Okay, over the last ten days we’ve been answering all your questions. The game is due out around the world tomorrow, with places like the US and Asia getting their hands on FIFA 09 for the first time. So this post is for everyone, the guys who have the game now, and the guys getting it soon once they’ve played the game.
All I’ve been playing for the last week or so is FIFA; I can’t even stop playing the manager mode to go and see the other parts of the game, such as Be A Pro Seasons and 10v10 online. I’m getting non-stop invites and I’m quietly rejecting them all trying to get my beloved Tranmere to win a game on “world class” difficulty. But no game is perfect, and so we were wondering; now that the dust has settled and we’ve hammered the game, what would you like to see improved?
Now we know there’s some mighty bugs in there – thankfully EA are working on a patch. I have to admit that the group of bugs present, headed by the through ball bug (where a through pass isn’t “recognised” by the receiver and he will jog around the ball rather than chase it), is annoying. But EA are working on it for the patch, along with the other bugs people have reported on the official EA forums, which is fantastic news.
What we want to know, is what needs to be improved (i.e. developed further or added) for FIFA 10?
Here are a few of my suggestions to get you started:
- Entirely new commentary (this year’s game has lines from last year’s; I’d love to see a team of four commentators, e.g. Martin Tyler & Andy Gray plus John Motson and another BBC colleague, to eliminate repetitiveness)
- Response times tweaked further again (they’re great this year but there’s still moments when a player gets “stuck”, allowing the opposition to take the ball off you – it happens online more often than not, but this is probably down to the servers rather than the game)
- Some more stadia or more varied stadia assignments (playing a season in the lower leagues means playing in the same three or four stadia over and over again, even though there is actually a reasonably wide selection in the game)
- Goalkeeper kits for more teams (there are a lot of generic goalkeeper kits in the game, and the red one looks a bit like a romper suit which is slightly offputting)
- Slightly tweaked difficulties (playing as Tranmere on “professional”, I can win every game against similar opposition 2-0/3-0, but playing on “world class” teams press for 90 minutes and it’s impossibly hard with teams like Cheltenham playing like superstars)
- Slightly tweaked fatigue (when playing the AI or playing online, you get matches where the opposition will press for the entire game without their players tiring enough to hurt their performance, which isn’t realistic)
- Slightly tweaked referees, but just slightly (I like that if someone hacks you down online they get a red card, that’s how it should be – if EA change that then it will be a step backwards, BUT, some games finish with eight fouls and eight yellow cards)
- Online manager mode, or at least expanded online leagues (for years I’ve wanted a football game where you can transfer players from one team to another, online – the first thing I’d do is offer £1.50 for Titus Bramble)
