FIFA 09 Hands-On

[spit_bubble]

Quote: Originally Posted by koshi

From what I've read about FIFA 09 so far, two things stand out to me...

I should've made myself more clear... Two positive things...

And on the other hand... From this OS preview:

"...The one area that perhaps isn’t seeing a ton of improvement is the hit-or-miss approach when it comes to stealing the ball. When a player is dribbling and a defender meets him head-on, it still seems like either the defender wins the ball or doesn’t, with little middle ground in between the two binary choices..."

This aspect really contributes to the constant back and forth action of FIFA, along with defending players closing down too fast in the midfield area and not playing enough positional defense.

ChaseB... If you can answer this from your time with the game... How is the overall team defense in the midfield area? Would defending players try to channel players properly, and close down more methodically like they should?

[ChaseB]

Well I was playing human vs. human games. But there's some new defending controls this year which should help you better keep the flow of players to specific spots. Whether you press a button to more or less contain a player, or another combo to close down harder, there's more ways to defend now in the midfield area. I'd say in my play time there probably wasn't quite enough time spent in that middle half of the field.

[sportsdude]

Quote:

Another big addition this year is team tactics. There will be various sliders to help tweak not only the style of the human players, but the CPU teams as well. This means if you want a CPU team to be more aggressive and foul you more that’s entirely possible by tweaking the particular slider. If you expect Arsenal to make short little passes all the way down the field (slicing up your defense in the process) then tweak the necessary sliders and there you have it. The menus are a bit laggy when tweaking these sliders, but otherwise it’s seamless enough. You can also set up four custom quick-select tactics that you can change on the fly in the game. So if you want to change from a quick-passing offense to a more long-ball oriented offense, then just have two different custom slider sets in place. Also, since the EA Locker is in the game this year, this means you could re-create the entire English Premier League tactics-wise, then upload and share those tactics with everyone else in the world. There’s a limit to how many tactics you can save, but there are enough slots to at least make the entire EPL if you choose. Basically if you think EA didn’t do a good job creating the way Chelsea plays in real life, then change it, end of story.

giggidy.

[spit_bubble]

Quote: Originally Posted by ChaseB

Well I was playing human vs. human games...

Ah, I see. Thanks for the answer.

How the AI closes down at different parts of the field is paramount...

Though these tactics sliders make it sound as though maybe you can effect this. I hope so. I'd love to kick PES 2008 to the curb sooner rather than later.

[Krebstar]

Chase, did you notice a decent amount of fouls? Or at least if you see a pretty rough hit with a rough animation that looks like a foul, was it called?

[EXboxur]

Quote:

There’s a limit to how many tactics you can save, but there are enough slots to at least make the entire EPL if you choose.

It would be nice if we could save tactics like roster saves or settings. So, if we can only save say 20 team tactics, then I could have an EPL set, Serie A, Bundesliga, etc. I'd like to have a bunch and load them in as I need them for the proper teams/leagues.

[[Icy]]

I wonder why did EA decide to limit the "Be a pro" mode to only 4 seasons, when the NHL09 mode is going to last 15 seasons (more like real life players careers).

[Krebstar]

Quote: Originally Posted by [Icy]

I wonder why did EA decide to limit the "Be a pro" mode to only 4 seasons, when the NHL09 mode is going to last 15 seasons (more like real life players careers).

They're banking on us all suffering an Eduardo type injury and then deciding to retire.

Maybe not the best explanation, but at least it's topical.