Last week we tackled a host of gameplay features for the upcoming EA Sports FC 25. Now it’s time to turn our attention to some of the upgrades in the presentation department.
While we’ll have to take the gameplay changes at face value given EA’s history of over-hyping their gameplay promises (cough cough, HyperMotion), EA have continuously delivered when it comes to enhancing the presentation elements over the years. With that in mind, let’s jump into it.
Living Stadiums
Slowly but surely the beautiful game is becoming more and more Americanized, for better or worse. One such area that dominates the American match experience is the introduction of mascots, of which EA are including for nearly every licensed club in the EPL.
Not only will we see mascots around the stadium, you’ll also have the ability to interact with them through connected celebrations. These “active sideline moments” are said to be seamless, but it remains to be seen how varied they are as celebrations of the sort do tend to become stale and monotonous.
Tied to these celebrations are “Authentic Crowd Reactions” that trigger during key moments of a match. A crunching tackle, a goal, and other sequences are supposed to trigger to help create a more lifelike experience. It remains to be seen if we can hear the “Ole” as you toy with your opponent. Also worth mentioning again are the dynamic stadium elements players can interact with. Ad boards, corner flags, and goalposts are solid and tangible game elements for your players to bounce off of.
Enhanced Visuals
Since the move to the PS5 and Xbox Series X, EA FC/FIFA has been one of the better looking sports games on the market, especially in the football/soccer arena. While games like eFootball have gone full-out mobile when it comes to everything graphics (textures, lighting, etc.) , FC 25 is rolling out two separate visual options:
- Enhanced Visuals
- Favor Resolution
While the full details are still being prepared for EA’s official Deep Dive, what we’ve been told is that Enhanced Visuals mode will upscale to 4K and include ray tracing (a rendering technique that stimulates how light behaves in a scene and bounces off objects). An OS favorite, cloth and hair textures, are also said to upgraded.
Favor resolution, while not specifically called out, seems to be more akin to the current visual experience found in FC 24, but like the Enhanced Visual mode will offer 60fps with gamers being able to toggle between both resolutions throughout the course of a match. Dynamic time of day will also affect matches so those 6 p.m. late summer kickoff times in England will see the lighting transition from day to dusk and then to night.
Player Cutscenes POV
Lat year saw the introduction of the referee POV for cutscenes. Match events like yellow and red cards were seen from the ref’s point-of-view and provided a nice variety to cutscenes. This year for FC 25 we’ll see the same camera dynamics extended to players for events such as dead-ball set pieces like free kicks, penalties, and even corner kicks. While not game changing by any standard, it adds a nice variety and imitates what we’ve seen in preseason matches such as Bruno Guimaraes’ body cam he wore last summer during the Summer Series tournament:
Authentic Match Intros Return
One has to wonder why EA ever removed pre-match introductions in the first place, especially after the major upgrade they received back when FIFA transitioned to this gen (PS5/Xbox Series X). Big matches across Europe and even in North and South America are events, major entertainment events complete with music, pyrotechnics, and a host of other over-the-top shenanigans that get the juices flowing before kickoff. Well, they’re back this year so no more quick transitions from locker-room cutscenes to kickoff, bypassing starting eleven graphics and the like.
Bottom Line
Gameplay isn’t the only area that EA has seemed to enhance for FC 25. Presentation took a few steps backward last year with the removal of pre-match intros, but credit to EA for owning up to the mistake and bringing them back this year. While it seems like the majority of online/competitive players want to skip over anything that resembles real-life football, those of us who enjoy the build-up to a big match will enjoy sitting back and seeing the different presentation packages from across the globe.
Published: Jul 25, 2024 03:49 pm