Game end Joy

We spend a whole day with the latest Fifa extravaganza – and find much to enjoy in its trinity of major gameplay overhauls

The makers of football sims would like us to believe that each annual repetition is a radical improvement in the final. In a minority of cases this is actually true.

The brief glimpse we have of Fifa 12 captured during E3 suggested that this one of those occasions. Producer David Rutter drives a trinity of major changes this year 's rate: a new player to affect motor, dribble a revamped defense and tactical precision. Having a full day game at EA 's Guildford offices, it seems to me that is much more than public relations bluster. This is a whole different ball game FIFA 11

The engine is the impact player immediately visible - and remarkably entertaining - \ is the game's new additions. An advanced procedural animation system with precise collision physics is bound, it means that every encounter is calculated between the players in real time - and they all seem to look and different from the end, depending on the physical strength and sheer mass of the men involved.

In a game between Newcastle and Spurs for example, sends a typically robust tackle Barton Bale turns - literally Spin - On the lawn like a crash test dummy. Physical fights are real crunch to them, muscular front and Balotelli able to barge through defenders, and her body rattling pushed, pulled shirts amid the wrangling.

But the real physics seems to imply a real risk. A tackle can upend can get the opposing player or the tackler himself out badly, clumsily spread to overturn an incoming teammates. You get those brilliant players in the goal area climbs like wild bunch, the ball bounce realistically between several sets of limbs.

And this physicality not only on-the-ball moments is limited: you 'll often see crunches the background when the players are just running into each other, someone sends a spiral accessible on the ground nearby. Everywhere there are players creep, jostle and trip. The pitch is crammed with action.

The effects engine, it's authentic, often humorous, but also a potential game-changer. Fifa have fans who have learned to predict the behavior baked into the ball and players are caught off guard in the true sense again and again. Sliding attacks now often put the ball against the oncoming attacker, recovered it glorious in its way, perfectly weighted through ball to the ankles of defenders stranded clip, she comes painfully off track.

Such a thing did happen occasionally in Fifa 11, but there was more structure in a synthetic system. Here it seems the bizarre and unexpected interventions rebounds to become a factor in every encounter - and it 's exciting stuff.

But it seems that there 's plenty of skill and dexterity in order to discover the new controls, the balance of the blood and thunder. The flow of the game feels a lot has changed. The revised system provides precision dribbling a jogging speed control option on the left trigger, you are reduced to a strictly controlled.

From here you can simply sell the ball speed in one direction and off in the other. Then the upper left bumper button for manual precision dribbling, the high-fidelity control of the direction is there, so that the ball circle guarding him, and hold up play. "We umm-ing and ahh-Ing were, if you keep this feature in," says Rutter. "But I suspect it won \ s too much fun. ', Because it cut \ t get'"

The result is a game that is more similar in terms of pace, you 're not just sprinting around (was it just me?), You' re playing with speed, you 're slow, then speeds up, you \ re 'Lionel Messi. (And even if you 're clearly not Messi, when you approach a defender with no buttons pressed, it'll drop you into precision control automatically. The system wants you to play well.)

Rutter saw this as a central goal of the design process. "Yes, there 'sa time for sprinting, when' sa large area, but there 's also a time for close scrutiny, if you' re in urban centers - and the two most important weapons are, if you the ball and let you express with great fidelity and imagination than previous versions of Fifa. That 's not to say that they' re over-powered, and I think that 's an important qualification. "

Meanwhile in the defense, which includes the new scramble control options on the trigger that you let the pressure on an opponent. But there 's \ also a tactical defense button' s more than hold your position and gently guiding an incoming players in the side line, where they cause no harm can 't.

"At a base level it's about containing, not letting that player do what he wants to do until you force him into an error," says Rutter. "One of those errors is showing the ball to you, allowing you to tackle him – at that point it becomes very much about skill, because it's a manual button press to tackle. I tend to use the jockey buttons to drop a player into a sort of free-ranging contained state and then use the top right button to bring in a second defender if necessary. He would then apply normal contained pressure and I can move my other player with full manual control to try and cut out a pass or shot and wait for my opponent to make a mistake.

"The more adept you get, the more you understand that, 'okay, what I'm doing here is not necessarily trying to tackle, what I'm doing is waiting and holding until play breaks down.' That's what real players do."

Beyond the match engine, another important goal with FIFA 12 in depth in order to add a career mode that was introduced last year. To cope as a manager 'll have with real injuries, guided by the physics-collision system reached.

Putting unsuitable superstars in your first 11 is a tactical option, but also a huge gamble - not only because they could get crocked again, but because of the effect they may have on your relationship. Players psychology and media intervention are much larger offerings in this game - ape, perhaps, have revolutionized the changes of the Football Manager series in recent years.

The newspapers are eager to take up violations, player grudge, any whiff of a potential exclusive - and if you 'do t well with your team' don \ s problems, they 'll Huff from the tabloids faster than you can say' Transfer gossip '.

"We 've placed a big emphasis on a manager in the sense that, if it can happen in the real world it can happen in the game," says Rutter. "Last year, the 'Play as a manager" mode was very narrow, it was only through you. This year, curve balls are thrown. Your players could be unhappy, because they re don \ as 't think they' enough to pay, because the team 's not successful enough, or they' re not enough to run outs on the field.

"If they are unhappy, their form dips when they come and talk about it and you don 't do enough, they' ll talk to the press, and if sent to the press, talk to other managers within the. Game could try and sign them develop basically the things that are beyond your control come -.. things to you It 'sa very different experience "..

Apparently the AI ??is much smarter to transfer. Transfer targets are randomly extravagant wage demands to test your resolve, other clubs made offers for your pathetic striker. Everyone 's to make the. Fortunately, however, there 's also an improved youth scouting system, so you can discover associations and marauding mercenary players and handle the next Jack Wilshere for themselves.

All clubs are in season the expectations agreed to take up the press and commentators (Alan Smith and Martin Tyler). There is also an extended transfer deadline for ordering tags feature, the tons of last-minute business, a news feed of the latest offers in-game prices, and a ticking countdown clock, the excitement of these last hours to replicate the negotiations . In the midst of chaos, you will become Chief Executive with some helpful hints on possible purchases, and you 're able to look at offers from the farm to the final moments of the day, like any other business pans.

Another fresh addition is the EA Sports Football Club, essentially a social networking feature similar Autolog and Battleog. Everything you do in the game, by winning tournaments triumph in the career mode gives you XP, in the online ranking filters, both globally and friend-based.

You 're constantly with what your friends have the game date and can also spam your own successes to your Facebook account. Elsewhere, a challenge section, the theme provides appropriate experiences around the last of the real world football game basis - so if Chelsea only beat Sunderland with the second-half hat-trick for Drogba could be a challenge to play to try the last half of the Black Cats and to prevent the attack.

As an extra motivator, participants get to align themselves with a favourite club, which then gets a share of all their XP wins – this is all averaged out to create a score and a league table reflects the weekly fortunes of all the real-world sides. I'm not sure how much all this will mean to the average Fifa player – I just want something like Autolog, that makes it easier for me to complete against friends online, either together or asynchronously.

Until then Fifa 12 looks to be a very exciting new era for the show rings - one of the complexity and unpredictability, both on and off the pitch. Interestingly, although it seemed to me that the player's influence was most obvious engine of the three most important innovations.

Rutter – who is on a something of a global press tour with the game – told me that different aspects are noticed much more in different territories. "Precision dribbling was a very big deal to the North Americans," he says. "Tactical defending was important too because it took a lot of the pressure off them. In the UK, we're talking more about the player impact engine – I'm off to France and Italy and Spain later this week and I'm sure they've all got their own take on what's important."

I guess that's the important thing with modern football simulations. Just like current fighting games or all those military shooters with their myriad load-outs and perk options, personalisation and individual expression are the key. Plus, anything that gets us further away from pre-cooked animation cycles, unresponsive team mates and defensive options that stop at "sliding tackle or foot prod" is a triumph, really.