REVIEW – EA Sports’ fresh football identity continues the legacy of the past: despite the name change, FC 24 retains the essence of FIFA while introducing a number of noticeable, if not revolutionary, innovations to last year’s game mechanics. HyperMotion V and the variety of play styles create a number of exciting and varied situations. In FC 24, the space, timing and collisions on the field are more authentic and add more uncertainty to the game. Ultimate Team continues to play a key role in FC 24, while new coaching career features deliver the best single player experience in years.

The beauty of soccer is often in the details. In the episodes where good coaches explain at the end of a match the reasons for a close loss, where something clearly didn’t go as it should have, or simply when the luck is on the other side. On the other hand, analysis, tactical planning, and coding are all activities that coaches, professionals, and players engage in to respond to unexpected situations, to neutralize chance, and to take advantage of every opportunity to perform at their best, score goals, and win. At the same time, it remains true that chance, even for a top player, has and will decide many matches and is an absolute protagonist in the history of football. Which is interesting, because football is a deeply conservative and tradition-bound sport worldwide. There is something romantic about the fact that in such a strict and traditional environment, the difference between winning and losing is so small.

This means that EA Sports has always got football right: while we want more control, better simulation and more realistic modeling, randomness and tradition are still key to the FIFA experience, which is now being continued under a new name. And while many of us were hoping for a big, spectacular revolution with EA Sports FC 24, as the historic moment suggested, that’s not quite what happened. Rather, what has happened is that EA Sports has reaffirmed the historical identity of the series, proving that it has lost nothing of the past. So FC 24 fully respects the FIFA tradition without touching the commercial and numerical foundations of the game, while introducing more variety and randomness. All in all, a step in the right direction.

New dimensions: the HyperMotion V engine and the renewal of the user interface

During the first few hours of play, it felt like I was playing a new, refined and expanded FIFA 23, powered by a new physics engine, HyperMotion V. This engine significantly improves the physical realism of the game and makes the ball behavior much more varied and interesting. The other major innovation is a radical overhaul of the interface, which initially caused some strange confusion. After ten days of intensive use, although I still have aesthetic reservations, I acknowledge and confirm the improved clarity and speed of the new text menu, which is further enhanced by the shortcuts.

Coming back to HyperMotion V and the gameplay, as I got to know the game better, I realized that the new features of FC 24 are much more exciting than I first thought. You should know that it’s still a direct improvement over last year’s release, but the more matches you play, the more enjoyable the gameplay becomes. With new touch controls and improved ball physics, HyperMotion V makes matches more beautiful, more fun, and brings unprecedented variety to the game. It takes physical play to a new level, making ball handling and dribbling more difficult, but providing greater satisfaction with long-range shots, hard crosses, and kicking the ball in general. All this doesn’t radically change the game experience, which remains dynamic, vertical and attacking, but it definitely becomes more fun if you like the concept of football that FC 24 brings from its heritage.

Dynamic gameplay and tactical innovations

The slowness of movement, which may seem alien at first, actually makes the gameplay more natural and less explosive as you get used to it. All of this, combined with the introduction of new play styles and tactical design, adds a sense of unpredictability that increases attention and tension. The occasional loss of control or risk-taking to exploit players’ unique abilities gives FC 24 a distinct personality without compromising the game’s identity for better or worse. EA Sports’ new soccer game continues to be offensive in style, where passive defense is preferred to active defense. Defense and offense have been simplified, but every decision carries weight. A well-played match, where the teams are roughly evenly matched, is likely to end in an exciting result and a memorable classic. The variety is now reflected in the goals, which are also more spectacular.

Tactical updates have also been made, adding new dimensions to the gameplay, especially in attack, while the defense has the unenviable task of balancing attack and retreat, somehow always falling short in both transition and positioning. This doesn’t take away from the enjoyment of the game, as HyperMotion V offers a great team press mechanic that requires physical control. However, if you’ve never been a fan of high scores in EA football challenges, FC 24 probably won’t win you over. After ten days of gameplay, I can say that FC 24 is a vibrant, energetic, and fun football experience that brings freshness with the variety and choice it offers in the areas of aesthetics, control, and perception. This game is an improved version of everything we’ve come to love over the past two years, while also making significant advances in space, time, and the representation of athletes and ball weight.

The goalie could have been better?

At the moment, with the exception of Ultimate Team, the only area where I still feel insecure is with the goalkeepers. As I mentioned before, the performance of the fullbacks is impressive in most cases, whether it’s positioning between the posts or at the exits. However, their inattention to powerful shots in front of their own net, or inaccurate passes that give the ball back to the striker, could be a long-term problem. So it is likely that sooner or later a rebalancing will be necessary…

As for the other game modes, the improvements vary, with the increasingly neglected VOLTA, for example, seeing little change, while the Club mode has undergone a major overhaul, offering a much more satisfying evolution. In particular, there have been exciting changes to the coaching career, where the introduction of a new layer of strategy and management gives us a deeper insight into the world of EA Sports soccer games than ever before. Hiring coaches, designing training schedules and interacting with various systems allows for more decisive tactical management of teams, with an effortless and accessible approach that allows for a more interesting, authentic and satisfying career progression. The marketing and scouting section is still a bit cumbersome, but overall it’s by far the best career mode in recent years…

The name is gone, the quality remains

FC 24 is an impressive game that offers a great football simulation and improves on FIFA 23 in almost every way, although it’s true that EA Sports has been working for two years to make the transition to the new IP a continuity of the past. We were hoping for a fresh start, a big bang, but it didn’t happen and it’s a bit of a disappointment, but it’s undeniable that FC 24 is a compelling game with gameplay that has a distinct personality. HyperMotion V and Styles of Play bring new depth and variety to last year’s gameplay, and the new features of Coaching Career provide arguably the best single player experience in a long time. However, those expecting a significant change in content, game philosophy, and gameplay experience with the title change will not be thrilled with the new chapter in the series.

-Herpai Gergely (BadSector)-

Publisher: Electronic Arts

Developer: EA Sports

Style: Sports Simulator

Release: September 29, 2023.