I'm calling OUT ALL PES/WE and FIFA games to do one thing...

[iluvnineties]

Hey guys,

I have been playing PES/WE for ages now, and we all know that recently FIFA has improved a lot and MANY folks believe FIFA nowdays is the king of football sim. While this may or may not be true I'd really like to hear all you professional, elite, PES/WE and FIFA gurus to compare these two games: FIFA 09 and PES 09. Again, this is not FIFA 09 VS PES 09, it's more like comparison. What I want to know from you is, what do you dislike and what you like about each game. But the most important question would be: What game do you think plays life-like, giving you ultimate football experience. Which one is more realistic ?

- Body movement
- The way players behave on the field
- The actual gameplay
- Which AI is better
- Ball physics
- Graphics


And scoring goals, which one does give you more excitement. When you score a screamer it leaves you breathless ??

Let's have a good, mature discussion, no BS, no bias just straight honest answer from the both sides, FIFA and PES fans all united

BRING IT ON!

 

[drekkard]

SIMULATION
- As a simulation, Fifa totally owns with a robust physics engine, great collision detection and good AI. In PES, physics, collisions and AI are really poor. The pace of the game in Fifa is closer to reality, as the dribling (once you master dribling in Fifa, and that doesn't mean you can beat a defender everytime you want). The are some annoyances in Fifa, but none of them is as critical as the flaws that plague PES, from the prehistoric passing routines to the scriptedness of movement and shooting. The result of all is plausible results in Fifa (0-0 is possible without the CPU resorting to cheats as a beast, even in multiplayer) and no near reality results in pes (25 shots a game per team, results of 8-6...).

The there are the animations. Animations have a huge impact in gameplay and in simulating a game. And in Fifa, they're top notch, there are hundreds of them and that allows the engine to depict realistic reactions depending on the ball's position, direction and so on.

Add to it the 30 leagues, the licenses, the graphics, Everything in Fifa is by far more realistic, except some faces.

GAMEPLAY
- As a game, Fifa has a lot more depth to it, not only because of the controls (having auto, semi and manual and the use of both analog sticks in different ways) but also because of the tactical depth. The next thing I would like to have implemented in Fifa is a better tackling system, causing more fouls when you mistime a tackle or you push someone too violently, to say something. Right now, tackling is too easy (that makes dribling too difficult for some people) and PES sometimes wins in this department. But only sometimes, because of the horible collision detection and reactions.

- Control-wise, as a player I'm much more in control of what I want to do and how to do it. I'm not as constrained by automated scripts as I was in PES. Some people say this is limiting the simulation of player's abbilities. That's wrong. I've played lots of Fifa 09 and I would never cross with Wright Phillips while running, nor shoot with Iniesta from downtown nor try to head a ball with Owen in midfield. You have to know your players to use them wisely. And it pays.
Add again the animations here, that allow for credible and nice reactions of players, and all the stretching / efforts they make and how well the inverted kinetics work in conjunction with the hundreds of movements your player can do.

I had a lot of enjoyment with PEs years ago, but me and my friends have no doubt about which is the best football game we've played. And there's a huge distance between Fifa and PEs, a whole generation of software between them.

 

[Zakov]

I'll make it simple.
Bear in mind, I'm comparing FIFA09 and PES2009, not previous editions.

body movement - FIFA has this one better.

the way players behave on the field - FIFA has this one better(although its far from perfect). I think this is down to PES's horrible animations.

The actual gameplay - In regards to gameplay, both leave a lot to be desired. In FIFA there's potential but still not fulfilled, but in PES, they've lost most of their depth in gameplay and need it back.

Ball physics - I think PES edges it but just barely.

Graphics - On a whole, FIFA has it better, but for player models, PES has got it closer to the real-life players. FIFA needs to tone down the muscularity and grumpiness of their players.
I also like the stadium lighting effects in PES more than in FIFA.

 

[Trance_Allstar]

Body movement

FIFA09 has far superior animations in basically any aspect I can think of. They are very evenly balanced in terms of pace, and nothing really stands out as being superhuman/not possible in real life). Foot planting for the most part is really good, and you can see a players foot really being "anchored" when it hits the pitch. Even just a bit of sliding completely ruins the illusion, because it looks completely wrong from real life.
Also FIFA09 has so much more nuance than PES09, such as teammates gradually going form full sprinting to jogging to walking to standing still, without any noticeable "steps".


The way players behave on the field


I have to give this to FIFA09 aswell. I've never been good at judging tactics or such, but PES09 seems pretty far removed from reality in terms of how you can pingpong through defences and such. PES09 usually still has some defensive line issues, and it feels disorganised in an unrealistic way for me. FIFA09, just from looking at it, strikes me as looking more like a real game would. Again, tactics and such aren't my strong side.


The actual gameplay

FIFA09 wins, hands down, in all technical aspects, and "controllability" aspects. Manual galore, actual analog sticks, etc etc.
But there are several things I would change for FIFA10.
For one, players are able to Control certain loose balls too quickly and with too much control. It seems like too often they are able to make split-second moves to control a ball, unrealistically.
Also, overall I would say that the speed and pace at which the players execute movements needs more variety. For example, there isn't really a way to get a player into a sort of "alert" or "quick-feet" mode when dribbling. Generally they feel too relaxed and slow to react to certain moves which in real life require split-second timing.
Basically, when I in real life would have been able to anticipate a defender making a stab tackle, and very quickly execute a heel roll of the ball to the side, in FIFA that "anticipation" aspect is nonexistant. You either have "execute dribble" or don't do anything.

One way to solve this would be to use the manual aspect of the FIFA LT trigger, which is used for the "dribble mode" in the game. The more you depress the button, the higher alert the player would be in, the quicker he would move his feet (to always have a foot ready to manipulate the ball). The "downside" would be that the player wouldn't be able to move fast forward, since running fast means that you need to do longer moves with the feet. Basically, the more you depress LT, the quicker "access" you would have to the players feet for a dribble or feint move, at the sacrifice of movement speed.
Players like Ronaldo and Messi though would be allowed a higher rate of movement when fully in the "reaction mode", since they can execute very quick touches on the ball even when their legs are also busy just propelling them forward.

This would be a great way to make the dribbling aspect more realistic, because the "quick feet" or "coiled up and anticipating to execute a dribble" aspect is lacking, and it takes away some of the fun and realism from both the trick stick dribbling aswell as the normal dribble and movement pattern.

Also the general movement pattern of the FIFA09 LT "Slow-dribble" mode should be designed more like the PES09 R2 dribble mode, which has the player manipulating the ball very nicely and realistically.
Also, the LT dribble mode needs more nuance and control in terms of how far the player will manipulate the ball in a direction.
In PES, if you hold R2 and move it to the player's side, he will start manipulating the ball in that directon, but if you very quickly change directions, he will immediately abort his previous move and start moving to move the ball in the other direction. So you can move the ball a short distance, like 30 cm, in one direction with the players right-foot instep, and then change direction and have the player manipulate the ball in the other direction with the outside instead.

FIFA09 in this department has alot less nuance and control, and the player is more "shoving" the ball quite violently (in comparison to PES which is slower but more controlled and composed)in a direction rather than controlling it in a way where he can quickly make changes.
If FIFA09 had an analog LT dribble mode, you could, by adjusting how much the button is depressed, how much urgency the player will have in the ball manipulations, and if you have maximum urgency, he will be quick to make sudden changes to how the ball is manipulated.



Which AI is better

Overall FIFA09. Just playing Be A Pro gives a hint as to which AI is better at reading the game in a realistic way. PES misses to many obvious pass opportunities and makes silly mistakes for my liking (though PES2009 is better than PES2008 in this respect).


Ball physics

Overall I like FIFA09 as the more realistic of the 2. Apart from some weird curl implementation when mishitting backspin shots, shooting normal backspin shots, aswell as during freekicks, FIFA09 has the more realistic ball behavior.
PES did surprise me positively, but some of the aspects of FIFA09 still aren't really there.
And as far as deflections and such are concerned, FIFA09 is in a different league entirely.


Graphics

FIFA09 for me. PES09 has some awesome lighting, but it is till a bit too bare-bones for me. FIFA09 is a bit more "flashy" in terms of lighting and coloring, but I prefer it. Also while PES has added some new more detailed lighting aspects, like the "sunset" lighting, and overall higher resolution to it, FIFA09 wins with the ball being able to cast shadows on goalkeepers as it flies past, players self-shadowing with arms and such in a very detailed-looking way, etc. Kits seem better in PES, but higher resolution in FIFA.

And for me, FIFA09 is just so much more "cozy" and warm to play a day match in. The contrast between sunlight and shadow, just the general appearance appeals to me. The pitch in FIFA09 looks like a proper pitch, whereas in PES it looks like a texture. I probably prefer the PES 3D grass effect more for closeups, but FIFA09 has improved from 08 atleast.

Cutscene animations in PES are better though for me. Also FIFA's camera movements during the interactive celebrations are pretty poor, they should have just used the normal ingame camera the whole tine rather than suddenly making the camera "float" around to show the celebration. Not really what you see on TV...

Another neat touch for PES is the way players will start celebrating before the ball crosses the goal line, which eliminates that old-gen bit where your player will just wait motionless or move like normal even though it is clear that the ball will go in. The game now detects if a shot or such will be a certain goal (ie not savable by the goalkeeper or defenders) and your player doesn't need to stand around waiting for the ball to actually cross the line.

 

[Rob92]

Anyone would have trouble arguing with any of that Trance_Allstar, another top quality post by you I agree with all of it.

 

[iluvnineties]

Man, I am really glad we have knowledgeable people on this board. KUDOS!

 

[WishMaster 23]

I must say I agree in most of what is being said in here. FIFA 09 is without a doubt the most complete simulation i've seen and played. The main problems of FIFA and I would like to hear you out on this, are that it's not intuitive as I would like and the pleasure of playing or scoring is not by any means closer to what I felt before on PES.

I must say I'm having a lot of trouble doing the moves with the right stick just to get a small dribble past a defender, I think it should be more intuitive and not a button combo like TEKKEN or any other fighting game. I can give the game some more time to get used to, but everytime I play it and something is going wrong, all I think is..."my dear PES"...

Even PES 2008 in PS3 didn't stop me of screaming goal sometimes...from the great moves i could create...in FIFA it's somehow different, the thrill is more controlled.

I can't even begin to say how much PES 2009 is wrong, I couldn't play it more than a few weeks. The flow of the game is somehow strange and the players seem to react too slow. I can't agree with people saying that this is the game the year before should have been. I enjoyed PES 2008, and I must say I lived a lot better with PES 2008 flaws that with this year's. I agree that PES2008 was too shabby in player movements, pitches, editor, and even online, but the PES feeling was there most of the time. My opinion is that PES 2009 just blew away that good feeling.
FIFA09 wins and it's taking my time, because i'm a harsh football fan and in a console I must have a good representation of it. FIFA is yet to surprise me, but it's winning clearly, I must say I would like FIFA to have the better player presence that PES had, with players being able to make more of a difference sometimes. The body presence of some players is just the same, no matter of what team you choose. I can't explain this feeling but most of you who played PES for years know for sure what I'm talking.

In conclusion, FIFA is a better game, FIFA is a simulation wise football game, but I'm yet to being conquered by the complex dribble system that EA implemented for the last years. It seems that many of you fulfill this moves in easy fashion but for me that played PES for years it seems too complex. Just remembering that in the best times, the PES game engine had a perfect balance that you could go past a defender just by calculating the right time, speed or the position of the defender or even just by pressing R2 it seemed too simple but it was intuitive and worked wonders.

 

[Chris Davies]

I absolutely 100% agree with you there, as much as I love FIFA I have to say that I totally agree that the "trick stick" isn't as intuitive as PES's dribbling controls - in-fact I never use it. It's far too complicated and requires far too much thought when you're in possession, you've got enough to think about.

I didn't do any of the spectacular tricks in PES but I mastered that little drag to the side, which helped me get past a man time and time again. In FIFA the tricks feel more like they're there to show off with, than actually beat someone with (which of course is the whole idea).

 

[drekkard]

I don't agree completely with your experience about dribling in PES and FIFA!

Maybe it's a matter of skill, but in any PES I could drible a good ammount of players no matter who I was. I mastered a lot of tricks and even with a player like Ono I could get past 3 or 4 inter defenders and score. I would have 14+ chances per game against friends and the only thing preventing high scores was that shooting was so scripted that you wouldn't score most of the times just to balance the scoresheet.

That mostly with average players. With superstar players we all know what happened, goal galore!

I find the balance of Fifa just "almost" great. It's difficult to do the tricks (as it is in real life) and you end up dribling the defenders just by moving around and playing with the different speeds. Take note that against my mates I (and they) can drible past some players now and then. And sometimes I've dribled up to 4 players and score with Robinho WITHOUT using the tricks, simply by moving, changing speeds and knocking the ball.

Having said that, I understand what you say, and share the feeling of "low thrill" in dribling sometimes. I think could be cool by adding 3 things:

- Tackling system is too easy. That is the thing that makes dribling almost impossible in certain situations. And that's the thing I'm expecting the most for 2010. If the defenders had to time precisely the tackle, the current dribling system would work incredibly well. Right now, as a defender, you simply run to the opponent and do pressure or tackle and it's almost always a win for the defense. That should be more balanced and would put the thrill again in the game. It would make defending even more thrilling!

- The trance_allstar mention to happy feet I think it should be a simple left analogue stick movement that would execute the simpler feints, as it was in pes years ago.

- The right stick knock-ons should be possible to use also in short spaces. I mean, if you do a subtle touch the player could move the ball 1 meter away and turn towards it (in the direction of the stick flick). That could be done in low speeds (and that's what players like Messi, Robinho and co. do when dribling at half-speed) and of course without the "fatal" inertia they have now when they knock the ball changing direction.

With these 3 simple additions, I think we would have an incredible thrilling experience. I think they will go in this direction for 2010 now that they have a solid engine in all aspects, and I also understand that meanwhile, EA has made defending easier by now. The opposite would have meant a goal galore ruining the level of realism thorough the rest of the departments.

 

[Trance_Allstar]

I must say I'm having a lot of trouble doing the moves with the right stick just to get a small dribble past a defender, I think it should be more intuitive and not a button combo like TEKKEN or any other fighting game. I can give the game some more time to get used to, but everytime I play it and something is going wrong, all I think is..."my dear PES"...

In a way FIFA's skill system is good in that it isn't easy to execute things quickly. But it could be better IMO.

Currently, the Skill system works MUCH better when in Be A Pro mode (or, when playing it more like real football). Since you control one player, you always have a sense of "absolute" directionality. If you play as the entire team, the trick stick is really hard to work since alot of quick passing means that you constantly swap players that are in different positions and situations, facing different directions etc. However I agree that it should be made more intuitive and easy to use, but they should alos introduce some type of balancing aspect to counteract it being to good, like some type of "composure" aspect where if you try to do many tricks too quickly, the player will trip on his own legs or such, or he will just misstime a trick and the ball will go off in a direction other than intended.

There should be some type of gauge or indicator to go along with this so that the gamer can always see how his player is composed, so that he knows if it is risky to try a dribble in a certain situation, or if there is a big risk of loosing the ball (just like a person in real life can feel how unbalanced or such he is, and knows what is risky to try and what is safe).

In other words, make the actual "input" stage alot easier and quick by simplifying the RAS trick input, but instead introduce realistic limiters (players more prone to mis tricks, players falling over if trying to do a trick unbalanced) to avoid trickfests and to keep Ronaldinho from being able to do 6 flip-flaps in a row.

- The right stick knock-ons should be possible to use also in short spaces. I mean, if you do a subtle touch the player could move the ball 1 meter away and turn towards it (in the direction of the stick flick). That could be done in low speeds (and that's what players like Messi, Robinho and co. do when dribling at half-speed) and of course without the "fatal" inertia they have now when they knock the ball changing direction.

The knock-ons really should be more subtle at their lightest level. I think they are currently designed to be more forceful as you hold the stick in a direction longer, but I haven't really noticed to be honest...



Also, they should really add free-movement during knock-ons.
SO that when you knock the ball in any direction with the RAS, you need to yourself control your player to get to the ball.

This way, you can knock the ball to one side of a rushing defender, and then just point your player to go around his other side. Also, this would mean that your player doesn't have to do that "inertia turn" when you push the ball out to the side of him, since if you have enough time and space, you can just slowly turn him onto the ball again with the Left Analog Stick (and not have him always turning extremely aggressively and loosing alot of speed).

This possibility, combined with the idea of getting some timing back into stab-tackling with defenders and not just running with the A/X button pressed, would also probably calm down the people who defend by simply running at you with a defender. Then if they run full steam at you, you could just tap the ball past them and skip by on the other side no problem, which currently you can't do.

 

[Rob92]

I can understand why some people think the skill moves in FIFA are too complicated, but I don't think they are at all.

The simple tricks such as stepovers, lane change, body feint, dragback, Ronaldo chop etc. are all very easy to do, and just require a tap (or double tap), hold or flick in a certain direction.

Other "showboating" moves such as the elastico, double elastico, hocus-pocus and rainbow flick need to be thought of a second or two before come to the defender because they take longer/are harder to execute.

Reading a trick guide with the list of tricks and what controls each require, and then messing around in the arena with them makes them natural to do.

 

[oFifa09o]

The EA Face and Kits DESIGNERS MUST BE EXECUTED ON SPOT:

 

[drekkard]

The knock-ons really should be more subtle at their lightest level. I think they are currently designed to be more forceful as you hold the stick in a direction longer, but I haven't really noticed to be honest...

It's not a question of holding it longer, it's a combination of momentum and quick flick. With this, I really have loooong knock ons and if I do it lightly I have short ones, but I would be much better the way we're describing it in this thread, for sure!

 

[Trance_Allstar]

It's not a question of holding it longer, it's a combination of momentum and quick flick. With this, I really have loooong knock ons and if I do it lightly I have short ones, but I would be much better the way we're describing it in this thread, for sure!

I am not sure what you mean by "momentum" and "quick flick", and how they apply here. Do describe further.


I was under the impression that for a short "RAS" kickout, you are supposed to only flick the stick and then immediately let it center, whereas if you want a longer knockout, you should move the stick in the direction desired, and then keep it in that direction for whatever period of time corresponds to the distance you want (Think of it sort of like how the PES2009 manual RAS passing works, if you hold the stick in a direction longer, the "pass bar" fills more and the knockout if further).

But even when I just quickly flick the stick and don't hold it longer in a direction, the player still seems to kick the ball out quite far.

 

[Zakov]

The EA Face and Kits DESIGNERS MUST BE EXECUTED ON SPOT:

That is one scary pic!!

 

[drekkard]

I am not sure what you mean by "momentum" and "quick flick", and how they apply here. Do describe further.

Well, english is not my first language so describing subtelties is not my best. Anyways, the distance you send the ball to depends on 2 things: the ammount of time you press it and the moment in which you press it.

Take notice that when I say "ammount of time", the difference between long and short knock-ons is quite small. I mean, the "range" of time that produces different kinds of knock-ons is about 1 second. So, 0.1 seconds flicks are possible and very different than 1 second flicks.

But: if you flick it violently just at the moment of receiving the ball, it will do a hard and far knock-on, while if you strike it very gently, it will do a shorter one.

Despite this, I would love the "short" ones to be even shorter and the long ones, far less accurate.

About the "moment" I've found that if I do it way before I should, the player still does a knock-on, but then he loosses accuracy in terms of length of the knock-on, and sometimes he will fail to trap the ball perfectly, though I'd like the "skill" of the player and the skill of the game player to be more decisive in terms of accuracy.

Hope it makes sense in english!

 

[Trance_Allstar]

Well, english is not my first language so describing subtelties is not my best. Anyways, the distance you send the ball to depends on 2 things: the ammount of time you press it and the moment in which you press it.

Take notice that when I say "ammount of time", the difference between long and short knock-ons is quite small. I mean, the "range" of time that produces different kinds of knock-ons is about 1 second. So, 0.1 seconds flicks are possible and very different than 1 second flicks.

But: if you flick it violently just at the moment of receiving the ball, it will do a hard and far knock-on, while if you strike it very gently, it will do a shorter one.

Despite this, I would love the "short" ones to be even shorter and the long ones, far less accurate.

About the "moment" I've found that if I do it way before I should, the player still does a knock-on, but then he loosses accuracy in terms of length of the knock-on, and sometimes he will fail to trap the ball perfectly, though I'd like the "skill" of the player and the skill of the game player to be more decisive in terms of accuracy.

Hope it makes sense in english!

It makes perfect sense now mate.

I'll have to do some more testing the next time I have some FIFA09 time. Now I know what to look for.

 

[emanon]

The EA Face and Kits DESIGNERS MUST BE EXECUTED ON SPOT:

Who the -bleep- is this guy? I'm hoping that is not Ronaldo ?

 

[oFifa09o]

Who the -bleep- is this guy? I'm hoping that is not Ronaldo ?

EA has spent millions on rendering just to get a C Ronaldo that looks like that...

 

[Rob92]

lol @ you guys.

Someone takes a screenshot of a replay with maximum zoom on Ronaldo's face and then go on and on about how bad it is... If you do that with any game then you will most likely find faults.

You can tell it's Ronaldo, even if it's not 100% accurate, you don't play the game from right up in a player's face, the cutscenes don't go that close, so in normal play then the graphics/player faces look accurate enough.

 

[Chris Davies]

I'm sure Ronaldo could realistically look like that if he tried to pull a funny face, sneeze and fart at the same time.

Not a million miles apart, turn the frown upside down and... Well done EA!

 

[Zakov]

the question is why is Cristina so close to the camera, seriously EA needs to improve camera angles during celebrations.

That reminds me, I remember playing FIFA 2002, and when your player scores an own goal, he smashes the camera, the camera falls down, then the keeper laughs at the camera man.

edit: And I remember another own goal celebration in FIFA 2002, the player who scores the OG kicks the ball, it rebounds off the post to his groin and he holds it in pain.

Those were the days

 

[Rob92]

the question is why is Cristina so close to the camera, seriously EA needs to improve camera angles during celebrations.

That's not from a default celebration cutscene, someone has gone onto a replay and set it to free cam (or whatever it's called) and fully zoomed in.

 

[oFifa09o]

lol @ you guys.

Someone takes a screenshot of a replay with maximum zoom on Ronaldo's face and then go on and on about how bad it is... If you do that with any game then you will most likely find faults.

You can tell it's Ronaldo, even if it's not 100% accurate, you don't play the game from right up in a player's face, the cutscenes don't go that close, so in normal play then the graphics/player faces look accurate enough.

Thats not the point...the point is that that picture shows huge level of polycount, ultra high texture, and huge level of rendering...
All of which are turned into shit by the pathetic design....
I mean with 1/10 of effort KONAMI managed a better result something that is mind boggling...

 

[Zakov]

That's not from a default celebration cutscene, someone has gone onto a replay and set it to free cam (or whatever it's called) and fully zoomed in.

oh my bad..didn't realize that someone could've done that. hehe
I haven't had time to check out all the celebrations in 09. Currently busy with Fallout...:p