Just got done playing a few co-op matches with my dad against the A.I.
Professional difficulty at first, then Top Player. Standard settings.
There's a lot to talk about so i think an "+" and "-" format works the best for now. These are just my first impressions after about 10 matches or something.
Pros:
+The pace is brilliant, it's slow and realistic, but not to the point where it's boring or that it feels "slow motion".
+The game feels more physical, kind of like 2014, 2015, etc. Players feel more heavy, both the user controlled ones and the A.I. ones.
+I've seen some miskicked passes, and it feels somewhat stat based, when i played as Juve i made less mistakes compared to when i played as River. It's not quite where it should be i think, but it's a step in the right direction.
+This game has the best models in any footy game ever, in my eyes, the anatomy is spot on.
+The animations are still great and the added weight to the players make them even better and more real.
+The new camera is a nice addition, and it's customizable, which i didn't think it would be, a nice surprise.
+The A.I. doesn't feel as "cheap" compared to previous entries in the series, and they attack with a bit more variety.
+There are a lot more fouls than in any other Fox Engine PES.
+The ball physics are the best in any PES game i think, very varied and random, which is wonderful.
+The defensive system is more manual, more similar to FIFA, tackling isn't as simple as pressing a button at the right time, there's more timing and positioning involved than ever before.
+The A.I. does less "ping pong".
+There are less backheels, for both the A.I. and the player.
Cons:
-This is more of a problem with the demo and not the full game, but i need to vent a little, who thought that a 5min limit was a good idea?
-The "eFootball" logo appearing after every replay, alongside every foul having a replay, is pretty bad.
-The "new" menus look like PES 5 and 6, okay for 2005 and 2006, but not anymore, we were promised new menus for years, and when they finally show up it's just a new color (so much purple) and a new main menu that's so bland it's painful.
-While i love the look of the game regarding models, the colors are just weird, i've tried to adjust brightness, contrast, etc, but something still looks "off".
-The new camera is nice, but still, the camera options in this game are so meh, either they are too far away or too close, there's nothing like the "Tele" cam in FIFA, for example.
Ok, so for now most of the "Cons" have been minor, because i'm optimistic about this game, i've liked it overall, but now i'm going to the most important cons.
-There are still quite a few matches with 0 fouls.
-The fouls themselves feel too random when given, still better than having no fouls, but not exactly ideal. In previous games i had an idea if my tackle would be a foul or not, "I was too agressive there" or "I did well in there" is what would go through my head after every time i challenged the opposition, but now the ref gives fouls for perfectly normal tackles a lot of the time, so every time i tackle normally i'm afraid it's going to be a foul, that's not realistic at all, when we say we want more fouls we mean that we want more agressiveness and more tactical fouls, like when a player pulls the opponent's shirt in the middle of the park to stop the flow of the attack, it's common in real life and nonexistent in PES, we want more fouls and PES 2020 certaintly gave us, but not in the right way.
-The A.I. still has a way too direct mentality, they attack with more variety than previous years which is good, but their core and mentality is still the same, go foward as fast as possible with as few passes as possible, it's going in the right direction but it still needs a lot of work.
-The pitch is still too big, which opens a lot of artificial space that shouldn't be there and makes it easier for both the player and the A.I. to be way more direct than they should be able to.
-Maybe it's just a coincidence but i noticed most of the goals i've conceded happened imeddiatly after i scored, felt a bit robotic.
Well, that's it, hopefully it grows on me, but i don't think it will too much since i'm already a bit more optimistic than i though i would be. Konami is doing exactly what they did in the PS2 era, every game is just a slight update of the last, the problem is that a lot of people have problems with the game's core, and a yearly update of the previous game is never going to fix those problems, i think that taking in consideration the current direction Konami is taking, with a focus on online and Myclub, and the fact that this game is still using the Fox Engine, i don't see us getting anything much better than this in this console generation. I think i'll just stick with PES 2018 because i don't feel like spending 60 bucks for an update that fixes some problems i have with a game i already own, but don't get me wrong, to me 2020 is the best in the Fox Engine era probably, but considering i already own 2 Fox Engine PES games, i think i'll just wait for the new engine, if it ever happens.
