PES 2015: PES is back in the game!

After a number of years of accepting its place in FIFA’s shadow, PES has stepped forward into a more competitive light once again in its 2015 instalment. The competition between the year’s two biggest soccer games is fierce, but rest assured, they definitely have their differences. FIFA 15 is all about the flash, the big names, the excitement you get to feel a bit like a hero, while PES is more about the serious side of the sport, the crafting of skill and a greater realism you get to feel like a professional soccer player. It’s a case of “the game of soccer” versus (the game of) “the sport of soccer.”

While some have slated its interface and overall appearance for falling behind its competitor aesthetically, it really just serves to make the whole thing more user friendly, and a lot less slappable. The menus are exactly what you want them to be, logical and well labelled you really shouldn't need a learning curve on game menus (I’m looking at you, FIFA 15 ). This, and much else about the game, means that you can focus on playing soccer. You can save your frustration for the field, where narrow misses make sense and space is used realistically (and is therefore a pain in the ass for a newb).

Master League career mode is likely to be where you spend most of your time, but the new MyClub looks promising as an Ultimate Team kind of play mode. More interesting though is the middle ground option called Role Control which is also playable in multiplayer. This mode allows you to control entire units throughout a game instead of simply switching between players closest to the ball the dynamics are quite different from anything else in the game and it really allows you to get to know the in-game dynamics of each player unit.

This is definitely the game for the real soccer nerd who likes a whole lot of detail in their tactics and want to take their mastery of the game seriously. Soccer fans, however, might find this game’s offerings a bit underwhelming. Massive chunks of missing licensing mean that you will find Manchester Utd (the only real teamin that league) playing against London FC instead of Chelsea. This can puta bit of a dampener on the overall hype of the experience, but on the upside you do get to edit your teams’ uniforms and customise your players to within an inch of their lives. The real-world players themselves are still present, it’s justa bit weird seeing Coutinho or Ozil’s well-modelled faces in a completely foreign uniform. If you can put a side that sort of thing, it’s certainly worth investing some time and moola in.