Pro Evolution Soccer Review Page 2

20 Oct 2009 at 16:35:17 by Chris Schilling
Systems used to review this title: (360)

In motion, PES 2010 is a curious mix of the sublime and the ridiculous. This year’s game matches FIFA’s claim of 360 degree player control, but there’s a noticeable difference in fluidity when you place the two together. It’s partly the fault of slightly clunky transitional animations in Konami’s game, which see players adjusting their movement in a faintly robotic manner, but this goes further than mere concerns about the quality of the graphics - it also impacts the gameplay because the physics just aren’t quite ‘there’ yet. It’s not nearly as organic, and if you couple the awkward movement with the worryingly slow player acceleration, you’ve got a game where it’s hard for even the quickest, trickiest winger to arc a run past a lumbering full-back.

That’s the case on the top two difficulties, anyway. Played on the default Regular setting, PES 2010 is embarrassingly easy – in the PS2 games our skill level was somewhere between three and four stars. On the equivalent of the former here, our second Champions League match saw our Man Blue side thrash Porto at the Estádio do Dragao 12-0. Now we know they’ve not been quite the same since Mourinho’s departure, but come on…

Indeed, there are concerns about the AI in general. Ramp up the difficulty and the CPU is more likely to defeat you simply by having a team that’s faster than yours and what appears to be an invisible switch that allows them to win every tackle. You’ll rarely be left praising an AI opponent’s consummate skill and tactical play so much as cursing their apparent cheapness. Moreover, player positioning, at times, seems to be all over the shop. We’ve seen centre backs part like the Red Sea, while any player picking up the ball in a bit of space will get a lot of mileage just by running at defenders, who seem worryingly happy to back off and back off until you’ve fired one goalwards.

Yet there’s definitely something thrilling about thumping one into the old onion bag PES 2010. The ball physics might feel too weighty in the middle of the park, but you can really fizz in crosses at speed, while shots have a real heft to them. It’s arguably even more satisfying to hit the post, with the exaggerated CLANG of the ball as it smacks against the crossbar provoking sharp intakes of breath in a way that similar efforts in FIFA don’t quite manage. And in player-vs-player games, where AI foibles aren’t nearly so significant an issue, there’s still plenty to enjoy here.

One area where PES is some distance ahead is in the match highlights. Curiously, in the slow-motion replays, the action looks much more fluid. It’s the polar opposite to FIFA in that respect – during a match, player movement in EA’s game seems significantly smoother, yet it’s oddly choppy in replays. Not so with PES. The highlights reel in Konami’s game picks up more incidents and genuine chances than in FIFA, too. You won’t see any brief clips of a keeper clearing away a cross in place of one of the goals here.

Ultimately, PES isn’t quite the force it once was – it’s probably a combination of both Konami’s complacency, and a genuine raising of the bar from EA - but this year’s game shows signs that it might provide a serious title challenge next time around. For now, though, the difference is clear, marking a real role reversal from just a few years back. PES 2010 feels like a game; FIFA 10 feels like football. 

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