FIFA 12 was considered by a whole lot of people to be the greatest sports game of all-time. I finally see where that praise is coming from since I started getting into EA Sports’ worldwide powerhouse. I don’t know if I’d anoint it with the GOAT crown, but it is a damn good game, and one that captures its sport better than any other.
And yet, FIFA 13 blows last year’s edition completely away.
EA themselves have said that after playing just one game of FIFA 13, it’s impossible to go back to 12. I can tell you that statement isn’t just hyperbole. The improvements made in FIFA 13 show you flaws you never even knew existed in FIFA 12. I played one match of head-on-head action, and already saw things I never had seen in last year’s game.
The improvements made to the Player Impact Engine makes all the difference in FIFA 13. EA has put a huge focus on real-world physics in all of their sports titles this year. The improvements have been apparent in my time with Madden 13 and the NHL 13 demo in those titles. FIFA shows its physics changes off with the enhanced ball control physics in FIFA 13. In FIFA 12, well-struck passes and long clears would seemingly still be collected in the same manner as most other passes, with the receiving player usually able to easily control the ball and immediately start a regular dribble. In 13, the ball is much more alive than in previous years, and players can do much more to direct the ball when collecting a pass. Receiving long goal kicks with one of your midfielders isn’t an automatically successful process as it was in FIFA 12, as long kicks will require extra effort on the receiver’s part to corral the ball to move it up field. The new one-touch control helps this, as you now have a greater ability to at least direct those hard to collect passes away from defensive pressure. It leads to sequences simply not possible in FIFA 12.
The new physics applied themselves very nicely to the players on the pitch as well. Players running full-speed who get clipped by a slide tackle fly farther than those who don’t. I saw a Keeper desperation slap away a ground ball to save a goal before a trailing attacker was able to pop it in from close. The whole game seemed to flow more naturally, and the occasional unpredictable bounces you’ll see in real-life soccer action now will show up in your game. Also impressive were the animations as a whole. EA seems to have lived up to their goal of doing away with canned animations, as pretty much every reaction I saw made sense in the context of the action on the screen and felt much more natural than in years past.
I also got to catch a glimpse of the Match Day features. When going into an exhibition match, you are able to see how player ratings are different from their default values, and who is hot or cold at that moment in time. EA also did a nice job adding small touches to the UI to get more info at a quick glance. Team ratings will show how you compare to your opponents right next to your squads stats to make it easier to find whatever skill matchup you’re striving for. Small touches like showing the order of substitutions is a nice touch also. This is also the first time I’ve not been bored to death by the game intro in a FIFA title.
I really wish I could’ve seen FIFA Ultimate team, but that will have to wait until another day. In the meantime, I can safely say with confidence FIFA 13 is going to be an excellent playing title when it drops September 25. If you love the Beautiful Game, or even just love sports titles and aren’t necessarily a soccer fan, you owe it to yourself to give this a look. Now I have to go back to impatiently waiting for FIFA 13 while I bemoan how lame FIFA 12 just inadvertently became.
VG Confab 