FIFA 08 (Wii) Review
Each year like clockwork, EA release a new iteration of their successful sports series. Fifa, Madden, NBA Live and NHL, are all guaranteed to make a yearly appearance on every gaming platform known to mankind. After missing out last year tho, this season Fifa finally gets a chance to pull on its cleats and hit the pitch on Wii, bringing with it promises of more intuitive gameplay. How does it fair? Well, its somewhat of a mixed bag.
Firstly lets talk about the controls. Obviously a big motivator for getting the game on Nintendo’s console is that it controls radically different from every other version on the market. EA for the most part
have managed to translate the simple controls quite well on Wii, with A handling pass, B through pass, Z sprinting and a Wiimote gesture up or down to shoot. It works well and beginners should have no problems in putting together a nice passing game pretty quickly. Unfortunately, this will be a recurring theme, when it comes time to do more complicated moves, the control scheme quickly breaks down. EA appear to be reluctant to use the dpad on the wiimote for actions, and this severely limits the number of buttons available, making the game rely on a confusing array of button combinations to perform actions. The C button has essentially been turned into a modifier, and is used in almost every move imaginable. Double tap C to send a player on a run, hold C and Z to do pace control, and C plus either A or B will do a cross. In all other console versions of Fifa, these moves each have their own button, making it much easier to remember what needs doing in the heat of battle.
Gestures have also been used for the trick system, with some tricks implemented using the nunchuck and others on the wiimote. I must applaud EA for giving very clear indications as to what will happen when each gesture is activated. In previous versions, using the trick analog stick for anything more then flicking in a particular direction was a very, hit it and hope, system that didn’t give predictable outcomes. Unfortunately, and there’s that word again, the wiimote tricks are very hard to execute reliably without having your player shoot the ball. This is because moving the wiimote left/right will execute a trick, and moving it up/down will perform a shot. It seems far too easy to trigger the shoot gesture when you want your player to do a lane change instead. The other gesture that gets in the way is slide tackling on defense. Slide tackling is also mapped to wiimote down, the same gesture as shooting. This becomes a problem when an attacker and a defender are both near the ball, and instead of shooting like you want, your player will do a slide tackle, and generally if he connects will get yellow or red carded. Not very cool.
That’s not to say that the game isn’t fun. It absolutely succeeds in being quick to pick up and play, and returning veterans won’t have too many problems adjusting their game to the new wii specific controls. Another excellent point is that this is the first Fifa game on a Nintendo console to feature online play. Don’t be fooled by the lack of WiFi Connection logo on the box, this Fifa is indeed online ready. Instead of using Nintendo’s service, Fifa uses EA’s own online setup, which means no friends codes, buddy lists, lobbies and more. Hopefully Nintendo can learn from EA’s good setup how to put together a good online service for future WiFi games. Graphically, Fifa 08 is a welcome improvement from previous Gamecube offerings. Players look more like their real life counterparts, and move and animate with pleasing realism. There are some interesting glitches, such as player shadows completely disappearing when a player moves into a shaded area of the pitch, making the players look completely disconnected from the pitch. Replays use a depth of field blur effect as well, which whilst appearing clever, often focuses on the wrong thing, making the whole replay look like a blurred mess.
Exclusive to the Wii version is a sickeningly cute Footii Party mode, which offers Table Football, Juggling and Boot It minigames. Juggling is a rhythm style game asking players to match on screen cues with button combinations to keep their mii juggling the ball. Boot It has the player doing rapid fire penalties, and Table Football is the classic game we all know and love. Unfortunately this version is hard to love, as one has to move all rows at once instead of individually, and scoring is based more on luck then skill. Whilst a novel distraction for people not interested in the full game, Footii Party needs some serious work to be enjoyable for more then five minutes, and I hope EA don’t develop this mode at the expense of beefing up the main game. One final complaint, which is possibly my biggest problem with Fifa 08, is the amount of modes that have been removed from the game. No longer can you create your own players, or embark on any kind of manager mode. That’s correct, Fifa 08 for Wii has no manager mode what-so-ever. This is a massive detraction for anyone that plays Fifa even semi-seriously, as most of the fun to be had in the game is in steering your club to glory in the league and cup, qualifying for Europe, and engaging in trades to get your team the best it possibly can be. You can still play in single season tournaments, however the lack of a manager mode means you’re definitely left wanting for more. Manager mode omission is completely baffling, as the Wii version of Fifa is taken from the ps2/gamecube/xbox versions of last year which all featured a very robust manager mode.
Overall Fifa is an enjoyable game well worth a look for veterans and new comers alike. Die hard Fifa fans might want to stick to a rental to see how the controls have been implemented, as the depth is sorely lacking with the lack of manager mode. Those that aren’t fussed about completely a 15 year manager career tho should really check out Fifa 08 as its a radically different and enjoyable take on the beautiful game.
