For a game that received such critical acclaim, there was a lot of uncertainty surrounding PES 2016 going into E3 2015. For one, there was Konami's mid-May announcement stating that going forward mobile gaming would be their future. While that statement was clarified in early-June several outlets sparked furious debates regarding the future of PES After some reassurances from Konami, the release of a teaser trailer before E3 2015 helped to erase doubt and raise expectations for PES 2016 as they debuted this year's tagline "Love the Past, Play the Future."

A few days prior to E3 2015, the team over at Konami released their first features list. With some time to digest this list -- and to witness the game in action -- let's revisit what we've seen thus far:

On the Pitch

Advanced Collision System – To be blunt, the collision system in PES 2015 was an eye-sore at times:

With a limited amount of animations in play and no true respect to momentum and physics the results were often unpredictable and quite random. From what we've seen so far this looks to be much improved in PES 2016 as the true physicality of the sport is better replicated. Players now use arms to hold off defenders and position their body in the way of marauding defenders. The true test will be how this interacts with the foul system/referee logic, another let down in 2015, especially considering how well fouls were called in PES 2014's final patch.

1v1 Control – A common and valid complaint about PES over the years has been the lack of responsiveness when dribbling with the ball in 1v1 situations. While 2015 improved upon 2014's sluggish controls the need for further tuning was realized by the PES team. In the Brazil vs Germany videos we have seen, Neymar (the PES 2016 poster boy) has been the terror he is in real life when on the ball. PES 2016 looks to be even more fluid and despite some instances where players still seem to slide. The game's respect of momentum and turning defenders as the primary way to beat them looks solid at this point.

Perfect Defense – The key to a good game, no matter the genre, is about balance, and Konami's news releases have touted what they called "Perfect Defense." While the catchphrase sounds a little scary the intent is focused on tackling. Tackling in 2015 was more clumsy than it was precise often resulting in a lunge which left your player dead-to-rights with no way to respond. Tackling in PES 2016 looks to be aided by the addition of more animations allowing for a more fluid transition from defense to offense. Again, the key for 2016 will be in how the referee interprets mistimed tackles or over-aggressive challenges. From the videos we've seen it's been a mixed bag. The referee AI looks to be improved but there were still instances where the defender got a little too physical without proper repercussion.

Intelligent Player AI – Strong AI has been the calling card for this series for quite some time and the team over at Konami do not appear to be resting on their laurels. Combination play, while improved in 2015, still suffered from the user having to manually trigger 1-2's which often saw your original passer continue his run after the ball was long lost. Replicating beautiful Barca-esque team goals often required many manual triggers. Intelligent Player AI looks to build upon your player AI off the ball by opening up combination play. Something this writer noticed were the runs made by the strikers. Frequently in the Brazil-Germany match you could see the attacking players actually attacking the space voided by the defenders.

Goalkeeper ID – After the calamity that was keepers in PES 2014 the team over at PES focused some serious time and effort on keepers for 2015. What resulted was a huge improvement but still not good enough to be labeled as a strength. For 2016, Konami looks to add even more animations as well as variations amongst the keepers based off their strengths and weaknesses. Keepers who are better in the air and command the box (Manuel Neur) will be balanced by those who are more acrobatic in their saves (David De Gea). Hopefully the team will address some of the animations currently in the game that play-out in slow motion. Saving penalties can be a painful experience when your keeper is in midflight only to see the opposition already celebrating.

Human Motion - For 2016 Konami has boasted that animations have been tripled in areas such as goalkeeping, shooting and passing. Too often in 2015 the game suffered from not having a deep enough animation databased resulting in some funky looking gameplay. Players would frequently take an extra touch when either controlling a pass or trying to get a shot off resulting in a loss of possession. Combined with more fluidity overall, this area looks to be improved from what we've seen.

Celebration Control - In 2016 Konami finally says goodbye to canned celebration animations. As we can see from the videos, a button prompt will now give users the opportunity to select the highlight of their choosing. Signature celebrations like Totti's infamous selfie are accurately captured.

Commentary - Commentary has been long been a sore spot for PES. The duo of Jim Beglin and Jon Champion have never really forged a cohesive partnership with both lacking the lines necessary to give a truly dynamic feel. New commentators (Peter Drury & Marco Hagemann) have been added for the UK & Germany respectively while new lines have been added that will hopefully make Master League feel more alive.

Enhanced Visuals - Building off another year with the famed Fox Engine, PES knew it had to step up its game in the visuals department. With more scanned faces and attention to detail, PES 2016 looks to improve from what was an inconsistent 2015 iteration. While up close the game can look stunning, from a zoomed out perspective the pitch and nighttime lighting can be hit or miss. Microsoft Xbox One users will be happy to hear that Konami has optimized the game in 1080i this year, a much needed upgrade from the disappointing jaggy-infused 720p 2015 edition.

Image Import - Edit mode has long been a staple of the PES series and one that has inherently created a strong online community. After being absent in 2015 it finally makes it return for the PS4 in 2016. Team emblems, kits, and manager faces will be benefit from a dosage of much needed realism. What's left to be seen is how/if Sony will deal with option files and their ability to be shared. Hopefully, Microsoft will open up it's console to USB image transfers in-time for this release in September 2015.

Dynamic Weather - PES will have Dynamic weather. While not truly dynamic in the sense that rain could stop and start at any time during a match, the weather can now change during halftime. The effects won't solely be visual as the weather will now affect ball physics, footing, etc.

Dynamic Wide Camera Angle - Konami mentioned this new camera angle in their press release but we the fans are yet to have seen it in action. As with all camera angle options, this will be based on user preference but I'm curious to see how this plays out as it is supposed to offer the user more view of the field while simultaneously zooming in depending on your location.

Off the Pitch

New Master League - FINALLY! From its archaic menu to its "Smiley Face" transfer system, Konami has claimed to look at every aspect of Master League. Once a strongpoint of the series, Master League quickly became outdated and surpassed by it's main competitor. From the 2015 E3 IGN video you can see what looks like a new interactive team management user interface with a return of the hexagonal system. Advanced team and individual stats can also be seen as well as club trends.

One last addition that has been confirmed is that the game will take photos of your players in-game with the intent of displaying them on the Master League menu with a brief write-up. All promising news but the true test will be when we the fans get our hands on the game come September.

MyClub - The first rendition of MyClub was a relative success and it's return will see Konami aim to improve on it for 2016. One area the developers aimed to address was the overall screen clutter. Many users, including myself at first, became overwhelmed by the menus and the large amount of data on the screen.

As you can see, there are plethora of new features Konami being touted by Konami for PES 2016 with the majority of them focusing on their core offering, gameplay. Konami came out of the games strong and received a fairly positive buzz during E3. Hopefully as we delve deeper into summer we'll hear a few more announcements before Konami's Gamescom reveal.

What PES 2016 features are you most excited about?