I've been playing PES games for a lot of my life, and have always played it on the hardest difficulty, but in recent years I haven't gotten into them as much. I have played this the most since probably PES 2016/17, although I think they were more online experiences. It's been a long time since I've gotten into an offline mode like I have here.
At first this felt and looked very realistic and I was enjoying it, but the more I've played it the more I've wanted to cause myself harm.
For a video game in 2019, that is something like the 25th iteration of the series, this isn't good enough. My list of issues, all played on superstar difficulty and generally with basic shooting on.
- The shooting is a joke. World class players miss easy shots including wide open goals. Shots from an angle in particular often don't even hit the target. Most goals seem to come from deflections off the keeper. It's incredibly frustrating. It's not just against the human either, it happens to the AI. It's like they thought, "To make the scoreline feel realistic we'll make shooting ridiculous.
- Crossing is laughable at times, going nowhere near where you want it to. I don't know what has happened to this. It was fine in previous versions.
- The passing and through balls are a joke. Players miss two metre passes. The throughballs often act as passes rather than throughballs that the player can run on to. I did try advanced through balls, but you have to give the button the slightest of slight taps or the balls flies forward. It's amazing. It's like with shooting where it's difficult to keep the ball on the ground.
- Which leads me on to my next point. The movement off the ball from players is another joke. They don't make runs or stop too soon. This is one issue that has been in PES for many years. And as an attacker you seem handicapped at times. You know the striker is much faster than the defender but they can't run past them.
- I have had players running into each other multiple times and doing other weird things. I can't think of seeing this in a real life game. I had a fresh air pass too and a playing with his hands in the air complaining about not getting a foul instead of going after the pass.
- The AI scored from a corner for the first time in something like my 150th game, and I had my second 11 defenders on. More headers hit the bar than go in and most go over the bar.
- In my five seasons of Master League, I always get the big teams like Man City, Arsenal, Liverpool, to play in a row.
- The game is overly physical. I've also had little players like Sterling pushing around larger players. They seem to think if a player gets the ball the tackle can kill a player, which isn't how football is referred at all anymore. Players get pushed out of the way too. There was the clearest penalty in the world not given to me. The defender just collided with the striker in the box. In all of the games I've played I've had 1 penalty and I've maybe given away 1.
- Free kicks are the easiest they've ever been. You are more likely to score with a free kick with a decent player with anything around the box than from a penalty.
- I can't remember the AI receiving a red card, ever.
- Why on Earth can you only save 5 replays? Are we in 1996 with a 1mb memory card?
- No other game has so many pop ups every single time you start it!
- I got a 'transfer rejected because the player is too important for our club' - This is a player who is was on the transfer list... Jesus!
At a basic level this is a good realistic recreation of the sport, particularly with how the AI guard space and defend, but it has a lot of minor gameplay issues, some of which were not in the series years ago. I've often said about PES that it's 'two steps forward, one step back' and my opinion hasn't been swayed with this game.
Gameplay 3/5
Graphics 4.5/5
Sound 4/5
Difficulty 4.5/5
Originality 3/5
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