FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

[Krebstar]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

While this game still has massive flaws, before you give up on it I urge you to play all manual, using custom CPU tactics and orion's sliders.

It's pretty damn fun. Most concerns I'm seeing can be addressed with these. You can't do anything about animations or the players ability on the ball, but there is no way you can complain about the pace of the game when we have the power in our hands to slow it down.

If you put a bit of work into this game you can get a bit out of it, and it's a fairly fun experience.

[dubcity]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

I've pretty much given up on tweaking sliders. The game was built to be played with 6 minute halves on regular speed (7-9 on slow) and I have more or less embraced that. As far as I'm concerned, the only stats worth taking seriously are goals and shots on target. Trying to get other gameplay aspects (pass %, fouls, shot accuracy) accurate and realistic is an endless exercise in futility. The real FIFA ends up rearing its head eventually.

Lately, I've been playing on World Class, Slow speed, 8 minute halves, default sliders, all-manual with the exception of through balls. Works well for me.

[bigh0rt]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

I've pretty much given up on tweaking sliders. The game was built to be played with 6 minute halves on regular speed (7-9 on slow) and I have more or less embraced that. As far as I'm concerned, the only stats worth taking seriously are goals and shots on target. Trying to get other gameplay aspects (pass %, fouls, shot accuracy) accurate and realistic is an endless exercise in futility. The real FIFA ends up rearing its head eventually.

Lately, I've been playing on World Class, Slow speed, 8 minute halves, default sliders, all-manual with the exception of through balls. Works well for me.

Stats aside, you're still going to get a much more realistic feel and flow to the match by using kreb's CTT, and, if you're looking at 8 minute halves (I play 9 myself), either Hedache or G's or Jamie's sliders.

[niharjhatn]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

Agreed on this assessment. The overall gameplay is a step backward. The general speed and animations during play are much too fast, and I feel like every game feels very similar—and this makes the scripting seem especially bad. Last year I felt like I would get a good variety of experiences from one game to the next, and it stayed pretty fresh over the course of the year. There are a lot of successes, but the core game is definitely a disappointment.

And this is the killer for me. Lack of variety. CTT's go some way to help, but apart from being a pain to input, I still don't see variety WITHIN a game. Teams don't stick with one particular mentality the entire match, and yet in FIFA 13 this is precisely the case. Sliders definitely improve things dramatically, but in the end the AI is boring to play against. For example - you never see the long passers on a team PASS THE BALL LONG. I've been playing with slightly modified orion's sliders and Krebstar's CTT but you'd still expect guys like Joe Allen or Xabi Alonso to go for the long pass on occasion even if their team isn't "set" that way - but I hardly ever see this.

This is then combined with crappy coding for long balls in general - they always seem to have insane back spin and seem to hang in the air. This is one area that is done so much better in PES.

Its very frustrating, but you'd expect them to be able to solve these things by now since moving to their next gen engine. The impact engine remains buggy as ever with horrible ghosting of players that initiate their 'body up' animations. Ever since the horrendous load of crap that was 11 it seems more than ever that FIFA devs only watch Barcelona play and build their game around that.

[demencia_total]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

All these points that you guys make are legit, but the one thing that really gets me is the defending. It is IMPOSSIBLE to mark anyone closely with any sort of precision. Having to manually get your defender in close for a wild tackle that has a 50/50 chance of missing is absolutely unrealistic. And when you do succeed, its always deemed a clean tackle even if you murder the dribbler.

AI teammates stopping for absolutely no reason and losing momemtum while tracking the receiver is the most common way for the opposing club to score, whether its human or AI controlled doesn't seem to matter.

So essentially, you cannot defend properly while you are in control of the player, and you cannot defend properly while you're not in control. Awesome. The tactical defending seems like a great idea, but the execution is complete garbage.

I can put up with the ridiculous offensive quirks because I rarely use the skill stick and I build my play fairly slow, but the fact that defending is taken completely out of my hands sends me into a state of rage. Even when you win (and you WILL win often as soon as you get good with the ball) you do not feel satisfied because you know that it was purely a numbers game where the AI just botched the chances they created out of the utter ineptitude of your defenders.

While I didn't spend my own money on this game (I was given a gift card), I truly regret getting 13. I'm usually not this negative on the forums, but the fact this game is still universally praised when it took an obvious step back from previous years makes me feel like I'm just not getting it. Maybe the problem lies with me.

And then I try to play another match, only to be reminded that I (and most of you who are also frustrated) are on to something.

[dubcity]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

Stats aside, you're still going to get a much more realistic feel and flow to the match by using kreb's CTT, and, if you're looking at 8 minute halves (I play 9 myself), either Hedache or G's or Jamie's sliders.

Honestly, realism went out the window when I gave up one of those BS overpowered cross-to-header goals to the CPU for the 900th time. There are just too many of those BS moments in FIFA to take the game seriously on any level.

[dubcity]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

So essentially, you cannot defend properly while you are in control of the player, and you cannot defend properly while you're not in control. Awesome. The tactical defending seems like a great idea, but the execution is complete garbage.

Yeah. Tactical defending and the impact engine are two of the main reasons that playing FIFA at higher difficulty levels is generally a soul crushing and painful experience in the long run.

[niharjhatn]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

Yeah. Tactical defending and the impact engine are two of the main reasons that playing FIFA at higher difficulty levels is generally a soul crushing and painful experience in the long run.

Probably a bit more dramatic then I'd put it.. but yeah

I mean FIFA's been around for a long time. I've been playing it since '98 on PS1 before moving to the PC version... people are going to get good at the game. REALLY good.

Yet how the game plays at legendary difficulty is terrible - teams don't play like they are meant to. Forget about it being 'challenging'. Sure I still lose games, but the losses always seem to be those "oh lol" losses.

As I am on PC, I do have the luxury of mods eventually fixing the game, but until some big AI mods come out (or some wondrous patch by EA) I'm done with 13. Might go back to 12 or just get PES this year.

It shocks me that the DEMO gameplay was so fabulous... and to me at least seems drastically different to how the real game has panned out. I dunno WTF went wrong with the final release.

[sars973]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

Playing as Chelsea in my manager mode I faced Tottenham in the Capital One Cup. They started Gareth Bale at LB. Needless to say I took advantage of that and won 4-2.

Weird stuff lol.

[Krebstar]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

Playing as Chelsea in my manager mode I faced Tottenham in the Capital One Cup. They started Gareth Bale at LB. Needless to say I took advantage of that and won 4-2.

Weird stuff lol.

Why is that weird? It was his natural position for many years. If you look at his profile in the game, I'm sure it'll have LB listed as one of his positions.

[Altimus]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

I've given up on this game... PES might be a lost cause as well unless the next patch tweaks a few things.

Back to FM13 full time looks like.

[dubcity]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

I've gotten to the point where I've started doing player edits to try to increase fouls. Custom tactics and sliders do nothing when defenders are so overpowered with tackling ability. They are seemingly incapable of making sloppy challenges. They either get the tackle right, or they don't attempt a challenge at all. I decreased all players' standing tackle and sliding tackle ability to 1, and they still made perfect tackles whenever they were close enough to an attacker. And sliders challenges are completely broken in this game. I've even been trying feints and skill moves, but doing that all game results in an average of 1 extra foul per game.

Just for the hell of it, I went back and played a couple of games of FIFA 10, just to see the difference. Playing the exact same style of play, I drew 20 tackles in my first game. There's got to be a middle ground. I just don't get why EA is unwilling to address this. This isn't football. This is a bunch of robots sprinting around the field, making short passes and never taking chances.

[bigh0rt]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

Why is that weird? It was his natural position for many years. If you look at his profile in the game, I'm sure it'll have LB listed as one of his positions.

It certainly was, and is listed in the game.

[MrOctober430]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

Can I get any other commentary in the game besides French, Spanish and English. Is German commentary available for US versions?

[Qb]

Re: FIFA 13 Available Now, Post Your Impressions Here

I've been in a bit of a FIFA lull lately, as I don't have a CM going to keep my interest. I'm not sure why that is... I keep waffling between starting with Arsenal or going back to Hamburg to build my own squad, yet I do neither. Probably doesn't help that I'm also waffling between World Class and Legendary difficulties. WC lacks a bit of edge, but Legendary can be grating (and great at times).

Anyway, I hoped on last night to play Arsenal/Olympiakos. Had one of the good games on Legendary, losing 1-0 despite bossing possession and shots. Olympiakos grabbed an early lead by countering off a cleared corner in the 8th minute. I had no one back to defend which caught me totally off guard, as I wasn't using a custom set piece and was set to attack mentality at most. That frustrating quirk aside, it was a fun game because from there the Greeks sat deep and mostly launched long balls in an attempt to get behind on the counter. It was different and oddly enough, almost smart. Ultimately they were able to soak up the pressure and keep me out. I used as close to the real squad as I could and it showed in my finishing... which is, uh, unpredictable to begin with.

I also gave the MLS Final challenge a try on Legendary. Usually the scenarios are so lopsided I do them on a lower difficulty to collect the catalog credits since the FCC reward is the same regardless of difficulty. But with this requiring only a win from trailing 1-0, I thought I'd go for the glory and 1000XP. My first went down to the wire with me generating several chances, but no goals. Robbie Keane scored in the 77th with a neat turn & finish in attempt number two, but it would go to extra time despite two Beckham near misses from great FK opportunities. I played fairly conservatively in ET and aside from a few speculative efforts from distance that looked closer than they were, not much was happening. On to penalties...

Three up, three in for both sides sees Beckham on the spot. I go for finesse to the top corner and hit it well... incredible save, another Beckham PK failure! CPU and I score on the next attempts, meaning I need a save to keep the title hopes alive... it's wide! We trade goals for several rounds, both getting pieces of shots but seeing them still cross the line. Finally, with the keepers due up next round, I have yet another chance to close it out with big save. I guess correctly, but it's a great shot low & to the corner -- IT HITS THE POST! The Galaxy are MLS Champs in Beckham's swan song! Somewhere Posh Spice is smiling.

This game can still be fun... sometimes.