FIFA 16 a considerable upgrade from FIFA 15
By Colin Giuliani, Staff Writer//
Over the past few years, the FIFA franchise has been one of the biggest video gaming franchises in the world. According to a recent report by Forbes Magazine, the FIFA franchise has sold over 150 million copies (for comparison, Madden has sold over 120 million copies). Following FIFA 15, which was well received across the board and was the second FIFA game on the next-generation consoles (PlayStation 4 and XBOX One), EA has released FIFA 16. The results are a game that picks up where the last one left off and for the most part, improves on the few but highly noticeable flaws of the last game. When grading a video game, there are two key components to address: Would I recommend this game to anyone who wants to buy a soccer video game, and would I recommend that someone buy FIFA 16 if that person owns FIFA 15? Is the upgrade noticeable? To address this, it’s important to analyze what’s new in this year’s edition of FIFA. While there are no new leagues for Career Mode, for the first time ever, it is possible to play as women’s teams including Germany, England and the United States. This was a feature that was long overdue and hopefully in future installments of the franchise, more teams are added on both the national and the club level. Ultimate Team, arguably the most popular mode in gameplay, got an upgrade with the new addition of FUT Draft. According to the official EA Sports website, it is now possible to draft a team and challenge others in tournaments for the opportunity to win coins and packs. Additionally, new legends have been added to the game, including American legends Alexi Lalas and Landon Donovan.
However, the biggest upgrade in FIFA 16 comes in Career Mode, which has seen significant improvements for the first time in a very long time. For one, training has been added, so it is now possible to train players on your team. In previous editions of Career Mode, player growth was highly unpredictable; some players would magically jump up twenty points in their overall rating, while other players with great potential would not grow a single overall point even if they were played in every game. With training, this problem has been eliminated. Now, the user can control the growth of a player by training certain attributes to improve his overall rating.
Secondly, preseason tournaments have been added to Career Mode. Much like in real life, it is possible to play in a preseason tournament for the opportunity to win prize money; that prize money can then be used to strengthen the team by signing players or scouts. In past editions of FIFA, preseason was relatively boring; injuries were frequent and the matchups were uninteresting. Now, there is something at stake in the preseason. It is also possible to make an unlimited amount of substitutions in preseason, much like in real life. Other small details were added to Career Mode that end up enhancing the overall experience, such as the expansion of roster sizes, the addition of two-year loan deals and a more accurate youth academy. While the mode isn’t perfect and still has room to improve, it is the best that it has ever been, and it is considerably better than FIFA 15 in that regard. In terms of the gameplay, FIFA 16 feels smooth. No longer is it possible to hold down the sprint button and run down the wing for the entire match; good passing build up is rewarded more than through balls over the top and pacey players running without losing stamina. While this could be patched in future updates (a center back should not be able to catch up to Lionel Messi in open play), I like the fact that in this edition of FIFA, the user feels more in control of the play. Scoring good goals feels more rewarding and allowing goals feels more like your fault instead of the fault of the game. The first touch could be improved and there are some problems with the computer AI routinely passing the ball with 90 percent accuracy, but the game is in a much better place gameplay wise than it was a year ago.
The one major complaint I have about the game has to do with the fact that at times, it can be hard to play the game. I am on XBOX One and to install the game properly on that console, you have to install the game, uninstall it and then re-install it. There have been numerous times that I have been stuck at the loading screen and have had to reset the XBOX in order to get the game to work. This is something that should be addressed in future patches. The game itself is fun, but getting into the actual game can be a pain at times depending on the console. Overall, FIFA 16 picks up where FIFA 15 left off. There’s still work to be done, but this is still a very good game that I have already had tons of fun playing. It’s enjoyable, the gameplay feels relatively smooth and the improvements are noticeable in almost every mode. This game feels like a considerable upgrade over FIFA 15 and that’s a very good thing. I give it a final score of an eight out of 10.