FIFA 16 is already out; should we be excited, even though there’s a new FIFA coming out each year? Obviously we should. It’s the beautiful game after all (not considering Satan/Diego Costa here). There are a lot of changes that have been made to this year’s FIFA, but none excites us more than the improved, in-game FUT mode.
Ultimate Team Mode comes to life with the economy created in the auction, so you need to know how to exploit it properly. Take your time to search the market for the best prices, and don’t fall into the mistake of buying expensive just because one of your targets is available. Reversing the role, before you set a card on sale, make sure to check its value on the market. If all players are selling Messi for 100,000 gold coins, for example, it would be a huge mistake to put him on sale for much less.
One of the largest factors in FUT is team chemistry. When viewing your active squad, notice the colored lines between all neighboring players on the pitch. The colors will display as red, green and yellow. Use these connections to monitor the level of chemistry among your players. Players with the most chemistry will be linked with green lines. Players with a bit less chemistry but similar attributes will be connected with yellow. Finally, a red line designates little to no chemistry.
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So what else is new? FIFA isn’t really a game that lends itself to showing off fancy lighting effects or breathtaking vistas, so graphically it’s much the same. Where you will notice an improvement is with the way the players move. You get a greater sense of their weight and momentum, something that’s been part of the last few FIFA titles but probably feels more lifelike here than ever before. If you attempt a pass while off balance it’s likely to fall short, while trying to play a pass on the turn may also affect its accuracy.
I will now talk about the coins that I have mentioned so much since the start of the guide. The coins are very important for your team as they can buy contracts, players and a few other cards. You will need a lot to open the best packs in the game, but the coins can be earned in all the modes I mentioned earlier. The regular gold pack costs 5,000 coins and will give you at least three or four decent players. There is also a pack for 7,500 coins, which gives you more players and a higher chance of finding a rare card.
In what seems to have taken forever to include, we’re finally getting the option to train our squad players and (hopefully) improve their value to the team. By completing mini-games you can enhance certain attributes of your chosen player in line with their base statistics. You can’t, for example, decide that you want Thiago Silva to be a forward and then spend the rest of your season building up the correct attributes to achieve such a thing.
Overall, “FIFA 16” delivers what it boasts on the box, presuming it says THIS IS A REALLY GOOD GAME on it somewhere (I haven’t checked). The learning curve will surprise you as you grapple with the drastically upgraded player moves and spend your transfer budgets like Florentino Perez after the Real Madrid Christmas party but once you get comfortable, you’ll keep playing as I did.
