The Retro FIFA Discussion Thread (All FIFA games by EA are welcome!)

*aLe

*aLe

World Cup Winner
30 August 2005
Lombardia
NOT Lombardia NA.
Well, seeing that in the FIFA 20 news thread we started talking about sone of the older PS3 titles (and blatantly copying from @miguelfcp's idea in the PES section), I thought to open a "General Retro-FIFA" thread.

If you still shed a tear from time to time missing FIFA International Soccer's Rudi Jantz in front of the defense, if you still wonder how Toronto managed to be so overpowered in FIFA 99, if you still recall all those freekicks you scored with Venetidis in FIFA 2003, or if your dreams are still haunted by Ibarbo collecting hundreds of LB+Y passes and scoring past your keeper again and again in FIFA 15, this is your place.

Long story short: here we could actually discuss about older FIFA titles without clogging the FIFA 20 thread up (I bet that @Chuny and everyone else interested in the current-gen soon-to-be-released FIFA title would appreciate it).

I'll kick this off with sharing my thoughts about FIFA 14 (it's a review I wrote several months ago for the Retro Sports Club). Feel free to post your own reviews/suggestions and/or discuss every FIFA title that comes to mind (provided that, say, it's not based on Frostbite? it isn't called Football Club 24).

(yes, now that the FIFA days are over I think it's pretty fair to discuss every FIFA in here without discrimination, even FIFA 23, even if it's current gen).


Thanks to @millossobek who collected links for all the available retro FIFA games (and thanks to the uploaders, of course, too), we are now able to enjoy the older games even if they're not for sale anymore. Even if we for some reason didn't buy them back then. We would have bought them now but EA decided to unlist them... Hardly our fault, is it?

This is the link to the thread where he posted the links, I thought it would be useful to have it also linked here:
https://evoweb.uk/threads/retro-fifa-installer-links.95718/#post-3988689


Also, here you can find a list of suggested mods to get the most out of the recent FIFA games and here a more detailed list of suggested mods for FIFA 14 (compiled in September 2023, to celebrate FIFA 14's tenth anniversary).
 
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Found World Cup 98 and FIFA RTWC 98 yesterday so might have to give those a go again.
Funny how the latter is over 20 years old and regarded as one of if not the best FIFA game of all time.
 
Well, it was almost revolutionary at that time if you think about it.

I still consider FIFA 99 better in terms of pure gameplay (of course I'll be comparing it to games of the same gen, no point in comparing it to FIFA 16 now), but you know...

FIFA RTWC 98 was a huge leap forward if we compare it to FIFA 97, and had a variety of teams and modes that the following games didn't have at all. That's why it's still considered (rightly) a masterpiece.
 
Aaah man, we do needed this thread badly. Glad it finally saw light.

*aLe said:
Well, it was almost revolutionary at that time if you think about it.

I still consider FIFA 99 better in terms of pure gameplay (of course I'll be comparing it to games of the same gen, no point in comparing it to FIFA 16 now), but you know...

FIFA RTWC 98 was a huge leap forward if we compare it to FIFA 97, and had a variety of teams and modes that the following games didn't have at all. That's why it's still considered (rightly) a masterpiece.
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Fifa 97 is a serious candidate for the worst "modern" :D football game of all time imo. The only good it did was to introduce my beloved indoor mode. And I completely agree on Fifa 98 RTWC, which was effectively a small miracle compared to the prior edition.. where 97 was an unenjoyable, atrocious game with players that moved like pieces of wood and not even a single fun or vaguely remarkable fundamental realized, 98 had smooth movements and controls, a certain armony on the field, some nice animations and scoring was satisfying. Sure, it was all still an heavy caricature of the sport all around, and AI wasn't challenging at all after a small while, but I remember having good fun with it nonetheless, both with friends and both putting on my fantasy brand of football (at 12 years you don't look for the tightness of the midfield line or for the precise movement of the fullbacks indeed :LOL:).

World Cup 98 was a serious improvement over that, with a more challenging AI, better standing tackles and stronger keepers. A truly precious title for so many reasons to me, even just the name bring me back to those magical days, as 98 was my first true World Cup. A shame it only had nationals teams tho. Would have loved that same gameplay with clubs.

And then yeah it came 99, which I remember play to death at the times. Felt like a big improvement as well. Then after that one between the rise of Iss Pro and the stagnation of the saga, I practically stopped play Fifa until the new course after 08 arrived.
 
Great idea for a thread, I considered it but didn't think there was much demand for a Retro Fifa thread so didn't bother, hope I'm proved wrong!

Played some more of FIFA 09 last night, It really is interesting going back & playing these with the mind set of 10 years ago, How people must've reacted to the animations & ball physics. It holds up OK today on the pitch, even though it's still pretty fast on slow.

Visually & aesthetically though, it's an abomination. Everything is so washed out & there's no contest at all, player models & face are of course awful & the match highlights are buggy beyond belief. Obvious highlights are omitted but a loose ball rolling out of play makes the final cut.

So we were a few years away from FIFA's slicker presentation but on the pitch with the camera out as far as possible, you forget about these things. You acclimatise to the controls & mechanics after 1 game & you forget your playing Retro FIFA, Your too busy just playing football.
 
this period of the year I have some nostalgia before new pes/fifa are released and I play old games. played fifa 17 today on ps4 on fast, default sliders and I must say I will take that game and play again for whole day. playing at dusk has mind blowing graphics and very fun gameplay also ball physics is far far better and more natural than fifa 18 and 19. maybe a cliche but sometimes we have to had some bad experience to truly respect something :)
 
It's incredible how 17 screwed up the true size of the ball for the 1st time. Annoys me so much that I've tried modding the ball size a few months ago (unsuccessfully, don't know if it can be done), but ball physics and the weight when shooting and passing feel really great, certainly the best out of all frostbite games.

And in all aspects it's by far the best fifa since frostbite. I guess it's no surprise as there's probably still some of the fifa 16 dna left in it from the previous year. But then 18/19 happened and so here we are, at the retro fifa thread. :)
 
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MafiaMurderBag said:
I look forward to hearing your impressions, Especially on WC 2010, I've been playing that most of this week and it's enjoyable in hindsight.
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I've been playing the 2010 World Cup game this weekend, currently doing a campaign with Greece. What can I say?
It plays good. It's not that it has no problems, of course (like all FIFA games of that period it has homing-missile-like standing tackles for example), but it definitely does play good.

What I like about it is that it's waaay more refined if we compare it to FIFA 10. Some of the obvious shortcomings of FIFA 10 have been corrected here (like the keepers being completely unable to evaluate crosses and lobbed balls in general at times) and it generally is more enjoyable than its "older cousin".

A good thing is that it introduces what I still consider the best PK system ever, for example.
Another great thing is that it has those very little cutscenes with managers and fans that we wouldn't see again until the following World Cup game.
Its graphics weren't really breath-taking even when it was released to be honest (that's likely because it was a 720p game when 1080p was already the norm I guess), but the atmosphere it managed to create was class. Unlike several games of that period and on the same platform, this really came alive during matches played in the World Cup stadiums.

Now, playing it on a 4K 49" TV, it shows its age even more, but after all it's still fun to play (and, despite being fun, it's also difficult at the right point most of the times: for example I had to fight to scrap a win, as Greece, against Luxembourg as they parked the bus when not behind, so they proved difficult to break down).

Thanks @MafiaMurderBag as your suggestion to try this was a great one. :)
 
I'm going to try and pick up a copy of FIFA 14 PS4, As like many it was my first current gen footy game, and i have fond memories of it so it'll be interesting going back to that before they gave us a true next gen experience with 15 & 16.
 
*aLe said:
I've been playing the 2010 World Cup game this weekend, currently doing a campaign with Greece. What can I say?
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I'm glad you enjoyed it man, It is what it is, A refined FIFA 10 which is what most of these summer tournament games where, A hybrid of the previous and a prototype of the upcoming annual title.

The homing missile pressing was one of the bigger complaints from this era, It's amazing how long it took EA to address this in later titles. But apart from that, The game is really enjoyable to play and there's a reason why it was lauded so much on here 9 years ago too.

I get what you're saying about the graphics, I play on a massive 4K tv too and it's not the easiest to look at, From the gameplay cam it's fine because you're so immersed in the football on the pitch but once it goes into a cutscene, replay or goal celebration it becomes apparent that the art direction is horrible, hideous at the time. From the shape of the player models to the blown up and stretched fonts on the shirts. And this is from the company with the bigger budget than Konami yet their artists couldn't get the most fundamental thing looking normal - The players.
 
Oh Man ! I used to play fifa hardcore before i found PES. Started out in 98 and thats waaay back for me (given the resources i had at disposal). 2003 was peak FIFA for me.

It was frustrating, mad and infuriating but it had licences. It was the pinnacle fifa before fifa adapted to PES geniuses. It had janky dribbling, terrible nets, shityy cutscenes, unresponsive players, no contextual situations, everything was on rails and programmed, no hint of randomness BUT it had PL, and FIFA games were more flesh and nail with PL back then. If you liked PL, you had to get FIFA, if you liked FIFA, you liked PL. Knew the entire PL roster like the back of my hand. Then came alone GAMER.TV's review of PES and the rest was history.
 
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Been playing a lot of fifa 18 lately,really didn't like it when it came, preferred 17 over it then.

But there's something that has got me playing it over my other FIFA games in my HDD.

FIFA 14 my first real FIFA game,though I had FIFA 7 or 8 never understood those coming from Pes 5/6.
I like this game,looks really bad though but a good game to me the movement feels a lot like 18,and having a patient CPU ( for a modern game)

FIFA 15 a game I've played the most I guess,still have two Xbox 360 copies at home plus a Xbox one version.
I know a lot of people don't like it,but it's (for me) probably the toughest FIFA game I've played.

FIFA 16 the highly acclaimed one!
Played it a lot, remember how good it looked,and tons of free kicks.
But replaying it now,on console,I really don't like it.
Fast, twitchy AI,way to high pass percentage by the cpu etc.
For me on console not very high up on my list (now)

FIFA 17 played it a great deal,didn't start playing it up until the release of fifa 18.
But I really liked it,still do!
I think I have 7-8 season on it.
And it was the game that I discovered that leagues outside PL was much better to play as,way calmer,better pass %
So it's a good game for me.

FIFA 18
Didn't like it then,like I said,but after talking to @Emroth midway of Fifa 19 and His experience of it,I gave it a try a few weeks ago again,and I've been playing it on a daily basis.
There's something about both CPU and HUM movement that makes this really good,and I get fouls!
Players feel responsive,my dribbling works great on it,I've found a good set of sliders who make it great!
Compared to 19,which I've been off and on past days,19 feels really stiff and one dimensional.

My take on (not so very) retro FIFA
 
MafiaMurderBag said:
Great idea for a thread, I considered it but didn't think there was much demand for a Retro Fifa thread so didn't bother, hope I'm proved wrong!

Played some more of FIFA 09 last night, It really is interesting going back & playing these with the mind set of 10 years ago, How people must've reacted to the animations & ball physics. It holds up OK today on the pitch, even though it's still pretty fast on slow.

Visually & aesthetically though, it's an abomination. Everything is so washed out & there's no contest at all, player models & face are of course awful & the match highlights are buggy beyond belief. Obvious highlights are omitted but a loose ball rolling out of play makes the final cut.

So we were a few years away from FIFA's slicker presentation but on the pitch with the camera out as far as possible, you forget about these things. You acclimatise to the controls & mechanics after 1 game & you forget your playing Retro FIFA, Your too busy just playing football.
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FIFA 08-12 was the best period of FIFA gameplay. It annoyed me with FIFA 10 which was an arcade game and it showed so much promise with FIFA 08 but it was slick, fast, fun and most importantly 'free'.

FIFA 07 was the genesis of this on the PS2/PC with FIFA 07 & 08 being proof of concepts! There was a freedom even the vastly superior PES 6 didn't have. Especially in how the skills where mapped out. This at the time was the beginning of what laid the foundations for FIFA on the last generation of consoles.

Since FIFA 12 only FIFA 14 for me was playable and enjoyable, I know what people see in FIFA 16 but me being this strategies enthusiasts i hated the rigidity of the tactics and how canned they where which put me off everything else.

But if we really want to bring back nostalgia? World Cup 98! That game, that music, the fouls, the atmosphere, the commentary, the angry cutscenes, the celebrations! Yeah, take the best of FIFA Road to World Cup 1998, focus on the biggest tournament on the planet and make a epic game!!! Ahh good memories.
 
Yes I still play RTWC 98 to this day. Despite vastly inferior gameplay, it's still better than most other FiFA games because it's a game I can enjoy with my friends by fooling around in the pitch. The presentation, menu designs, soundtracks all felt so robust.

I mostly prefer to play with national teams and RTWC 98 had lots of national teams. The intentional dive, pushing opponents for intentional fouls and tackling the GK were the best parts.

It's a shame that EA abandoned world cup games and we just got an average "world cup" dlc for fifa 18 instead of a complete separate game fully dedicated to world cup.
 
I recently got my hand on FIFA 14 PSP version, which is basically a FIFA 2005 "remastered" legacy edition. What impressed me more was that it still has the awesome SIM function, where it advances like and old FM text-only events style and whenever you want, or you need you can press :x: and intervene and play the rest of the match. Really can't understand why both games today do not have this type of mechanism to SIM matches in CM/ML.

Second fact that impressed me , watching that FIFA 14 ps2 version is also an improved version of FIFA 05/06, is that like in PES PS2 version, where 2008~2014 are an improved version of PES6, in FIFA case we had the same situation. Someone or a team of "someones" gathered and improved the gameplay of the old aged 2005 engine.

Even if you liked FIFA 05 or not, it is for sure an improvement, or many steps το the right direction. And what i want to conclude. It is maybe better to work on a stable core for many time, than making radical changes every 2-3 years and starting from scratch. I mean if someone can make something good out of FIFA 2005, even nine years after, then when you have a good gameplay as a base, and do the right improvements every year, you may produce much better results.
 
i've been playing fifa since fifa94 (my first ever fifa on 386), but my favourite retro ones are fifa 97, fifa98rtwc, fifa99, fifa2001, fifa2003 and fifa2004.
 
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MadbaLL said:
i've been playing fifa since fifa94, but my favourite retro ones are fifa 97, fifa98rtwc, fifa99, fifa2001, fifa2003 and fifa2004.
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Did you find a way to run fifa 2001 smoothly on modern pcs?

On my new pc, FPS counter shows 60 fps but everything runs at 30 fps, the camera panning, player animations are all 30 fps and it looks very laggy.

But somehow the flags waving in the crowd are fully 60 fps lol. Only that thing looks smooth. CPU affinity 1 didn't solve the issue even though that did fix the framerate for fifa 2002 and wc 2002.
 
Sami 1999 said:
Did you find a way to run fifa 2001 smoothly on modern pcs?

On my new pc, FPS counter shows 60 fps but everything runs at 30 fps, the camera panning, player animations are all 30 fps and it looks very laggy.

But somehow the flags waving in the crowd are fully 60 fps lol. Only that thing looks smooth. CPU affinity 1 didn't solve the issue even though that did fix the framerate for fifa 2002 and wc 2002.
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to be honest i haven't tried running fifa 2001 since 2002 :)

i would like to play fifa 2003 again, but there is no 1920x1080 support mod.
 
I was never a fan of FIFA on the PS1. And now I've just played 05 - the last one released for the console. In theory, they'd have refined it by then. Wow, what a steaming turd. Seriously bad. So disjointed, lightning fast. Taken aback by how poor it is - miles behind This Is Football, even.
 
rockstrongo said:
So guys!
Older FIFA games,last gen.
Fifa 8-11,any game standing out,being good?
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From what I have read FIFA 11 PC seems to be the PES 5 of FIFAs. Not sure, but I think PC and PS3 are same ports.
Can't tell for sure as I have played only 10 & 11 on PC, but not so deep.

Basically FIFA WC 2010 south Africa and FIFA 11.
 
slamsoze said:
From what I have read FIFA 11 PC seems to be the PES 5 of FIFAs. Not sure, but I think PC and PS3 are same ports.
Can't tell for sure as I have played only 10 & 11 on PC, but not so deep.

Basically FIFA WC 2010 south Africa and FIFA 11.
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Thanks Slammy!
I'm getting a 360 tmw (again) with Pes 6/8/12/14/17 and FIFA 8/9/10/11 and for 2 € I'm adding FIFA 12+13.
That's why I was wondering.

Never played those old FIFA games,I played FIFA 95 on my Megadrive (rubbish) then I played FIFA 07 on my laptop,coming from years of Pes 6 I remember laughing at that game.
But it's going to be fun exploring all those old games.
 
slamsoze said:
From what I have read FIFA 11 PC seems to be the PES 5 of FIFAs. Not sure, but I think PC and PS3 are same ports.
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FIFA 11 for PC is a very good game in general, but it's a port of the PS3/Xbox 360 version of FIFA 10 so it has its flaws: keepers not being reactive enough on high balls (to the extent that you can lob the keeper with a long pass) and missilie-like teammate pressure, for example.
But it's definitely enjoyable anyway.
 
slamsoze said:
From what I have read FIFA 11 PC seems to be the PES 5 of FIFAs. Not sure, but I think PC and PS3 are same ports.
Can't tell for sure as I have played only 10 & 11 on PC, but not so deep.

Basically FIFA WC 2010 south Africa and FIFA 11.
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I don't know, it doesn't make a lot of sense to call it the pes 5 of Fifa. Compared to other fifa games that came after 11, it has the best "feel" when it comes to controlling your players and passing/shooting. This makes it a lot of fun. At the same time the base speed might seem too fast, and the gameplay as well, most teams are very direct going forward. Starting with 12, everything feels so "light" about everything, passing, changing direction... but it's also a much slower game, with build-up and requiring some patience if you want to create a good chance. Oh and 11 was the last fifa game with no sliders! It's interesting revisiting the last game with no sliders (it's still good!) and the first one with sliders. It's depressing that sliders are almost exactly the same today as they were when they first implemented them in 12.
 
manmachine said:
I don't know, it doesn't make a lot of sense to call it the pes 5 of Fifa. Compared to other fifa games that came after 11, it has the best "feel" when it comes to controlling your players and passing/shooting. This makes it a lot of fun. At the same time the base speed might seem too fast, and the gameplay as well, most teams are very direct going forward. Starting with 12, everything feels so "light" about everything, passing, changing direction... but it's also a much slower game, with build-up and requiring some patience if you want to create a good chance. Oh and 11 was the last fifa game with no sliders! It's interesting revisiting the last game with no sliders (it's still good!) and the first one with sliders. It's depressing that sliders are almost exactly the same today as they were when they first implemented them in 12.
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Yes, agree. When i say the PES 5 of FIFA, i mean that it is kind of "retro" and i know many people that, for them it is the last FIFA they enjoyed, according to what they say always.
My opinion is based on people form our Greek Forum to be honest. If i would base my opinion on Evoweb, i would say FIFA 2016, but 2016 is in the current gen.

I hope i am clear. This is not my personal evalutation. If you ask me, based on the time i played it, it is very good, too fast at times, having in mind the NO-SLIDERS though. Good content in CM.
 
rockstrongo said:
Thanks Slammy!
I'm getting a 360 tmw (again) with Pes 6/8/12/14/17 and FIFA 8/9/10/11 and for 2 € I'm adding FIFA 12+13.
That's why I was wondering.

Never played those old FIFA games,I played FIFA 95 on my Megadrive (rubbish) then I played FIFA 07 on my laptop,coming from years of Pes 6 I remember laughing at that game.
But it's going to be fun exploring all those old games.
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I've seen this movie before.

I'm pretty much about to buy or rebuy every PS2, PS3 and PS4 FIFA. PS3 was my FIFA era. I remember the love ramping up from WC 2010 especially - it was excellent.
 
Flipper the Priest said:
I've seen this movie before.

I'm pretty much about to buy or rebuy every PS2, PS3 and PS4 FIFA. PS3 was my FIFA era. I remember the love ramping up from WC 2010 especially - it was excellent.
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FIFA WC 2010 is a main reason i wanna buy a PS3 console, shame this game was a console exclusive.
 
slamsoze said:
FIFA WC 2010 is a main reason i wanna buy a PS3 console, shame this game was a console exclusive.
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See, I've never been a PC gamer so I don't know what I'm missing. I think I - and my bank account - should keep it that way.

Although I have recently acquired FIFA 06 for the PC. I wanted to check it out as it was the debut of the Career/Manager Mode. Far better than I remembered. Of course, PES was superior - untouchable at that point and I was a massive fanboy. Even if I liked FIFA at the time I wouldn't have admitted it.

Honestly, (re)discovering old football games has been quite possibly the best aspect of lockdown for me. There are games like PES3 and PES5 that have never gotten old. There are all the PS2 FIFAs and PS3 PESes that I didn't play as I was on the other team. There are belters like FIFA 2014-16 where just enough time has passed for me to have forgotten them despite playing them remorselessly at the time.

It's a bit like the clamour for old, real life football during this period. There's a feeling that there's enough quality to reminisce about to make the current stuff redundant, or at least unimportant. With the archives, you can tap into what makes you happy and love football, guaranteed. I'll still embrace new games, real or computerised, but I like knowing that the past can keep me ticking forevermore.
 
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