Winning Eleven 9

Written by Adam Woolcott  on July 14, 2006

Review: I can't wait for Winning Eleven 11

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It could be argued that the Winning Eleven franchise is the soccer version of the late, great, NFL 2K series. Meaning that while FIFA (Madden) gets all the sales and the larger following, Winning Eleven arguably is the superior, more exciting game of footie, perhaps hurt by the lack of the FIFA license and the sort of title that doesn't exactly roll off the tongue. Among US soccer fans, the series has slowly gained respect since it finally began to pop up on our shores, and this is the most recent entry into WE, better known as Winning Eleven 9. WE9 is of course still a super-realistic, exciting game of soccer that features some of the most intuitive gameplay in the genre, it's very Madden-esque in feel Ц without a new and much-demanded gameplay option, it would feel very much like WE8 unless you were really hardcore and could find every little nuance. But then...if it ain't broke, don't fix it, and Winning Eleven 9 certainly isn't broke.

Without a FIFA license, WE9 does feel a bit behind the times, as almost every major sports game is driven by authentic teams and players. It's not completely devoid of licensed stuff, as it contains some players and clubs, but it doesn't cover the gamut of soccer like EA's game. Without the major licenses, there's no official leagues or even the 2006 World Cup, however Konami has made a decent enough facimile of the events Ц just with different names to avoid the Trademark Ninjas raining down. The big addition is the online setup; it won't rock your world with innovation or anything like that, but it offers exactly what WE fans have been asking for since the online gaming movement kicked into high gear Ц the ability to play against other people, from perhaps other countries, with that same sort of passion (some might say obsession) you see in a real stadium.

That online play hopefully is good enough for the Winning Eleven fanbase to spend $40 on this year's version, because when you get down to it, what you'll be playing in WE9 is the exact same as what you played in Winning Eleven 8. Yeah, there might be some minor stuff that's been changed, but most everyone will feel the same thing they felt playing the last game. However that's not a bad thing in many ways; what the game is famous for is its outstanding gameplay, and that's well represented here. The game just feels so very real, and captures the intensity of the game extremely well. The AI is tough enough to make every shot feel important, but not brutal enough so you get plastered or feel like you're getting cheated. The controls are very intuitive and easy to grasp, with an army of moves at your disposal that are easily executed if necessary. I was surprised how excited you can get playing the game Ц after a long dry spell where every shot comes up short, it's very satisfying to finally break through and score a goal, whether it's to deflate the home crowd or bring them to their feet. Unfortunately you can't head butt other players.

It's helped by some of the best presentation around, albeit at the expense of some visual quality. The menus are better than WE8's cluttered mess, but lack the pizazz and intuitiveness of something out of EA or 2K Sports. The character models are decent enough and if you're big on soccer you can pick out the players based upon their faces, but they lack emotion and play the game in a near-catatonic state. So much for the Emotion Engine. On the other hand, the animations are absolutely superb, some of the best in the business. The crowd is wild and boisterous, waving their towels around and making their presence felt from the first minute to the 90th minute. Yet on the technological end, the game is showing its age and thus looks like a 2nd or 3rd generation PS2 game rather than something pushing the power of the console to its limits.

The wild and boisterous crowd returns on the audio side of things as well. Like in real soccer, the hooligans are out and the game is extremely loud Ц let it be known that soccer fans do not sit on their hands, They hoot, they holler, they chant and taunt, just like they do in reality. They moan and groan when the visitors score or a home team shot just misses, and go berserk when the visitors miss and the home team breaks through with a goal. It really pulls you into the experience. On the other hand, the announcers, while good and quite foreign, are kind of boring, merely repeating the last name of the players over and over as they pass the ball along...but then that's like the real game seeing that soccer is a game where action doesn't constantly happen. After a while even the announcers probably get tired of seeing the ball kicked around.