PES Chronicles

Today I spent another few hours on the Xbox360 demo of PES2008. All the reports that are starting to appear on PESfan and elsewhere from people who already have the full game are making me grumpy, so another stint of quality time with the demo is more than called for.

I doubt that I’ll be going back to play PES6 again now. There just isn’t any point. So it’s officially farewell from me to a great game. Granted, PES6 was nowhere near as good as its immediate predecessor, the legendary PES5; nor did it quite match up in my affections to either PES2 or PES3. But it was better than PES4 and the original PES1. (In my opinion, of course.)

Damning PES6 with faint praise? Perhaps. The scripting (or, if you prefer, the ‘AI advantage’) was the most extreme we have ever seen in a PES game, in my opinion. While it didn’t exactly spoil the game, it didn’t enhance it either.

My hopes for PES2008 are sky-high. Playing the demo has really helped to set my mind at ease. I did worry that we were going to get a version of PES6 with next-gen graphics. Some would argue that that is what we’ve got anyway, but I see things differently. The players move differently. The ball behaves differently. You can’t first-time 40-yard shots into the net – or, if you can, it’s not immediately obvious how to do it.

The whole game just feels different from any of its predecessors. Reaching back in my memory for a PES with a similar ‘feel’, only PES3 springs to mind.

During my fresh stint with the PES2008 demo today, I managed to allay another one of my worries. I was very concerned that I wouldn’t be able to score long-range goals with such gay abandon anymore (see my PES5 videos – links on the right – for examples of this).

Recent iterations of PES have featured a long-range shooting mechanic that is one of the most deeply satisfying gameplay components of any game I have ever played. Let me just mention here a certain Mr Mathieu bursting past the halfway line and unleashing one of his left-footed rockets. I love long-range shooting and I have scored most of my memorable goals in that fashion. (Ive said it before and I will say it again: I am emphatically not a dribbler.)

So during my first stint with the PES2008 demo on the Xbox 360 last week I was a bit worried by the fact that every goal I scored – even the hatfuls of goals I scored with the difficulty set to Amateur or Beginner – were all scuffed kinds of shots from close or medium range. Despite making scores of attempts to bag myself a PES5/PES6-style 40-yarder into the postage stamp corner of the goal, none of them went in. Most of them barely even left the ground.

But everything is okay. I needn’t have worried. Playing as Portugal against Brazil on Professional difficulty, things were winding down at the end of yet another 0-0 draw. Then I broke up a Brazilian attack and emerged with Simao. I raced him past the halfway line and turned slightly in toward goal. Two Brazilian defenders moved towards me. I was about 40 yards out…

To hell with it, I thought, and pressed down hard on the shoot button. I flicked the analogue stick slightly toward the top right. Simaos right boot swung at the ball, and it flew through the air, travelling, travelling… and beat the keeper’s graceful dive, billowing the net in style.

The best goal I’ve scored on PES2008 so far (albeit in the demo), and a great fillip in advance of PES2008’s D-Day, later this week.

Speaking of which… Monday’s update will be at around 6pm. I’ll be spending the afternoon in town, looking for PES2008.

I overcame Brazil quite comfortably in the end. 2-0 to me. It was the first knockout game of the International Cup.

The first half was a stalemate. I played my usual 4-3-3 formation seen in the diagram. Hargreaves is monstrously great as a DMF in PES6. Konami always take note of the year’s football events, and Hargreaves was one of the most notable performers at the World Cup in Germany last year. His value in PEs6 is a reflection of that. I anticipate him being just as good in PES2008, albeit perhaps with a reduction in fitness levels to reflect his recent injury layoffs.

After halftime I managed to work the ball out to Gerrard on the left in a bit of space. I took it on a bit until the Brazilian fullback was drawn in, then abruptly turned a 180, then cut in toward goal while the CPU was confused. As ever, the entire Brazilian team moved to block off the shot, so I had to unleash it before being strictly ready to do so. The ball flew in like a rocket, from 40 yards. 1-0

Brazil restarted, I immediately won the ball with Hargreaves, and chipped a through-ball over the defence for Rooney to run onto. Again I had to get a shot away early before those pesky PES super-defenders pinched the ball from me. Dida saved the shot – easily enough, as it was straight at him – but the ball rebounded to Joe Cole wide on the right… Hit it first-time from an acute angle. Back of the net. 2-0 to England…

The rest of the game saw me defending, and trying to score another on the breakaway – and failing. It really doesn’t seem fair just how penalised the human player is when leading against the CPU on high difficulty levels. I had a one-on-one with Owen – still one of the paciest players around – and he was at least 5 yards clear of the nearest defender. I thought I had plenty of time to go closer and place my shot into the net. But the defenders sprinted back to smother the ball away.

Eventually the whistle went and I was through to the quarter finals. I would face Argentina. It doesn’t get any easier…

I took an early lead. Joe Cole dribbled the ball down the wing to the corner flag, and I sent over a double-tap cross. The ball sort of scuffed off a defender’s head and fell to Owen, who was standing near the penalty spot. I jabbed the shoot button, wanting to get a first-time shot away, but there was no response. Somehow Owen still had the ball at his feet. I took him a step sideways, shot again – and he side-footed it over the keeper’s dive. 1-0.

I hung on under intense pressure for the remainder of the half. Whether its fans believe in the existence of scripting or not, it is undeniable that the CPU teams are programmed to exert tremendous pressure when behind. The answer seems to be nothing more than putting up with it, defending well, and keeping the ball as much as possible.

After half time it was the same pattern: Argentina streaming forward, intercepting all my passes, snuffing out my counterattacks. I seemed to be weathering the storm.

In the 75th minute I got through with Joe Cole on the right. Running in on goal from an angle – 45 degrees or so – with clear space in front of me and the goal at my mercy is one of my favourite scenarios in the game. Time after time I simply pound the ball high past the keeper into the top corner of the net. I ddn’t do so this time. The ball missed, wide, by several yards. I thought it shouldn’t have missed. PES fans can be a paranoid lot. The computer really is out to get us.

In the 79th minute Argentina won a throw-in in my half. Their winger received the ball and lofted in a cross to my far post. Crespo was there to head it in, sending it back across Robinson into the opposite side of the net. A good goal really. 1-1.

In the 84th minute Argentina played another cross in from the opposite wing. Crespo was there again, in almost the exact same spot on the other side of my goal. This time his header went through Robinson – through his hands, in fact – and into the net. 1-2. I’m behind, and it’s nearly all over.

I had one more attack. Wright-Phillips (on for Beckham) screwed a shot wide from outside the box. Argentina kept possession well, and then the final whistle blew.

My tournament is over. By my own house rules, I am not allowed to reload from the end of the group phase. I must now go back and play again from the start, as England, in a whole new International Tournament.

Ahhh, that’s better. Slipping the PES6 disc into the console and picking up the familiar joypad feels like coming home. I still feel bad about abandoning the PSP version – but, hey, the fact that I’d had it for nearly a year before only recently trying to get into it is a telling sign.

Straight into an International Cup tournament, playing as England on the Top Player difficulty level. My personal default 4-3-3 formation looks like this:

Yes, I know: it’s a typical ‘computer-gamey’ football formation. A real-life manager of a real-life team would faint to see it. The midfielders are spaced too widely apart. There’s too much space between midfield and attack. That lone DMF won’t afford much protection against CPU counter-attacks. I know all of its faults as well as I know my own name. But this formation, and 4-3-3 formations like it, have served me incredibly well for many years now. The possession you concede in midfield is more than made up for by the attacking threats you pose, especially down the wings. I vary the formation according to which team and players I’m playing with. The 4-3-3 seen above is not the 4-3-3 I’ll usually start with at the outset of a Master League career, for example. Castolo and Huylens et al would hardly get a kick of the ball.

Why do I have Steven Gerrard on the left side of midfield? Rather than on the right, or even in his other great position as a DMF? (With his thunderous long-range shooting, Gerrard is almost the ideal DMF for an attacking 4-3-3) It’s because I want to accommodate Hargreaves as my DMF, and Gerrard is just as good on the left side of midfield (in PES6 anyway) as on the right; he also manages to work his way into just as many long-range shooting opportunities as he would from the DMF position. Maybe more.

Joe Cole as a right-sided CF? Another questionable choice, but he is so effective in the position – and has been for a couple of PESes now – that like any good player playing well, he virtually picks himself. At times I almost prefer him to Owen.

After an awkward first half of the opening match against Spain, which I ended up drawing 1-1 (struggling to re-re-readjust to proper PES, after my adventures with the PSP version of the game, and also with FIFA08), I sailed through the remaining group matches, thumping Nigeria 4-0 on the way with a brace each from Rooney and Owen. Rooney in PES6 is a little overpowered for my liking.

Next up in the first knockout game is… Brazil.