCH: FIFA 17 vs PES 17 – Which is better? In many ways it’s just like that, but I have to give props to EA (and BioWare who assisted with the story) for how well it’s been done.
#Fifa 17 cover movie#
I instantly likened it to some crappy straight-to-TV football film, or the laughably bad but also quite entertaining Goal! movie series. I too had misgivings about The Journey – FIFA 17’s name for the story mode – when EA first announced it. Spike Lee even directed last year’s version.
2K has been at it for years with its M圜areer mode in the NBA series, with the mode becoming increasingly popular with each iteration. It sounds odd at first having a single-player campaign in a football game that isn’t completely about management, but it’s hardly something new. There are two huge changes to FIFA 17: the move to a brand-new engine, Frostbite, and the focus on a story lead ‘campaign’. In many ways it’s a resounding yes, but FIFA and PES are now more different than ever, and that’s a good thing.
#Fifa 17 cover update#
But in the most odds-defying 12 months of football I can remember, can the latest update to the beautiful game’s most popular sim still stand tall against Konami’s fantastic PES 2017? In football’s incredibly unpredictable world, FIFA’s regular yearly launch provides us with a nice bit of stability. Available on Xbox One (version tested), PS4, Windows PC, Xbox 360 and PS3