Hate List
Player Weight
Like the new penalty system, I’m sure I’ll get used to this, but there’s something off about how the players feel. Defenders don’t seem to react as fast and forwards make a lot of mistakes. While I believe in the new Frostbite engine to carry FIFA into the next generation, I’m having a hard time as of now getting used to the movement although I’m confident I’ll be making Messi runs from half in two weeks.
Set-Piece System
FIFA 17 allows players to, during corners and set-pieces, pick a precise spot where the ball will land and switch to an attacking player to finish the chance. My problem with this is that it decreases the skill-gap and doesn’t add anything to the complexity of the gameplay. This is fine in offline situations where CPU opponents have their own thing going on, but I could see this becoming overpowered against human opponents in Ultimate Team or Online Seasons. Although in Pro Clubs with a dozen human-controlled players in the box awaiting a corner, this new system would surely make for a better experience instead of only scoring from 1 of every 50 corners.
Inconsistent Goals
I put this one down to demo hiccups but after a couple dozen games I found that my shots would vary between hitting the top corner to my surprise or launching the ball into Row Z after an underpowered hit. On top of that, some long range shot animations look like lobs or simple passes only to be hit viciously onto the bar. And unlike other aspects of the game, I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to this assuming that it happens as regularly at launch.
What’s excites me about FIFA 17 this year surprisingly has to do with the online side, which isn’t available in the demo, like the many tournaments EA have announced in Ultimate Team and Seasons, even though I am primarily a Career Mode player. The Journey is by far the biggest surprise but there are some worries on the gameplay side I hope can be sorted out as FIFA 17 has the potential to be the best iteration since FIFA 10 introduced 360 degree dribbling.