Every year, year on year, there is always that list of things you can count on to return. Christmas time, Tax time, the dreaded flu season and of course the flurry of sports games on our consoles and computers. Of course, there are those FPS games too, but they do not belong anywhere near a sports game review!

So here we are, another year, another FIFA game. Like any franchise that lasts this long, fresh ideas get harder and harder to implement each year because, well, apart from visual improvements, soccer is just soccer. The aim is to kick that ball in the net. As a Rugby League & V8 supercars fan, I still don’t understand the fascination with soccer.

In saying that, I have been playing the FIFA games on and off since getting my hands on it when I was but a young pup with a SEGA Mega Drive.

I’ll be honest and say that I have zero interest in online play. I have my reasons for this, but I have always been a loner. I like to play career mode or story mode when it comes to video games. So, when The Journey showed its face in FIFA 17, I was excited.

Jumping to now, to FIFA 20, the story mode feels somewhat watered down. The Journey career is there, but it’s not really. Yes, you play a career and build yourself up by earning attributes for your character and yes you go through the motions of starting down the bottom, well sort of, and working up, but that is really about it.

There is no real story like The Journey. You just play, train, play, train and so on and so forth. It is more fun being a manager this time. I think someone has been taking notes from Football Manager…. Hmmmm. Anyway, I digress.

The career in FIFA 20 feels much more like UFC 3. I have played a lot of UFC 3, I mean A LOT and the career mode is perfectly fine, but for me, The Journey just felt better. More in-depth and more connected to your character.

Being the team manager is more than just picking a team and winning. It is your responsibility to keep the morale up which will in turn, keep you winning and your players in good spirits. So, watch what you say at those pesky press conferences. Everything you say there will influence the happiness or frustrations of your players.

Managing your team is quite challenging. I have played football manager. I have reviewed a couple of them. The one thing football manager did was include every little detail and stat of the game in which you could use to make or break your team. And when I say every little detail, I do mean Every… Little… Detail! To a point where you could sometimes feel overwhelmed.

FIFA20 has dialed this down and made it more fun for the novice. Granted, FIFA has more to offer than just managing a team so it can afford to dial it back as management is not the core focus of the game.

Now to door number 3 and we have a new addition to the FIFA franchise, VOLTA! Volta football draws on the previous FIFA street-style elements but dials it up about 8 notches. Volta is a fast, fun and colourful way to play soccer. Throw in the hip-hop soundtrack and you have all the elements for you and your soccer-loving friends to have a lot of fun versing each other.

Volta games are not only short and sweet, but fast-paced to boot. The players manage to pull off some amazing ball tricks when passing or shooting, and when you score a goal, you are presented with different player finishes which are meant to be, for want of a better word, hip. When you score that goal, instead of the usual telecast replay like in the main game, you get what looks like a security camera footage from different angles of the court or a view from a phone just as if you were filming it yourself on your own phone. It all adds the sense of the game, even if it is a bit tacky at times.

Volta also offers its own career style play, but this time it feels more like the journey. It shows you cut scenes as you progress, and it gives you that sense of connection with your player. Volta also focuses more on you playing more independently rather than as team like in the main game.

It has multiple play modes such as 3v3, 4v4, 5v5 and 11v11. Local and online multiplayer are there too, but local games feel much more like a social gathering rather than a game of tactics. Is that a bad thing? Not really, I don’t think. I enjoyed the quick games with mates while putting FIFA20 through its paces. But longevity is probably not its strong point.

While I can’t say I am the biggest fan of the Volta addition, it does bring me back to what I said at the beginning… when a franchise runs this long, how much more can you add to it. So, while Volta might not be everyone’s cup of Kool-Aid, it is certainly a welcome addition regardless.

So, graphics. What can I really say that we didn’t already know or expect? Games such a FIFA focus 3 main features in my mind. Graphics. Gameplay. Content.

Every year, graphics are pushed further and further to get the most out of current technologies. Movement is fluid throughout the entire game and the players don’t just smash in tot each other during a match, you can see them really try to make an effort and use their arms and hands in the same way any of us to push past another player. All player movement is just so fluid and smooth and almost real, that there are points during play that you could be forgiven for forgetting you are playing a game and not watching a match on TV. Even the crowds show some independence during play which is much nicer than looking at copy & pasted sprites.

The player faces during close-ups however, not so much. But hey, who cares. It is the actual playing of the game I care about.

With regards to audio, it’s soccer. There is cheering, music and on field effects. Not much has changed here. Nothing of any real note anyway. The commentary however, while it can sometimes be both funny & literal, something that it becomes is monotonous. This is however something I find in just about every single sporting game though. There are only so many sound-bytes that you can probably have in a game for any given occasion, but for some reason, it feels like there are only a handful in FIFA20. That said, you tune it out after while as your focus is on the game anyway.

Controlling the game will come natural to seasoned FIFA players, and for those that haven’t played a FIFA game yet, (get out from under that rock of which you have been living under) the controls are super simple to pick up and play. There is a trainer turned on by default when you start playing, I give 1 match and you will turn it off. No, I give 3 minutes. The trainer, which is simply instructions above your players head on what buttons it recommends you press during play, is goddam annoying! But I do see its purpose for some.

Multiplayer is there as expected. Pretty simple really, you play local or online against your friends or your foes. Local is more fun if you have the opportunity to have your friends over, as it tends to get a bit rowdy and excitement charged during matches as the games progress. Apart from dedicated party games, not too many other games can cause so much fun even if you aren’t a big sports fan. That’s one of things I love about these games.

I could keep going, but if I drag this on too much more, you won’t bother to finish reading my wonderful review! HA!

So, let me end it with this:
FIFA 20 is yet another iteration in what is a long running franchise that has seen its share of both successful games and its failures. It is hard to breathe life into a game that, let’s face it, is basically the same from year to year. There are no big leaps and bounds forward in these games, and nor can there be. It is soccer. That’s it. The loss of “The Journey” is a big minus for me, but the Volta story does bring some of that feeling back. And it is nice to try something that is not just simple soccer.

Being a manger is also more fun than I anticipated. On paper, it just seems so boring. But surprisingly it wasn’t. It was playing the main FIFA game career that seemed to lack the most fulfillment. Don’t get me wrong, it is still fun, but being a manger was better.

FIFA fans are always going to buy the next FIFA. It is almost a given. With that though, if you have been holding out because like me, you believe a FIFA game is just another FIFA game, FIFA 20 has a lot to offer this time around.

Written by: Kurt Frohloff

A Founder of MKAU, a gamer, a family man. I have a love of all things gaming and a wish of mine is to have more time to actually play the games we review here!