REVIEW: FIFA 17

As I said last year, and will probably say again next year, annual sports games are surprisingly tricky to review. The changes are usually subtle, numerous and may not truly reveal themselves until many hours after a typical review period. Mercifully, however, this year’s release has at least one major addition that doesn’t make discussing it feel like a game of ‘spot the difference’.

Once again though, in the interest of good ol’ consumer advice, perennial soccer sim rival PES must be briefly addressed. I’ve played a pretty good amount of PES 2017, but again not enough to feel comfortable giving a definitive opinion. In lieu of a full review, I’ll give my general impressions.

Compared to FIFA 17, PES is a little more precision-focused. Some may call it “fluid” or “responsive”, but while those are not necessarily inaccurate descriptions, “crude” would probably be more honest. FIFA isn’t unresponsive to the point where it’s a dealbreaker, but by default, there’s a bit more simulation (animation, AI assists, etc) in-between you and what’s happening.

See, PES is like a racing car, with all the interior stripped out for maximum efficiency and the truest connection between the machine and the man behind the wheel. FIFA is an expensive sports car; beautiful and full of luxuries like air-conditioning, an automatic braking system and various kinds of computer assistance software. Neither one is really better or means you’re more “pro”, before you start writing that comment. It’s just a preference thing.

In other words, both games are about even on the pitch, but your personal preferences will determine a clear winner and loser. This renewed competition is really nice to see again. The rest of PES 2017 is, well, the same as every year. The presentation is terrible and there’s a distinct lack of authenticity. It still has the Champions League license, and downloading fan-made kits and so on is pretty easy, but it doesn’t come close to FIFA.

Onto FIFA 17 then. Before we get to The Journey, we’ll start with the actual gameplay, which is neither going to win many new fans or lose many that liked 16, but it’s certainly a bigger jump than the one between 15 and 16.

The headline feature is the new Frostbite engine, which is now EA’s company-wide game engine of choice. This is a good thing, if FIFA 17 is anything to go by. The graphics are massively improved, with vastly superior lighting, depth of field effects and more detailed player models.

This is even more evident in the replays and match presentation (as well as The Journey) which now looks virtually indistinguishable from the real thing. Weirdly, while the addition of manager character models in the game is long overdue and awesome, some of them look kind of bad compared to the players.

The other big change is a totally different set-piece style. Penalties are a lot better, with significantly more control over the run-up and placement of the ball. The only criticism is that keepers don’t seem fully equipped to actually save the new penalties if placed in certain parts of the goal. It’s not a major problem as shootouts are always the worst way to settle a game anyway.

Corners are now seen from the regular camera view rather than behind the player, and there’s a reticle that lets you place the ball much more accurately, in theory. This change sounded good, but it actually sucks. It doesn’t actually make it any easier to hit the guy you’re aiming at and the corner options – like “crowed the keeper” and “near-post run” – barely seem to work anymore.

With direct free kicks, there seems to be a bigger difference in accuracy between bad takers and good takers, but they’re otherwise mostly indistinguishable. You can theoretically change your angle of approach to get more curl on the ball or run from far away to smack it, but it doesn’t seem as useful as it should.

Surprisingly, open-play actually feels the most different. The AI has finally remembered how to attack and hasn’t lost anything in defence, so it will offer a much bigger challenge at all difficulty levels. I had to drop a setting at first, after learning to hammer every team on Legendary last year. This is extremely welcome and makes it a lot more realistic and rewarding. For many people, no match will automatically be a win anymore.

Teams are also more distinct, but still not distinct enough. For instance, Arsenal will play pretty passes and be tough to contain, but even a terrible long ball team can turn on the style more often than reality suggests. Even so, team tactics are customisable enough that styles are balanced and recognisable if you know what you’re doing.

Whatever your level and style though, it’s the little changes that will require the most getting used to. Interceptions are even more common than last year, which when combined with the enhanced physical strength of players, can make breaking down an entrenched team realistically frustrating.

Trying to dribble or pass remotely near an AI defender on World Class or Legendary is like trying to penetrate a force field. This does make pulling off a great run or passing move rarer and therefore more rewarding, with the downside that high-pressing teams are going to experience a lot more give and take.

Adding to the potential for controller-smashing rage is a new, somewhat looser, style of shooting. Bad shots are now far more likely to go into the stands or flirt with the corner flag. They also feel a bit less satisfying to hit, but it’s not all bad.

There’s actually even more ways to score now, including improved chip shots, better headers, more accurate volleys and classy “passing-it-in” style finishes. Pressing the shoot button again after holding it down will perform a ground shot if off the foot, or downward header if off the bonce.

Through balls also get a new modifier, similar to driven passes, called threaded through balls. All these make building and finishing moves a more deliberate set of choices without demanding significantly more skill.

Mercifully, keepers aren’t as ridiculously good as they were before. They’re a lot closer to being believable this time around, performing great saves when it makes sense but not immune to human error.

All this and a whole bunch of smaller tweaks makes FIFA 17 feel quite different, but a lot of people’s first impressions will not be unreservedly positive. It’s a kind of two steps forward, one step back situation, while PES has clearly moved forward every year this console generation and has now levelled the field.

But it’s still really fun once you make the transition, regardless of whether some of the new features let it down. It’s getting closer and closer to the real thing every year, which is great, even if that progression means that the game becomes more difficult to just pick up, bang in a few screamers and have a laugh.

Of course, the thing that’s really got people talking this year is The Journey. Essentially a cinematic evolution of Be A Pro, The Journey follows the story of fictional player, Alex Hunter, rather than a custom player.

There are characters, rivals and better storytelling than a David Cage game. There’s even Mass Effect style dialogue choices that subtly change what kind of things happen to Hunter, but mainly just whether he gets more fans or recognition from the manager.

Most of the things you expect to happen will happen, like choosing which club and position to play, getting loaned out to a minnow, battling for success against rival players and other spoilerific but kind of predictable things with his career.

In order to develop as a player, Alex attends training between every match, which isn’t as annoying as it might sound. The training mini-games are similar to those in last year’s game, but have been tweaked to be more tolerable and less time-consuming.

Also between games is the Twitter-like fictional social media feed, which doesn’t allow for interaction but does a nice job making things feel more alive, as fans that once disliked Hunter learn to love him, or vice versa. Of course, the interactive cutscenes are the main focus, outside of the actual matches.

These story moments are mostly believable with decent performances and really great facial animations, especially for a game that has, you know, never done a story before. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem like much can be changed about the story, with the same things being said and same events occurring no matter what you do. This is disappointing, but understandable. Again, they’ve never done this before.

On the pitch, it’s incredibly satisfying to come on as a sub with 20 minutes to go and turn the game around, while controlling only one player. In every match, Hunter is set challenges to meet. These are really basic, like “score a goal” or “get an 8.0+ match rating” and don’t change much.

The grading system itself is pretty simplistic too. It often punishes good ideas, like knocking the ball off a defender to win a corner, telling you that was a bad pass or whatever.

It’s another aspect that needed nuance to it, such as a cutscene where the coach gives you specific instructions like “the left back is slow and I want you to exploit him” or “we’ve got this, so just defend from the front and break up play.”

That’s all that can be said about The Journey, really. It’s great, but a bit shallow.

The rest of FIFA 17’s modes haven’t changed much from last year, depending on your point of view. There’s no player interviews or press conferences in Career mode, which seems like a massive missed opportunity given the awesomeness of The Journey. There is a slightly improved menu layout so you can see a few days ahead in the schedule at a glance, but the big addition is club goals.

Basically, the board sets a bunch of targets for you to meet: youth development, brand exposure, financial prosperity, domestic success and continental success. Each club applies a different level of importance to each of these, so Man City want trophies but don’t give a flip about youth or profits, while Spurs love youth and need international brand exposure.

It’s not totally clear how to meet all these, but they don’t affect much so once again it’s another feature that’s too dumbed down to be interesting. If FIFA 17 could have some kind of advanced career mode along with the regular one, that’d be very welcome to all of us who aren’t into Ultimate Team.

Speaking of which, FUT has attempted to tackle the monotony of saving up for superstars by adding squad-building challenges that do a better job rewarding you for creating different kinds of teams. Most interesting though, is FUT Champions, which rewards success with a ticket to a tournament where you’ll be able to win real-life prizes. It’s tacky and manipulative, but FUT is already kind of tacky and manipulative, so whatever.

Summary

FIFA 17 is a great game. The on-pitch action is as realistic as it’s ever been, aesthetically and mechanically, but not without some shortcomings. It’s no longer stagnating like last year’s iteration, but while The Journey is fantastic, Career mode still feels woefully underdeveloped.