Anyone who’s reading this will already be well aware that this year’s officially licensed UEFA EURO 2012 tournament offering is paid DLC rather than a full blown retail release. Only time will tell whether that turns out to be a good move, but we can tell you exactly what it’s like right now.

The DLC is split into five sections. The tournament itself, Euro 2012 specific challenges, Kick Off, Online and the all new Expedition mode. As with FIFA Street and our later FIFA 12 playtests we weren’t able to get online, so we won’t be able to comment on that. The same goes for challenges, although they’re unlikely to be live given the fact that the tournament hasn’t started.

Euro 2012 Tournament

Much has been said about the decision not to include the qualifying stages in Euro 2012, with producer Sebastian Enrique stating that they looked at the metrics and decided to leave it out because based on Euro 08 and WC2010 data, they saw that many people skipped straight passed them. It’s a massive shame that they’ve done this as funnily enough, the tournament itself is the best bit of the DLC and being able to progress through the qualification stages to extend that experience would have been most welcome. Instead you’re left with just six matches to play to lift the trophy which you can blast through pretty quickly and although the presentation is superb, there isn’t much of a draw to play through it more than a couple of times.

The tournaments homepage is similar to a stripped down Career Mode homepage and much like World Cup 2010 too, with team management and statistics options available on the left and the ability to cycle through the current group standing on the right. In the middle you’ll see your next available fixture and the news panel, which will display things like suspensions or reactions to results, at the bottom. One really nice touch is the simulation of fixtures played before your next match, meaning you can quickly keep up with other teams progress in the tournament without having to dig back into the statistics menu. All the fixtures are scheduled for the correct dates and times and the match conditions reflect that.

On the pitch everything is very much FIFA 12, but the match atmosphere has been nailed and you really feel like you’re participating in something big. The new commentary in particular stands out, with frequent references to happenings elsewhere in the tournament as well as progress in the golden boot, previous games and so on. Going into the Euro 2012 Final Rooney and Bent were tied with three goals each and when Bent scored, Tyler noted that he was now ahead of his team mate in the chase for the Golden Boot. Hopefully we’ll see more depth like this continue to leak into Career Mode as time moves forward, as such small touches do wonders for the games authenticity.

The stadiums themselves are again, top notch. The advertising and official branding have been plastered on with a spade and although it can look a little busy at times, I fully expect the tournament itself to look this way too. The trophy celebration will disappoint many and I’d have expected some change here, but sadly there isn’t. It IS basically just FIFA 12 reskinned for the tournament, with new stadiums, commentary and updated kits, but that said I’m very much looking forward to loading it up again once the tournament starts. EA have managed to capture the magic of international tournaments in these six matches and I can imagine it’ll only be more enjoyable once the tournament starts proper.

Expedition Mode

Expedition mode makes up the bulk of the DLC and it’s certainly the part which is going to demand the most time investment should you attempt to finish it. The concept is somewhere between Ultimate Team without the control and the winning players model we saw introduced in FIFA Streets World Tour. You start with a poor team and you tour Europe playing matches to make it better, fairly straightforward really, but it’s a bit of a mess.

Your captain can either be your Virtual Pro or a player of your choosing and once they’re confirmed you then need to select the rest of your squad. You’ll be given a mash-up of players rated roughly 49-59 (in our experience) from various nations which you can refresh as many times as you like, but it probably won’t make a blind bit of difference.

The team customisation options are pretty thorough, with plenty of options to modify your kits, badges and so on, much like FIFA Street but without the option to unlock others further down the line. You can revisit these options and make changes at any time should you fancy it.

Nations are sorted by their qualifying groups, so once you’ve selected a starting point you begin by playing the teams that didn’t qualify (I could be wrong about that, but it certainly seemed that way, you need to play the lesser teams in the group before the better ones unlock). Beating nations gifts you one of their players, the first time you beat them you’re awarded a reserve player, the second time a substitute and the third time a first team player. You don’t get any control over which player you get, but you can choose to reject them if you wish. The problem with this is that you might be looking to strengthen up at the back, but if you keep getting rewarded with strikers the idea of designing your own team goes out the window. The possibility of hunting out the better players just by playing against better teams isn’t available to you either because you need to beat the smaller nations to unlock the bigger nations.

Winning matches also allows you to build roads to other nations. You can’t play a team until you’ve built a road between them and somewhere else that you also have unlocked so usually you’ll be given the option at the end of a match to pick which path you want to open. It doesn’t always work however as sometimes you’re only given one road to open (which in my case was one I’d already opened, even though there were other locked paths within that group). If you lose a game then the road to that country is destroyed and you’ll need to revisit other nations and beat them to unlock it again. Every win (up to a total of three against each country) will unlock a photo from the tournaments history. Each photo counts as a piece of a mosaic you’re slowly building as you progress through the Expedition which I guess is the goal of the mode – to complete the mosaic. How likely that is though I’m not sure as there are a total of 180 pieces to collect.

Given that it’s the largest part of the Euro 2012 DLC, it’s a shame that Expedition Mode is so convoluted and drawn out. To make any sort of progress you’re looking at a huge number of matches (150+) and at the end of it, all you’ll have is a mosaic and a hodge podge team that you’ve had little to do with sculpting beyond choosing the teams to play against. I’d have been happier if it had been left out and the DLC was cheaper. Sounds harsh but I really didn’t get the concept at all. Maybe it’s just me.

Verdict

The overall presentation is fantastic and completely faithful to the Euro 2012 branding. The tournament itself was hugely fun to play through even with the real deal being so far off and the prospect of frequent challenges being made available throughout make this a good piece of DLC for FIFA 12 which I will certainly be buying. Expedition Mode feels like a massive swing and a miss, although it’s entirely possible that some people will enjoy it. The balance between investment and reward just seems completely off to me. Overall though, UEFA Euro 2012 is definitely worth a look.

As I’m sure you all know by now we plumped for a 7/10 in our FIFA Street Review and predictably some of you agreed, some of you thought we were generous and others were disgusted with our constructive negativity. Just another day on FSB then, but what did everyone else think?

Here’s a round-up of the the best FIFA Street Reviews everywhere else on the web…

IGN – 8/10 – “FIFA Street is more about fantasy fulfilment: it’s about nonchalantly pulling off audacious tricks, scoring outrageous goals, and humiliating your friends in the process”

Eurogamer – 8/10 – “This is still unpretentious fun, but now it’s also a surprisingly deep and characterful little sports game, and a welcome stopgap between FIFA 12 and 13″

CVG – 8.5/10 – “Polished in a way only EA can, FIFA Street is a quality offshoot – ping pong to the main game’s tennis”

TheSixthAxis – 8/10 – “FIFA Street is a very enjoyable game, even though it’s not the game I expected”

Joystiq – 2.5/5 – “The latest FIFA Street could be the foundation of a great game down the line; it just isn’t one now”

OXM – 7/10 – “Still, if you’re getting bored of FIFA and like your football a little more vibrant, this is a decent if not essential choice”

VideoGamer – 8/10 – “Messi’s appearance as poster boy is not coincidental to the sudden increase in quality, as FIFA Street strikes an enticing balance between trickery and an all-round solid game”

Metro – 7/10 – “It’s as gritty as a corporate luncheon, but this is a worthwhile, if lightweight, alternative to FIFA 12 – even if it still doesn’t fulfil the potential of the concept”

The Guardian – 8.5/10 – “It’s worth a look, particularly if you appreciate football skillshots, or like to play 5-a-side after work”

Playstation Universe – 7.5/10 – “If you can get past the poor A.I., occasionally frustrating goalkeeping, and controls that are just a bit slow, you’ll find a lot to like about FIFA Street”

Official Playstation Magazine – 8/10 – “This is a fantastic alternative to the main series – offering up all the thrills of your Monday-night work league”

We’ll continue to update this post throughout the day.

As well as the launch hype we should also see a massive influx of FIFA Street reviews today which we’ll of course round-up for you over the weekend. In the meantime if you’re still on the fence about FIFA Street you can check out our informative review, and if you need to know where the cheapest place to purchase said game is, then head over to our buyers guide.

So who got the game delivered a day early, who’s rushing out to the shops after work and who’s holding on for a price drop?

Click here to view the embedded video.

Gameplay:

One of the key differences between the demo and the retail code is the availability of the harder difficulties and playing on Gold and Silver again after racking up some time on Bronze in the demo makes Eas decision to only include that difficulty even more bizarre. Given that the unlocks in World Tour stack, there isn’t really a reason to play the game on bronze. Once you’ve got to grips with the game, it won’t test you at all.

The two tougher difficulties however not only provide more of a challenge, but allow you to see some of the new AI at work. I’ve seen CPU players refuse to score in an open net in 2v2 Panna matches as they’ve not got anything in their bank, instead they’ll bring the ball back into play and try to take you on and rack up beats before finding the net. On the flip side of that, they will actively try to score to wipe your bank if you get cocky and build up a large lead without cashing it in. Sometimes those gems can work against the game though as I’ve also seen the AI avoid scoring in a similar way, but in a 5v5 match when they were behind.

Overall your supporting AI is pretty much spot on. It feels like they’re always trying to make themselves available to receive passes and ensuring you have options, Something I imagine is significantly helped by the smaller pitches.  They can sometimes get caught behind the ball when you push forward quickly however. If you switch to your keeper or most defensively positioned player and move them, one of your team mates will drop back in behind to make sure your net is protected at all times.  Keeper distribution is a bit of an issue, sometimes the keepers pass choice is just bizarre,  it breaks the flow of the game when a pass doesn’t go to the obvious destination and at it’s worst, concedes possession.

Another issue Keepers have is getting pulled out of position at the end of matches. In the final 30 seconds or so of a match you’re losing, the keeper will stray from his line presumably to join the attack, but he ends up going out wide and leaving the net open. In a match with a one goal margin, it could be the difference between stealing an equaliser and taking the game to golden goal, or having the final nail smashed in.

Sticking with Keepers, they do cause problems in other areas. In match types with a dedicated goalkeeper I found them to be really heavy, and usually late, when going into a challenge, completely wiping the player out. This is usually coupled with a defender getting involved, creating a mash off three players all struggling to get up. It’s not the impact engine at its best.

Although the impact engine has been tuned to suit the smaller, enclosed environments of FIFA Street it still suffers. Perhaps more-so than FIFA 12. When a bad collision happens, it takes a while for the players to correct themselves and for normal service to resume. It’s not something that’s happening in every match and it seems to happen less in larger environments, but it’s a slag when it does. Generally speaking the interaction between players feels a little sticky and you can sometimes feel like things are out of your control. Not scripted as such (dear lord I hate that term) but somehow hindered. It could be a product of animation cycles finishing or something else entirely, but once in a while you really notice it. In fairness, this will work in your favour as often as it works against you.

You’ve got the option to lock to a single player in any given game which is a welcome addition, but not one I’ll personally continue to use. It seems to disable the supporting AI somewhat, making them take a backseat until you give them the ball. When they have the ball they do adopt a much more attacking mentality but considering the pace of most matches, you’ll want to be in control as much as possible and won’t want to be relying on the CPU to score goals for you.

Passing is good for the most part, although the heavy assists don’t always make the right choices. Manual players will suffer the most frustration, but after a few games you get used to it. In honesty I think the game is a little too quick for manual passing to have worked anyway. The frustrations with passing don’t stem from accuracy, especially once you’ve started levelling your players up, it’s the choice of destination that will cause people problems. When you’ve beaten a player and try to play the ball to a team mate in space but the game decides to try a 1-2 to yourself off the wall, it’s incredibly frustrating. It’s not a massively frequent issue but it’s there, and will almost certainly be a a focal point when people play online.

Shooting is solid, but again can be irritating. In some cases it does feel like there’s too much error, especially when you find yourself missing an open net from close range. In arenas with larger goals it’s entirely possible to score from range and shots tend to stay low when hit hard but as the net size decreases things get a little more wayward. With both passing and shooting, the balance between the heavy assists and error just feels a little off. It’s frustrating to miss sitters when you’ve pressed the right button, but without the error, scores would probably get a little out of hand. I think less assistance and slightly less error would probably give a better experience but I could be wrong.

The trick input is much easier than we’ve ever seen in a recent  FIFA game (although you can revert to the FIFA 12 style system if you want) which allows you to concentrate on skills and combos without having to stress about the controller input. It was an absolute necessity to simplify the controls for tricks because of the broader audience EA are looking to reach and it’s been nailed. The style points feedback panel that flashes when you perform a trick gives you a visual indication of your input if you’ve pulled something off by chance and will tell you if you’re trying to do a trick that’s not yet been unlocked. I haven’t found any tricks to be particularly overpowered yet, or any that are completely undefendable and have been pretty successful in stringing together combos and chaining tricks that look cool but still actually authentic. I’ll leave the flashy stuff to the YouTubers, nothing beats the satisfaction of a good Panna anyway…

Streetball Control is the biggest change you’re going to see on the pitch, holding LT will allow you to face up to the defenders and move the ball around your player whilst remaining stationary. You can drag the ball left and right, back and forth, putting your player between the ball and the defender before choosing your next move. You can use it to tease players by hanging the ball out in front of you ready to ping through their legs when they dive in, or shield the ball to run the clock down. From an attackers perspective, it’s a wonderful tool to have at your disposal and i’m sure EA will find a use for it in some form in FIFA13/14, but as a defender it can cause you problems.

Defending is another area that needs some work. The controls are just too simple. With only one tackle option you again rely on the game correctly interpreting your intentions which is hit and miss. If your timing is sound you’ll  stand a chance but a mistimed tackle can put you into a fairly wild swipe or stumble animation which pretty much leaves you for dead. I understand the logic, because the emphasis of the game is on style and not defending, but I still feel it should be more fluid. The ability to chose HOW to tackle as well as WHEN is a must and it’s sadly not available. Another defensive gripe is the way physicality works. The attackers ability to put himself between the ball and the defender creates situations where defensively you “tackle” the ball 2-3 times but aren’t able to gain possession because even though you’ve knocked the ball out of the attackers control, you can’t get round him to pick it up.

World Tour:

World Tour is where FIFA Street really comes alive. Once you’ve gone through the opening match you’ll start building your squad and levelling your players as you work your way through the 4 different regions. My experiences have been from a starting point of SE England, so your mileage may vary.

Those of you that have started a World Tour in the demo can import that progress into the game. I found doing this to take the edge off the earlier stages as your players have already levelled up. The first step of World Tour was clearly designed to be a challenge when starting from nothing, so importing players at level 6-7 from the demo allows you to steam straight through it, even on the harder difficulties. Just a gripe really.

The hub of World Tour comes in the way of a map, which gradually expands as you progress through. You can revisit earlier stages at any time, allowing you to truly carve your own experience. You’ll be walked through the various match types, Panna, Freestyle, Last man standing and so on, and the tournaments will come in the way of 4v4, 5v5 or Futsal, with the other types being available through challenges. It’s a great model that ensures you see everything the game has to offer. Challenges are offline only but tournaments can be played online, which is the equivalent of playing on Gold difficulty in terms of unlocks.

As well as the ability to play online, World Tour also downloads teams from the region you’re playing in. This morning I had the pleasure of playing in a 5v5 tournament in Newcastle and the first team captain I came across was called “Facebook my nan”. So now the afro loving idiots can infiltrate your game even if you’re an offline only player, there’s no way to turn the download teams function off (that I’ve found), short of not being connected to the internet.  As more and more people have started to pick up the game, every tournament I’m playing in is filled with 6’7 monsters with huge grey afros. It’s ridiculous and I really hope something is done about it.

In each region, with the exception of the first, you’re required to reach a certain rank by playing tournaments to unlock the next. The beauty of this is that you can progress to the next part of the map without having to finish the prior part 100%. Once you’ve opened a particular area, you can play any of the tournaments or challenges within it, in any order you decide, giving a sense of freedom and allowing you to pretty much avoid any match types you don’t get on with.

The unlock and progression systems in place in FIFA Street are definitely one of the highlights. Any match played contributes to your players XP totals and level, meaning that time on the pitch is never wasted. Lose in the final of a tournament? No problem, you’ve been earning XP all the way through, upgrade your players and try again. If you really got hammered, you can go and play some of the one off events, or revisit earlier tournaments/challenges on a harder difficulty with your improved squad to gain some more XP.

Unlocks are fairly steady and seem to stay in line with the increase in difficulty as you go further through your tour, with small rewards in the way of kit/boots/arenas becoming available after each challenge to boost that feel of constant progress. There’s a mix of licensed and EA branded gear, with a fair few of the assets being immediately recognisable from Creation Centre, but sadly without web connectivity, so no badge/sponsor downloads. You can customise the color of your selected items to your hearts content, and as well as designing your teams kit, used in tournaments, you can also customise each squad members street outfit individually. For the more professional tournaments all of your players will wear the same kit, but in the challenges they’ll wear their street outifts. The customisation is really deep and if you want to spend the time editing your players street outfits you can, with everything from boots to glasses being changeable.

Tricks are unlocked based on your players levels and available XP points. When you reach certain levels, the next block of tricks opens up and you can purchase any that you have enough XP for. It’s a great system as it allows you to cherry pick the tricks you want as soon as the bracket they’re in unlocks. It feels a lot more open ended and customisable than traditional systems that funnel you through a certain path of progression and the variety within each bracket allows you to tune different players in different ways. With your defensive players, it’s unlikely that you’re going to want them doing the flashier, more advanced tricks, so any XP they earn will be better spent boosting their defensive and physical attributes, rather than on unlocking new moves.

At the end of each match you’ll get a summary of your players progress for that game, and from the World Tour map you’ll see an indication when players have levelled up and have unlocks/XP available to them. Other little touches like the ability to preview tricks are great too. When at the trick unlock page you can hit the preview button to watch the trick being performed, really handy if you’re looking for something but don’t know what it’s called.

You can search for friends players and add them to your squad at any time and they’ll start at the level they were on when you download them, for example I downloaded the player of friend who has early access and they started at level 8 rather than 0. The same goes for players you steal from other teams through World Tour. After beating certain teams you can choose a squad member to claim for your team, and depending on where you are in World Tour, they will be considerably better than your other players.

There is a genuine sense of growth within the mode, within the first stage you feel fairly small fry, but as you open the later tiers up, the game cracks wide open and suddenly you’re playing against far better players and real world teams in bigger environments with more at stake. Once you hit the international stages you’re into the realms of playing in the signature arenas with localised announcers which feels a long step away from a kick about in Guildford.

Whether or not World Tour will stand up to repeat playthroughs remains to be seen. I progressed to the third tier in one before starting another and so far so good. Starting in different regions should offer a little more replay value and take you through different arenas in different orders.

Aesthetics:

As you may have seen from our Recent Post, There has been an awful lot of work put into the arenas and visuals. There’s just so much variety and World Tour does a brilliant job of walking you through them all. Little touches like the sun shining through the window in The Hangar, or the background detail in arenas like The Park or Munich Park, really give the game that extra drop of class. Ok, you’re hardly going to stop and admire the view from the Rio Mountain Vista in the middle of a game, but the attention to detail in most of the arenas is outstanding.

The soundtrack captures the style of the game perfectly and there’s pretty much something here for all tastes. Again it’s the small touches like the audio slowing to a stop when the game is paused, or the squeak of trainers on polished floors that give FIFA Street such a unique feel. “Commentary” comes in the most part from the players themselves in the early stages, but as you progress into larger tournaments you’ll get stadium announcers. They pretty much only mention goals and slick beats, but it’s regionalised which is a nice touch.

There has clearly been a great deal of time spent in Eas Mo Cap Centre. The animations played for each trick change based on your starting point, so if you try a rainbow flick from a standing position, you’ll do a rainbow, If you do the same thing you’ve got the ball dragged out to the side using Street Ball control the animation will account for that and the outcome will be different. This goes for pretty much all tricks, meaning that firstly, you can create a much wider range of combos as the animations exist to fill the transitions and secondly, tricks don’t get boring as quickly as they might.

There are 2 camera angles available and both are excellent. The Sideline camera works better for larger matches, Futsal, 5v5 etc whilst the End to End camera works really well in Panna. Really really well. Playing in end to end does flip the controls somewhat but it shouldn’t take more than a half to get used to it.

The Practice arena is FIFA Streets answer to the pre menu arena found in FIFA, which gives you access to all of the available tricks and a keeper to try them out against. It’s surprisingly useful for learning trick combos and stick inputs without the constraints of a match in progress.

One thing that’s hard to describe is how light the game feels in terms of options. You can customise your button layout, but not the triggers, you can set a default AI difficulty and cameras, but not much else. There’s no EA Trax menu, which is a shocking miss as the soundtrack is so good. There are some nice touches to the match menus, such as the return to match setup option, which returns you to the setup screen rather than booting you back to the main menu.

Hit the Streets is the equivalent of Kick Off in FIFA, letting you jump straight into any match type either solo or with friends. You can customise settings like, whether it’s a timed match or first to x goals, which ball type you want to use and how many players are on each side. There’s also 4 slots for you to save customised match types into.

Following in the footsteps of EASFC is the FIFA Street Network, which provides a new way to see what your friends are doing, see when they post or like new videos and hit milestones. It’s well laid out and far less intrusive than the menu toasts you get in FIFA 12. It scans your friends list and makes suggestions on people you could add. At the moment it’s hard to see how good it’s going to be as there just isn’t much content uploaded yet, but that’ll change next week, we’ll do a follow up post once we’ve seen it in action properly.

Online:

When first digging into the online menus you’ll get a bit of a shock. The shock being that not all gametypes available offline have made their way online, Panna, Freestyle and Last Man Standing have sadly not made the cut, which seems especially strange given that Gary Patterson himself has said frequently that Last Man Standing was the surprise hit once they started showing the game off. With that in mind it seems really odd that it’s not been included. They’re a huge miss in my opinion. 2v2 Panna online with three friends would have been amazing.

We were really pleased to learn that you could use your team from World Tour online, less so when we found you can ONLY use your team from World Tour online. You can’t use real teams. It’s BAFFLING and will probably turn a few people off of the game. Yes, every game you play will reward you with XP and will allow you to level up your squad, but unless there is some REALLY smart matchmaking tech in the background online play is set to become a complete mash of unbalanced matches and frustration. My biggest concern would be for people who don’t pick the game up on day one as they’ll be miles behind, even after a month or so. Unless there’s something in place to protect them from heavily levelled teams, they won’t stand a chance.

Street Season borrows heavily from Online Season and rightly so. I think most FIFA players agree that the format is great and offers a lot more than the previous ranking systems ever did. Matches are 3 minute halves and in my short experience online I haven’t yet come across anything horrendous. It should be noted that I haven’t been able to play that many matches online, due to the servers not being very full yet.

Present are 5-A-Side, 6-A-Side and Futsal, which can be played Ranked in Street Seasons or Unranked with friends. As well as Online Team Play which again can be played with friends or random ranked matches.

Street Stories is a section of the menus that allows you to search the leaderboards, see where the spead of players lie in terms of Division and view your Online trophy case to see which of the 9 Trophies up for grabs across the year you’ve won.

Another less important gripe with online is the absence of highlights at the end of matches. It’s not a huge deal but with the FIFA Street Network giving you a new way to upload, share and rate video, it seems bizarre that you can’t save clips from online games.

Verdict

FIFA Street isn’t going to be the game that everyone was hoping for. If you’re specifically looking for it to scratch certain itches that the main franchise hasn’t, i.e 5 a side, then you’ll certainly enjoy it, and may find yourself surprised by the other modes too, but I can see some of the mechanics and heavy assistance not being to everyones tastes. World Tour is definitely the saving grace given the mistakes that have been made with the online portion of the game, but thankfully it really is superb.

People concerned about the game having too much emphasis on tricks shouldn’t worry. I’m not big on skills or flashy moves, but have still had a really good time playing through World Tour, levelling up my team and unlocking new arenas to play in.

It’s fun, fast paced and a little out of control at times, but it’s definitely worth a look.

 7/10

Here’s a snippet of what OXM thought and you can catch their full FIFA Street Review here.

“Thanks to its high-quality animation and well-realized mechanics, FIFA Street only reinforcesFIFA’s standing as EA’s top sports brand. It’s a welcome alternative for veterans, but even folks relatively unfamiliar with soccer will find a lot to love here”

In what is perhaps the shortest FIFA review in history OXM plumped for a 9.0/10 but to be honest, there’s very little in the text to back that up. Mark us down as extremely disappointed, because we, along with many sites would have killed for an exclusive review and this just not good at all. Sigh…

Thoughts?

FIFA Soccer Blog - 8/10 – “Even though it’s lacking the features of FIFA 12 and the touch controls are slightly underwhelming, the beautiful game has never looked or played better on a handheld”

Eurogamer - 7/10 – “It will also undoubtedly be beaten into the turf by its own successor in less than a year’s time”

CVG - 8.5/10 – “Not perfect, but the best handheld game of football ever made”

Gamespot - 8/10 - “Don’t be too disappointed you’re not getting FIFA 12 – you’re still in for a really great time”

Videogamer – 8/10 – “if you want FIFA on the Vita, EA has delivered an excellent port of FIFA 11″

thesixthaxis – 8/10 – “FIFA Football is a seriously good first outing for the franchise on Vita and will be a delight for football fans on the go”

Official Playstation Magazine – 8/10 – “For a first-season effort, FIFA Football is a seriously impressive achievement”

Metro - 6/10 – “It’s clearly been quickly thrown together for the launch, with many features missing or out-of-date, but this is still an encouraging start for FIFA on the Vita”

NowGamer – 8/10 – “Niggles aside, this is one of Vita’s best games, a great game of football and a horrendous time-waster. Good enough for us”

Godisageek – 8/10 – “It’s bloody cool to play FIFA on the train”

Pretty much unanimous then.

With the release of the Sony PS Vita just a few days away now it’s about time we spent some time with EA SPORTS impressive looking launch title FIFA Football. Next-gen Gaming Blogs Asim Tanvir steps up to the plate for the Official FIFA Soccer Blog Review to find out whether it’s all style and no substance, or if it’s the essential handheld football purchase? Read on to find out…`

 FIFA Football Review

With the FIFA series at an all-time high, it was almost inevitable that EA would capitalise on the launch of PlayStation Vita. FIFA Football is the fruit of their labour, but does it live up to the standards of recent releases or is it a launch day rush job?

GRAPHICS

Uncharted: Golden Abyss aside, it would be fair to say that FIFA Football is next in line when it comes to the award for best looking launch title on the PlayStation Vita. One quick glance at the game running on the system, and you would be forgiven for thinking it was the PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360 version of FIFA 12 running on a handheld. Extended play reveals that not to be the case, as you’ll spot low to medium resolution textures designed solely for the Vita, but the game is still visually impressive nonetheless.

Animations are akin to those seen in recent home console versions, which is a remarkable feat considering you’re playing FIFA Football on a handheld. For the most part, this allows for smooth, fluid gameplay but there are a few occasions where you’ll see the frame rate dip quite considerably. These instances don’t last too long though and far from hinder FIFA Football’s incredible visual package.

SOUND

Commentary is exactly the same as FIFA 12, which means it’s really quite good, but you will hear the odd random statement that doesn’t match the on-screen action in anyway whatsoever. Most of the time though, Tyler and Smith or Tyldesley and Townsend bounce off each other nicely, adding to overall TV style presentation.

The crowd sounds are the most impressive audio related element though, with the Vita immersing you in the match atmosphere whether you’re listening via the speakers or headphones. Not only is this a testament to the quality of the Vita’s ability to handle audio, but also further evidence of EA SPORTS’s excellence in sound design.

GAMEPLAY

To clear up any confusion, FIFA Football is not a port of FIFA 12. This, of course, means that the Impact Engine, Tactical Defending and Precision Dribbling do not make the transition across to the Vita. The game uses FIFA 11 as its base, with a few tweaks made to certain aspects of the gameplay to help it flow more naturally. The most notable improvement is the player movement, which is a lot more responsive when compared to recent home console versions. Physicality has also been tweaked a little, somewhat alleviating the issue of almost constant pressure that hampered FIFA 11. If you’re still not getting on with FIFA 12 for whatever reason and preferred its predecessor then you’ll probably enjoy FIFA Football, as it’s essentially what FIFA 11 should have been. It retains the majority of the home console version’s positives and negatives, but in this instance the former far outweighs the latter.

As you’d expect, FIFA Football makes use of the Vita’s touch screen and rear touch=pad, and the results are mixed to say the least. The touch screen can be used to pass the ball into space and directly to team mates. To perform a ground pass you simply touch the area of the pitch where you want the ball to go, whereas a lobbed pass is executed by touching and holding the position where you would like the ball to land. This might sound simple enough, but when you’re actually holding the Vita and trying to use the touch screen to pass, it’s extremely awkward and uncomfortable. To add to that, when you move your finger(s) to initiate a pass, your view is guaranteed to be obscured, leaving you on the back foot even if you’ve executed the action successfully.

You can also use the screen to shoot by simply touching the part of goal you would like the ball to head to, but you’re probably better off doing that with the rear touch-pad, as it’s much more intuitive. When you’re getting ready to shoot just imagine the rear touch pad as the goal and touch the section where you would like to aim your shot. The longer you press the area, the harder and higher the shot will go. A coloured indicator lets you know if your shot was good, average or bad, with good shots more often than not finding the back of the net. Despite the rear touch-pad shooting being a wonderful idea, this is where the cracks in the system start to show. After spending a few hours using this shooting method, you’ll find that strikes are heavily assisted and even defenders can find the back of net with regularity from distance. This applies to the touch screen passing too, even if you’ve got your controls set to manual.

With the rear touch shooting, you might also find yourself accidentally firing off the occasional random shot. It all depends how you grip the Vita and whether your fingers make contact with the rear touch-pad in the final third of the pitch. A warning indicator does pop up to let you know when you’re touching the pad, but you’ll still end up taking a few accidental shots from long distance, especially when you first start playing the game. Thankfully, you are able to turn the touch controls off and continue to use the traditional method with your choice of assisted, semi-assisted or manual control options. Hopefully EA SPORTS improve and refine the touch controls for the next iteration released on the Vita, as the rear touch pad shooting definitely has the potential to work well.

LONGEVITY

There are plenty of modes in FIFA Football to keep you busy with Career Mode and online support doing wonders for the game’s longevity. Sadly, there’s no FIFA Ultimate Team, or Pro Clubs mode and, as the title is based on FIFA 11, the online section is missing the wonderfully thought out Head-to-head Seasons. Also, the Career Mode doesn’t include the vast array of improvements (transfer deadline day, scouting etc) that were introduced in FIFA 12.

Just like FIFA 11, the Career Mode does allow you to take the role of manager, player or player manager. This, of course, means you are welcome to create your own Virtual Pro and guide him through a career spanning 15 seasons. With that in mind, how long you spend playing FIFA Football depends entirely on how addicted you get to the core gameplay and modes. If you do get hooked, then you better keep that charging cable handy, as you’ll be playing the title on your Vita up until the release of the next iteration.

VERDICT

Thanks to FIFA Football, EA has kicked off their journey on the PlayStation Vita with a bang. Even though it’s lacking the features of FIFA 12 and the touch controls are slightly underwhelming, the beautiful game has never looked or played better on a handheld. If you’re picking up a Vita at launch and are a fan of the sport, FIFA Football is well worth a purchase.

8/10

FIFA Football is available on the Playstation Vita in North America and Europe on February 22nd 2012.

Well the year has finally come to an end and over the last 12 months there has been an incredible amount of new FIFA content, announcements, feedback, articles, videos and screenshot from all over the world and in our FIFA Review of 2011 we look back at the very best bits to hit FIFA Soccer Blog.

January

2011 didn’t exactly start with a bang for FIFA news and the announced mass server closures meant some fond FIFA memories of old would be lost forever. Things quickly picked up though and straight after our Retro: FIFA 98 Review the very first FIFA 12 details were announced by Dave Rutter and the term “revolution” would end up sticking with the series all year long.

Some worrying rumours about Andy Gray also began to surface…

February

In February FIFA 11 received its post transfer window roster update as expected and we grabbed EA soundtrack regulars Hadouken for an exclusive interview. Not to be left out the FIFA Manager series also received big news as they launched the Your Feature campaign which would see many community ideas make the final release later in the year.

March

March started well as details of a new FIFA 11 patch to fix issues with Virtual Pro AI and Ultimate Team surfaced. Meanwhile we spent some time reminiscing about FIFA World Cup 2010 which as it turned out was one of our favourite FIFA games of all time.

In a bumper news month EA SPORTS also announced that they were ditching in-game manuals and the Ultimate Team Web App FIFA 11 Beta began. It was only a disappointing night for FIFA at the Gaming BAFTA’s which soured a solid month of updates.

April

FIFA on handheld devices was the hot topic at the beginning of April and rumours of FIFA 12 on the 3DS and the code named NGP were rife. The Official FIFA 12 Forums also opened for business and the revolution bandwagon gathered even more pace after a David Rutter interview with IGN.

In a minor Twitter gaff Clive Tyldesley confirmed his involvement in FIFA 12′s commentary and Andy Gray’s birth was coming under increasing pressure.

May

A dear friend Phil Wride left EA at the start of May but the words on everyone’s lips were “Impact Engine” as OXM published the first details of FIFA 12′s new collision system.

FIFA 12 was officially announced on the 3DS in May, although the fan fare was dampened slightly after we later discovered that there would be no online play as previously promised by EA.

The end of May was utterly fantatastic for FIFA 12 as the first official details on the all new gameplay elements the Impact Engine, Pro Player Intelligence, Precision Dribble and Tactical Defending all hit FSB. Screenshots and a trailer followed and Team FSB were Guildford bound for the first play test of the year.

June

June was off to a flyer as the FIFA 12 E3 Trailer hit the web and the Ultimate Edition of FIFA 12 was announced. This was followed closely by the first community reaction to FIFA 12′s  in the form of our Gameplay Impressions taken from our two day trip to EA Guildford.

E3 2011 brought the biggest wave of news in June and the announcement of the EA SPORTS Football Club topped the billing at the EA Press Conference. During E3 2011 week,  the FIWC Final also took place and Francisco Cruz was crowned champion in Los Angeles.

To cap a fine month for FIFA 12 the release date was announced as September 30th, Arabic Commentary was confirmed and we got a fantastic behind the scenes look at how the commentary duo of Alan Smith and Martin Tyler were settling in to their new partnership.

July

July was the month of Career Mode as Team FSB headed to Guildford once again to sample FIFA 12′s managerial simulation. We released a list of the new Career Mode Features as well as two impressions articles (Dave’s view / Tom’s view) on how the reinvented mode was shaping up.

The first “shaky cam” gameplay video then hit the internet followed by the “unprecedented” EA SPORTS deal with Man City which caused quite a stir at the time, although future deals with other English clubs would eventually dampen the discontent.

July was rounded off very nicely with the release of the FIFA 12 official covers graced by Rooney, Wilshere and co.

August

With the FIFA 12 release date looming EA SPORTS launched their Season Ticket service in August which would give subscribers free DLC and the much desired early access to FIFA 12.

Pint Shot Riot were the first band to be confirmed on the FIFA 12 soundtrack and we grabbed an exclusive interview with them and later All Mankind who would also grace FIFA 12′s audio.

The biggest event in August was of course Gamescom where for the first time the public would get hands on time with FIFA 12 and subsequently open gameplay footage would hit the web. Aside from watching FIFA 12 videos the Demo date was also revealed and we broke the news on the demo details thanks to an early morning German adventure for Asim.

Eclipsing all other Gamescom news though was the surprise announcement of the rebirth of FIFA Street which I don’t think any of us saw coming and the first FIFA Street trailer and details hit FSB soon after.

September

FIFA 12 release month was upon us but it was also the month of lists as we revealed the Teams, Stadia, Trophies and Gameplay Sliders which would all grace FIFA 12 in just four weeks time. Even though the release was still some way off it didn’t stop the first official review score leaking with GamesMaster awarding FIFA 12 – 94%.

New FIFA 12 screens and trailers were litterally pouring out of EAC now and as well as the hilarious US TV Advert FIFA 12 Ultimate Team and Creation Centre also went live, albeit a little later than first advertised.

Then before we could blink it was Goodbye FIFA 11 and hello FIFA 12 as the game launched first in the US and then three days later in Europe becoming the UK’s third biggest game launch of all time.

October

It was starting to get cold outside, but on FSB things were hotting up nicely as our mammoth, six part FIFA 12 Review released with us awarding FIFA 12 a more than respectable 8/10.

We also asked you all to get involved with flagging up bugs in FIFA 12 and worryingly our post amassed some 263 comments, but luckily the first patch was already on it’s way, to amend some of the glitches.

FIFA 12 was grabbing all the headlines by outselling PES 25/1 in the UK but FIFA 11 bit back in October by winning the title of Best Sports Game at the Golden Joystick Awards.

Not to be outdone by it’s bigger brothers, FIFA Street also had a good month as we brought you an exclusive Developer Interview with Sid Misra and a host of pretty new screenshots. The novel FIFA 12 Scarf World Record attempt also launched and we ran a competition to get your names amongst the footballing elite.

November

FIFA Football kicked things off in November and was announced as a PS Vita launch title as we got some new details on the handheld gameplay. We also got the first glimpse of the timed FIFA 12 exclusive on the Xperia Play and the trailer certainly raised a few eyebrows.

The feedback train was also in motion and our Career Mode: The Road To Success parts one and two were posted for the reading pleasure of Simon Humber and his team.

FIFA 12 Patch number 2 also landed in November and it was massive curing many bugs, for many modes although sadly it caused a few of it’s own too.

FIFA Street was back with a bang with the superb Mash-up Trailer and the quite incredible announcement of Lionel Messi as the the new FIFA cover star signing a multi-year deal with EA SPORTS which we then analysed meticulously.  After that we became the Messi Soccer Blog with goal competitions, screens and the Messi Cup all stealing the limelight.

December

With EA SPORTS in a festive mood the hilarious FIFA 12 Xmas Advert was released which would later propel FIFA 12 once again to the number one spot in the UK chart between Christmas and New Year.

The FIWC 2012 opened for business at the start of December with all six online qulifiers announced and PS3 FIFA players were certainly being spoilt as the $400,000 Virgin Gaming Challenge also launched, as envious Xbox 360 owners looked on.

As the middle of the month rolled round we saw the impressive FIFA Football Trailer and an exclusive Messi inspired FIFA Street pre-order bonus was revealed after some questionably titled images leaked.

With Christmas drawing ever nearer it was time for FSB to wind down with our 2011 Awards and a Community Survey from EA SPORTS allowed you to have your final say on football gaming before the year came to a close.

See you all on January 1st 2012…

Don’t worry, we won’t judge you if you scroll right to the bottom to see the final score first and then come back to the top to read the more detailed final verdicts. After you’re done hit the comments and share your own final verdict of FIFA 12.

Suffwan’s Verdict

With the launch of FIFA 12, EA have managed to push the bar tech-wise with sports video games once again. With a plethora of improvements to graphics, audio, gameplay mechanics and features combined with improvements to both offline (Career Mode) and online game modes FIFA 12 offers a much improved gaming experience when compared to it’s predecessor. However, whilst FIFA 12 manages to impress with it’s bold implementation of new gameplay features, it is hampered by the same fundamental issues that existed in previous iterations and remain unresolved.

For all it’s glory visually and mechanically, this game remains an enigma. The simple fact is that FIFA 12 allows you to play football the beautiful way with skill, precision and finesse. However, the basics of the sport that include pass, move and support are not endorsed by the almost lathargic AI that fails to support build up play and seems static. For this reason above all it has surely been the most difficult football game to ever review due to the gulf in variability within the game’s various aspects.

Take nothing away from the FIFA development team in Vancouver, FIFA 12 is the best FIFA game to date and is a joy to play! However, on a personal level I feel that the potential of this game was immense and I keep wondering “What if”!

Tom’s Verdict

FIFA 12 has shown that EA are capable of making bold moves. A lot of FIFA 11 has been ripped up and disposed of, Menus, Online systems, Career mode has seen drastic changes, as has Creation Centre, and that’s before you go into changes on the pitch. I want to see more of this bravery going forward. FIFA 12 is very much a step in the right direction in so many ways, but there is more work to be done. Those largely cosmetic changes don’t alleviate the issues with player movement and AI, which I feel haven’t really moved on from last year. That’s what frustrates me most about FIFA as a franchise, with every step forward, certain aspects get left behind, leaving them to stand out even further than they previously did.

At this point 12 months ago I was already picking holes in FIFA 11 and becoming more and more frustrated by the day, but currently I’m still very much enjoying the game overall, which excites me because there’s still so much left to explore. That said, it’s early days and there will no doubt be problems that arise and exploits that appear, but for the first time since FIFA 09 I feel confident that I could be enjoying the game right up until the next release.

Toby’s Verdict

Overall, FIFA 12 is a game which has improved a lot over FIFA 11, and represents the single biggest yearly improvement in recent years. We have a bulked up Career Mode, an entirely new online setup, and in some ways, revolutionised gameplay, but in far too many areas the game is all too recognisable. The Be a Pro side of Career Mode, and Clubs modes are almost unchanged from last year, and there are far too many problems in FIFA’s gameplay which have been there for far too long.

In that way, FIFA 12 is a contradiction. EA has bravely shown that they are completely capable and willing to make big and risky changes to their core engine, while still experiencing sales growth and great critical acclaim. At the same time, they have been unwilling to expand this revolution any further, spending a lot of time implementing the complex Player Impact Engine, barely noticeable but for the glitches, yet leaving the AI in a frankly appalling state. FIFA 12 may be the best FIFA yet, but at the end of it all I’m still mourning how much potential is still unrealised.

Dave’s Verdict

One thing EA always seem to nail with new FIFA releases is the feeling that you can never go back, and with FIFA 12 that sentiment is perhaps greater than ever before. If that was the only barometer for success, then FIFA 12 would be without doubt a 10/10 game. For me though, improving your product immeasurably year on year is simply expected and not necessarily cause for celebration.

With fundamental issues surrounding AI, inertia and variety of team styles still prominent for many FIFA gamers there’s only so far the largely successful trinity of new gameplay features could ever carry FIFA 12 on the pitch. Tactical Defending has forced FIFA in the right direction but until the intelligence is there to back-up the impressive tech, it will always fall just short of the mark.

FIFA 12 is an immensely enjoyable experience this year and it’s probably the best FIFA game I’ve ever played. My major disappointment is that I don’t believe FIFA 12 is as good as the potential many of its features possess.

Asim’s Verdict

Thanks to new gameplay features and revamped modes, FIFA 12 represents the biggest change in the series since FIFA 09. Tactical defending, precision dribbling, an improved online structure and a bolstered career mode all make the game a much more enjoyable experience than its predecessor. Yet despite all that, FIFA 12 still has some of the same old problems and a few new ones too.

Whilst you’ll get a decent game of football out of FIFA 12 (especially if you play with friends), thanks to the lack of AI, you won’t get a great one. It’s a shame really because the potential for a truly amazing representation of the beautiful game is there, hiding somewhere deep inside. EA promised a revolution, instead what we have is more of a slight evolution. Still, even with that in mind, FIFA 12 is quite possibly the best addition the series yet. If you loved FIFA 11, chances are you’ll love this too.

And the Official FIFA Soccer Blog Review score for FIFA 12 is:

8/10

* The final score is not an average of each element reviewed, additional weighting was given to more prominent game modes.

Replay Theatre – Dave

In fairness, David Rutter did admit quite early on in the release calendar that EA have done very little with Replay Theatre for FIFA 12, and whilst that may have been the correct decision in terms of resource allocation, I can only review what’s in front of me.

The good news is that the limit of saves in Replay Theatre has been upped from FIFA 11’s meagre offering to a bulging 50 saves. Sadly that’s the end of the positivity because beyond that, Replay Theatre is feature and quality identical.

The main issue is that the replays you save aren’t actually replays at all. They’re heavily compressed, poor quality, video files which can’t be re-edited after saving. Even more disappointing is that they’re limited to an astonishing 11 seconds in length, which makes capturing any kind of build-up play virtually impossible.

When you see what Activision and Bungie have done in recent times with their own versions of Replay Theatre for Halo and COD respectively, it really does emphasise just how far away FIFA’s lacklustre offering is from an acceptable benchmark. I really can’t stress enough how poor Replay Theatre is and to be frank, in its current state it’s only wasting valuable disk space.

You’re only as good as your worst feature.

4/10

Game Face -Dave

I’ll be honest; it is odd for an application which has been widely available for two years to still be in beta, but none the less that’s the current state of play with EA’s Game Face technology. Even though it’s still classed as in beta the million dollar question is, has it improved?

For FIFA 12 I decided to create my Game Face again and thankfully the photos I used last year were still stored against my EA ID. Anything which saves the uncomfortable process of capturing a gormless self-portrait gets my vote so very much a +1 to Game Face on that front.

Visually Game Face looks the same, the instructions are the same and the steps to completion are exactly the same. This could fool you in to thinking that the result would be the same, but it’s not. In fact once my FIFA 12 Game Face had been created I barely had to tweak anything, it just worked. In previous years I’ve always had to spend hours upon hours tweaking sliders, gradually making the Game Face look less and less like me as I went.

It’s pleasing to see that the development of Game Face has been solely focussed on the outcome and that’s without doubt the right strategy. The evolution of Game Face has been slow, but finally the rewards are beginning to be reaped.

7/10

Custom Audio – Tom

EA obviously have some limitations as to what can and can’t go into the game, which is why over the last few years we’ve seen so much customisation handed back to the users. Custom Audio was one of the tools provided to do that. The first outing was good, aside from some bugs which we’re assured have been fixed and haven’t experienced ourselves this year, although others reportedly have. Sadly, aside from that bug fixing, Custom Audio hasn’t been touched. The process and features remain the same as FIFA 11, and if there have been any changes to quality behind the scenes it’s not immediately noticeable.

There are still useful options missing such as preview functions for playlists from within the game so that you could test how the audio sounds against the backdrop of the crowd and make adjustments if needed.

That said I still spent the best part of an evening carefully sorting my playlists and assigning everything properly before I’d even thought about starting a Career Mode because this is an excellent feature that, used properly, can help boost the atmosphere of matches, it just needed some attention. So whilst the premise remains solid and still has the impact it did in FIFA 11, the lack of new features or innovation this year makes you wonder if EA have decided that it’s as good as it needs to be.

6/10

Edit Mode – Dave

The actual contents of the in-game edit mode in FIFA 12 haven’t really changed a great deal from FIFA 11 but with Creation Centre now picking up a lot of the slack in this department it hasn’t needed to. What’s there is good and it works well but there are two main issues hampering our creative juices.

The first is that you’re unable to edit the appearance of licensed players. I guess this is restricted by one of the many weird and wonderful license agreements but with the vast majority of FIFA’s roster still without 8-way facial capture it’s a disappointing miss. Seeing Phil Jones running around with dark brown hair rather than his expertly highlighted golden locks isn’t ideal and it should be easy for us to amend.

There is some hypocrisy in the AWOL Appearance tab though because the current settings will allow you to set Wayne Rooney as a goalkeeper, but not make Phil Jones blonde. Which is worse from a license perspective?

The other problem is that once you change aesthetic items like boots, the game treats your default squad file as “customised” and if you then wish to use these changes in Career Mode you have to waive the right to be on the leader boards. Now if I’m transferring players around I totally understand that restriction but for aesthetic changes only it’s an incredibly harsh price to pay. I’ve always said that accessory changes should be contained within their own data file rather than modifying the default, to allow you to re-apply should the default fail or corrupt. I hope EA take that feedback on board.

Beyond those issues the usual options for tweaking Team Management, Rosters and Stadiums are all present and with Creation Centre backing Edit Mode up there’s an awful lot of time you can invest in customising FIFA 12 should you wish to.

An overhaul visually is needed going forward and also a change of strategy with regards to how aesthetic changes are saved and applied but on the whole it’s fairly decent.

6/10

Creation Centre – Tom

You could almost forgive EA for the lack of attention paid to the above considering how much has been changed in Creation Centre. Almost.

The turnaround in the 12 months since it was first released is astounding, with several huge changes being made. Stand outs include being able to customise your created clubs badge and sponsor, which, when coupled with the extra kit options, allows you to create pretty much any team past or present that aren’t in the game, including your sunday league team. The ability to make use of licensed content is a great addition, as is the ability to spread your Creation Centre content further into the game than the exhibition and unranked matches that were available last year, with certain content accessible through CM.

Things haven’t changed drastically in terms of editable stats in player creation but the using the unity plugin that powers gameface to allow player faces to be designed in 3d is a big step forward, allowing more face types to be used. There are more boot and kit options for people that like that kind of thing.

New to Creation Centre is create a tournament which allows you to create a custom tournament of up to 24 teams with customisation of balls and screen overlays which can be downloaded to play in certain modes, which people have already used to recreate full leagues unavailable in game.

The app is easy to navigate and generally solid. There are a few overhanging issues with content from FIFA 11 currently unable to be deleted, but we understand a fix is incoming for that. I experienced the odd crash whilst editing the FSB team, but if you use quick save frequently enough you won’t lose anything. Another downside is that when you’re viewing teams for bookmarking, you can’t see the kits, so you’ve no idea how faithfully it’s been reproduced until you download and use them in game.

Now some of the features above need to be paid for, unless you have an EA Sports Season Ticket, but I have to admit I was shocked at how cheap the add ons are and as long as that money is put back into Creation Centre next year it’s fine by me. The key thing is that you don’t have to own the premium content packs to be able to download content that has been made with them, smart move by EA, as is breaking down the premium content in to packs, letting you pick and choose which features you want to bolt on.

The doors that Creation Centre unlocks are vast and a quick look at the figures at the time of writing shows that, over four million item downloads so far today. There are people that have used the tools for unsavoury purposes, namely creating teams for Virtual Pro boosting, but that aside Creation Centre needs to stay and needs to keep improving in the way it has.

8/10

Features Total 31/50

*This is not the final score for the game. It’s the score for this portion. The final score based on all aspects considered will be live at 3pm*