EA's newest soccer title is nearly in stores. A demo is already available for download on both the XBox 360 and the PS3. What can we expect from EA's latest soccer title? Here are a couple observations I've made from the demo.
- Celebrating After Goals - The custom celebrations is a pretty cool features. It doesn't effect gameplay, and I don't think too many people would have been upset if they left it out, but it adds a bit of fun, simply because every gamer loves to taunt their opponent after a goal. How many fights will this lead to among friends? We'll keep you posted. (Screenshots of some celebrations below)
- Penalty Kicks - PK's are going to be far more difficult to stop now. The keepers can only move slightly left and right before the ball is kicked. This means that they're really going to have to dive in order to make the stop!
- Near Post Goals - The keepers react much better to the near post shots and aren't going to allow 'automatic' near post goals from nearly impossible angles.
- Keepers More Agressive - In general, the keepers are more aggressive and come out to attack the player with the ball more. I'm not sure yet if this will be a good thing or not. I do like it so far though.
- Slide Tackles - The slide tackle animation is a bit different this year, which I think will turn out to prevent some of the gamers that slide tackle all game long. Now, it's more of a sweeping tackling, instead of a long slide. This causes the defender to cover less ground while sliding. Again, a bit too early to tell if this is going to be a positive or negative yet.
- Free Kicks - Free Kicks still feel very similar and you can't pass the ball in a 360 degree angle in the demo. Still pretty good though.
- Corner Kicks - As a preliminary review, I would say that corner kicks are a bit easier to defend, and more realistic. I haven't seen the GPS guided laser to the attacker's head that the defender can't even touch yet, but I have only seen a handful of corner so far.
- Goal Kicks - I like the new camera angle on the goal kick. It makes it much easier to clear the ball.
- Passing - The passing game is not as easy in terms of short passing and knocking the ball around as it is in FIFA 08. However, I think there is more potential for attacking passes, and I believe that you'll find the difference between average gamers and top notch gamers will be how well then can pass. I'm not yet sure if they have tied the passing game in with the ability of the players, but this would be a way to finally make midfielders more valuable. I noticed that the lobbed through ball is now a much more deadly pass, but doesn't seem glitchy. Very promising so far on the passing, although I can see some people being very frustrated by it.
The most significant difference in FIFA 08 and UEFA Euro 2008 so far is the player controls. This could be due to the weather factor, or it could be due to the fact that UEFA is still in 'beta' mode, but the players feel much more stiff and harder to control in UEFA than in FIFA. I'm just not sure what to think about this so far. This could be a good thing, that requires gamers to pass more, but it could be very frustrating as well. I think we'll just have to wait and see how the final build turns out before we pass any major judgment.
Oh, and for you guys that really liked the collectible cards that were in last year's version of UEFA Champions League, I think they're back this year. The cards we're in the specs when the game was announced for next-gen, but the players have gold, silver, and bronze stars over their heads. This leads me to believe that represents which level card they are. We'll know in a few weeks.
