The journey kicks off

You are a young footballer, who failed to make it pro with the academy. At 17, your dreams of making football as a career are quashed, sans a faint ray of hope – exit trials.

Can you ace the trials, will the scouts be impressed by your performance, is making it pro all you can do or do you have it to step up a notch and turn heads in your way!

EA Sports’ FIFA series that has been enthralling football fans since decades, has come in for sharp criticism in the past two editions for bland game play, but the makers came with an answer that made all fans drool – The Journey. This newest addition in FIFA 17 is all about mercurial rise of a young footballer from relative obscurity.

The narrative of this segment is so compelling that once you start as Alex Hunter, the lead of the game play, you will seldom put down the joysticks even if your fingers are aching. For all gamers, who are the verge of shifting from FIFA to PES, this segment ensures that they remain loyal to FIFA.

FIFA 17 is better than its predecessors. The decision to use Frostbite as the gaming engine has changed the game for good. It will take you some time to get used to the new gaming engine but it is worth the wait. PES, which usually scores over FIFA in the player movement, dribbling and shooting will have to stand back as these traits in FIFA are better, if not the best.

The much hyped active intelligence system, which is supposed to make your teammates take intelligent runs, when you are tearing down the flank with the ball, prevents them to do so, leaving you exasperated and cursing them. However, it cannot be counted out either, as there are plenty of positives elsewhere.

Player collisions are as realistic but don’t try to discern the physics behind the collisions as they seem to run series on complex equations. But, this new revamped physical play overhaul will pay you handsomely, if you play a high-press game.

You will be rewarded for relentlessly battling for the ball or stretching a leg out to deflect a pass when closing down an opponent. 21 years on, it’s actually reminiscent of FIFA ’96, which felt like a dreadful grind but rewarded doggedness as a counterpoint to the game-dominating trinity of pace, power and footballing celebrity.

Compare FIFA 17 with FIFA 16 and the early signs are it will have the same longevity, the same appeal as an online experience, and the same power to ruin Sundays you should have spent preparing for that big presentation at work.