FIFA 09
November 21, 2008
EA have been a little cautious with N-Gage so far. You get the feeling they're not pumping too much money into the venture - possibly because of the misfortunes of the N-Gage of yesteryear.
Either way it's good to have the FIFA brand on-board and this update proves a lot nicer to play than the previous FIFA 08.
I say update because that's pretty much what it is. The same game modes apply: Friendly, Scenario, Challenge, Season, Tournament and Penalty mode but the gameplay has certainly changed. Compared to its predecessor FIFA 09 feels a lot quicker, snappier and fun to play. FIFA 08 felt a tad drab and wasn't really worth the £6.
The graphics although not vastly improved have been tweaked slightly. You now experience weather effects (which you can change during play) and the new camera angle seems to work a lot better. The players still look quite blocky however which is a shame but from a distance they are acceptable.
Landscape mode is a must for FIFA 09 - playing in Portrait is just too fiddly and doesn't feel natural.
The game modes work quite self explanatory but you may not know about the Scenario modes which can be quite fun. You basically set up a match to "challenge" yourself. Chose your teams, chose the score and how many players are on the pitch and then start the game from any point in time. For example, you might set up Germany Vs England with England down by 1 goal and only 10 men remaining. You can then play from the 89th minute to try and make a come back and beat Germany 5-1!
As mentioned previously the control system is miles ahead of the previous installation. Although seemingly basic at first, the two button system is more intuitive. Tap A for a short pass, hold it for a long pass, B will shoot and obviously the longer you hold it the harder you kick the ball. However, as explained further on you can still perform headers, volleys etc. and even some new advanced moves.
There are some nice additions to FIFA 09:
When shooting now you will see a "shooting bar" which shows you how accurate your shot is going to be. Get it in the green zone and you're on target; yellow or red means you're likely to miss. This works better than the simple "power bar" in FIFA 08 because you've got an idea of where the shot's going to go and also gives you something to aim for rather than just blasting the ball every time you're near the goal.
Indicator arrows above your players' heads show their status. A red arrow indicates the player you might be thinking of passing to is offside. A single green arrow denotes the player who will receive your pass if you wish to do so. A double green arrow shows that you can play a through ball to that player (by tapping pass). You can see with these new features that you can be a lot more tactical with your game. You know where your players are and how you can play to them which helps you on attacks.
Double tapping in any directions makes your player run. Don't forget that in tournaments and season matches your players each have their own stamina which is reduced by running. Once their stamina is down to 50% their gameplay will be noticeably reduced whereas if it gets down to 30% you risk your game and should substitute the player as soon as possible.Also during these modes you have to chance that one of your players becomes Man Of The Match. Doing so will see his stats raised for the next game.
Skill moves work well and although they can be a little tricky to master on the d-pad, once you have you'll be running circles around your opponents. If you find you're not trying hard enough in a game you can change the difficulty at any time. You don't want it to be too easy right?
Another new addition to FIFA 09 is who we can only assume is meant to be your coach who shouts things at you every now and again (just by text luckily). It's not necessary really but can be amusing when you get him upset.
At the end of each match you get highlights. This is a series of replays that the game thinks were worthy to watch again. Again, a nice touch if you pulled off some nice moves during the match.
You can upload your scores to the N-Gage Arena but again, as in FIFA 08 there is no multiplayer mode which comes as quite a shame. Surely EA Sports could have included at least a Bluetooth multiplayer mode? Maybe in FIFA 2010?...
The sounds and music in-game are nothing special but then you don't expect too much on a mobile phone. It's nice to have proper (although low quality) MP3's playing in the menus (should you enable the sound) and they've even catered for the foreign audience too as you'll hear if you're in the menu for more than a couple of minutes.
One last thing, the tutorial mode is much improved over FIFA 08. Before you would have to sit through trying to play a match while being interrupted every few seconds to tell you how to play. Now the tutorial is accessed through the menu system with diagrams and an explanation on how to play - much better!
So let's take a look at the highlights: FIFA 09 is fun to play and feels solid. The landscape control system works extremely well and the various game modes will keep you busy for ages. Now N-Gage finally has a proper football game.
Summary:
Sound: 7/10
The music in the menus is good, it's nice to hear music you've heard of before like you get in the console versions of the game. The sound effects during the match are as expected, nothing special but not bad.
Graphics: 7.5/10
The graphics on the players could still be improved. On close-ups they're noticeably blocky as they were in FIFA 08 but you tend to forget about that when you're pulling off a Marseille Turn.
Gameplay: 8.5/10
The new control system is miles ahead of the previous installation. The game is only really playable in Landscape mode however because too many finger movements makes Portrait mode clumsy. There are plenty of different game modes and a lot of fun to be had with FIFA 09.
Overall 77%
