Game Overview
On an improvement from last year 08 is almost more like FIFA Street than a representation of real life, Saturday afternoon football. You are required to master the trickery and showboating skills which have been dramatically improved this year. Rather than twiddling the stick and hoping for a step over or round the world, this year there is a lot more control and precision in the skills and even the shooting, to really make you feel like you are on the pitch playing with 15,000+ fully licensed players! Impressive huh!?

Obviously FIFA fan boys out there will still stick to the same argument, it's got licenses where as it's rival Pro Evolution Soccer doesn't, well they are right of course! Although PES in recent years has introduced a few licenses here and there Konami will be hard pushed to produce something with the definition and detail that FIFA series is so well known for and 2008 is no change. 620 licensed teams and at last.......lower divisions, players names, licensed kits with nothing spared except the players facial features, in other words, they look nothing like their real life counterpart. Still who cares when you have your beloved team there; on a computer game for the first time in god knows how long! It's a shame that the lower league stadiums haven't been included but to be honest that’s probably pushing it a little bit so you'll have to put up with playing at the same ground every time you play with a lower league team. Maybe we'll see them introduced as downloadable content at a later date?

You will probably have heard about the "Be a Pro" mode that makes its first appearance in FIFA 08, if you haven't then we'll give you a quick run down. You play as one player on the pitch and one player only (although you can pause and change), you have to play as though you were that player in a real game, so get into the right position for corners, free kicks, defensive work, attacking etc You are then rated for each thing you do, so, completing a pass, getting into space to receive a pass, being in the right position for a corner and of course scoring a goal. Obviously if you do things wrong then you are docked points on your overall rating, so if you are playing as a Left Back you'll probably lose points for being in the 6 yard box in your opponents half when they have a corner down the your end! "Be a Pro" will eventually allow for 11 v 11 online and we have heard that eventually EA want to get the 11 best players from each country and hold a World Cup, so get practicing! It's not possible to do online just yet but a patch for 5 v 5 isn't far off, so we hear. That really will make FIFA08 the game to beat!

All the usual high quality graphics, and sounds that you have come to expect from EA are there including real chants for all teams, oh how sweet it sounds to hear "EAGLES" being chanted out of the surround sound speakers! As gaming continues to grow the online capabilities are key for most games and FIFA definitely isn't a let down in that department with online tournaments, single matches, full selection of teams and full squads. Hours of entertainment and the kind of game you can go back to time and time again and never have the same game twice.

The only gripe we have with FIFA08 is the fact that sometimes the gameplay and movements of the ball seem way to slow and you never really get a sense of speed in game although they have tried to improve it with "Be a Pro" as the camera will zoom in and shake a bit when you hold the sprint button down, little bit like Gears of War.

Our Conclusions
EA really have started to build a quality game here, PES took over for so many years and obviously until we have got our mitts on PES08 it's different to say which we prefer but FIFA08 does not disappoint at all and is a top game! When "Be a Pro" online is introduced via a patch, FIFA really will be tough to beat! We love it!

Overall Score: 9/10

Thanks to EA