FIFA 16 is Essentially Just FIFA 15.1

For some strange reason, I couldn’t figure out why this year’s FIFA demo has had such little fanfare and such low expectations. There wasn’t half as much excitement on social media as usual for its release and I don’t know anybody that’s overly keen on shelling out for it this October. After a few hours with it, I can easily see why.

Being someone that played FIFA 15 to death, I grew to know all of its little details and quirks, so when the first match loaded up on FIFA 16 and I was greeted by the verbatim same commentary intro and player animations for walking onto the pitch, I was more than slightly bemused. The sense of there being very little difference between 16 and 15 is a prevailing one I had throughout my time with the demo.

Aside from kit updates, slightly altered kicking animations and the addition of bouncy hair for those with beautifully flowing locks, the graphics remain more or less unaltered. That would be fine if this was your first time with a FIFA game, but when players react to bookings and off-the-ball interactions in exactly the same way they have done for the past 12 months, it’s hard not to feel disappointed. Couple that with the commentary team squawking out the same old inanities along with a few new soundbites of exposition about club history and you have a recipe for ennui with long-time players.

After about the fifth game, I found myself slipping into old patterns from FIFA 15. Once you find a way to break the defence and keep the ball, you have more or less discovered the formula, even when playing on Legendary. The game is more challenging that previously, if only because the AI opponents are obsessed with getting in touch with their inner Jordan Hendersons and passing side-to-side relentlessly. From an authenticity standpoint, FIFA 16 is more realistic than its predecessor in that your style of play will reflect the team in real life. For instance, considering that Manchester City’s forward line once painted themselves orange and worked at Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, crosses and passes are much more effective when played along the ground.

When the features announced are stripped of all their marketing jargon, its laziness becomes that much more apparent. You can defend slightly better, the kicking requires more precision and it’s harder to pull off lobbed through balls: the scourge of all online head-to-heads. That’s basically it, minus women’s teams being playable for the first time ever. The most galling thing about FIFA 16 is that they have the temerity to claim an in-game tutorial is a new feature. Thanks for reminding me what the X button does, I will have all of the shiny FUT packs now, please.

Even worse, when you compare FIFA 16 to the leaps and bounds Konami have made with Pro Evolution Soccer 2016, a case could be made for complacency from EA Sports. Konami have invested heavily in adapting the Fox Engine to create a bustling, vibrant game of football whereas FIFA 16 serves to makes four minute matches seem like a chore. After just a few games, I felt like I had been playing the game for months as it’s just all so familiar; PES kept me playing for a few days and eager for its eventual release.

However, it’s worth mentioning that FIFA 16 still looks like it will be a good football game, although it’s going to be nowhere near FIFA 10 or FIFA 07 in terms of innovation and features that make it simply unmissable. It looks like it may just be a stopgap year for the franchise. Although the full game might have a bit more polish to it and the modes more in-depth, the core gameplay being essentially a copy and paste job should be enough to put prudent players off.

The incremental changes from the previous incarnation makes this hard to recommend from the demo so far. If you’re looking to save yourself £50 for Christmas, don’t buy FIFA 16 – you may as well stick with 15 because it’s hard to tell the difference either way.