Playing Fifa however, the game is played with the camera being far out, and so the only time you really see the detail on the players is in replays (playing the game with a close up camera we found extremely difficult, with it being too difficult to see to pass to other players and to find space), and it must be said, the replays are not the best in the world.
Generally however, there isn’t a problem with framerate like in the previous version of Fifa, which was a real hindrance at times. The graphics do their job, even though it’s not often that you really see what the game or console could be capable of.
Controls are extremely vital to any game, and when playing a game such as Fifa (especially amongst friends) high responsiveness of controls are essential. Thankfully the responsiveness of the controls is better than that of previous Fifa games, and it really helps much more with the flow of the game. In spite of this, we still found players not always doing what we wanted them to do, passing to someone who we didn’t want them to pass to, taking a moment too long to respond to a pass, or just not getting into that position which was integral to an attack.
The controls are however, some of the best we have had in a Fifa series for a long time, and are generally as good as they have ever been, with the new controls for the penalties being absolutely excellent and are possibly the best emulation of a penalty shoot out ever, 2006 Fifa World Cup really hits the spot so to speak. The new controls in this area allow new moves, such as those for the goalkeeper which let you distract your opponent. This really adds to the drama, and the intensity of a penalty shoot out, and is easily one of our favourite aspects of the new game.
Fifa really comes alive when played with the company of friends and 2006 Fifa World Cup can lead to many high scoring games, especially when played with someone who really knows what their doing.
For those who have no friends - or just prefer to play online, the game (unfortunately like the previous iteration) offers only 2 player mode online; unlike the four players it offers offline. In the first few games we played online we experienced bouts of lag, although we must say in the games we played more recently there didn’t seem to be any lag at all. One of the most annoying problems we found online was that when someone scores a goal, there are no replays, and thus no chances to really rub it into your opponents face (isn’t that what football is all about?) which is quite disappointing, especially after that 30 yard volley goes straight past everyone and into the top corner of the goal.
As mentioned earlier, penalties are great fun, and when playing with friends (or online) this is no exception, and is in fact when it shines the most. Giving your keeper the old wonky legs only to see your friend or opponent sky the ball right over the bar is both hilariously funny and exceptionally fun.
It might be worth noting that the most annoying thing about multiplayer is when you go to join someone online; you have to load the entire game, every time. Trust us, it gets extremely annoying.
So has it changed much since its last iteration? Well it would be easy to say that the new version has changed about as much as a one identical twin differs from their, well, identical twin. But to be fair, the Fifa series gets one or two new releases with each year, and generally does see an improvement on each incarnation (albeit a slight one).
Despite the games many problems it’s not all bad, and the game is better than the previous version (despite the annoyances like not being able to skip substitution scenes), and is still a half-decent football title to play over summer, especially with World Cup fever and a few friends.
It’s worth noting however, that we would suggest that if you do have FIFA 06: Road to Fifa World Cup then we don’t think there is enough of a change to warrant this as a new purchase, unless your one of those die-hard can’t live without the next Fifa type people.
In saying that, if World Cup fever (it’s around at the moment apparently) has struck you already, then you might want to check it out. Now to practice those penalties...
