FIFA20 Is Almost Out, Here’s Everything You Need To Know From The Trial Version Before It Officially Releases

FIFA20 Is Almost Out, Here’s Everything You Need To Know From The Trial Version Before It Officially Releases
Credit: EA via YouTube

A pre-trial version of FIFA20 has been out over the last weekend which allowed you to play the game for 10 hours ahead of the game’s release this Tuesday. Although the game is a FIFA game, and as a result, not massively different from its predecessors, there are one or two things that have changed concerning gameplay.

Overall, the pace of the game feels much slower. Attacking isn’t clunky exactly, but the pace you expect from players on the wing isn’t as explosive as FIFA19. There’s something a little off when players like Mane don’t hit those crazy speeds.

As well as the pace slowing down, your defenders feel a lot chunkier. The Premier League is known and loved for its physicality and you’ll definitely experience that in FIFA20. Players like Virgil will push you off the ball, much like in real life.

However, to balance these pace changes and improved/more realistic defender mechanics, passing is incredibly smooth. There is a huge reliance on tight passing patterns to dissect your opponent’s team. It feels more rewarding than ever when you manage to string together great passes.

Shooting is just shooting. There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to it, and many of the shots are not very surprising, with even brilliant strikers falling flat on occasion. Free kicks have had a rework though, with a mechanic in place that allows you to knuckleball the ball, allowing you to whip in some crazy free kicks.

In terms of microtransactions, this is FIFA, after all. The packs are back and they’re big – it was recently revealed that Ultimate Team makes up a huge percentage of EA’s yearly profits and the mechanics are going nowhere for the foreseeable future.

There is a new mode in FIFA20 called ‘Volta’, or street football. This was not available to play in the trial version but the trailers so far look pretty interesting. It’s a new concept for FIFA in a game franchise that hasn’t had to get too experimental over the years. Small teams, fast-paced passing and skills, and a shooting system that is more reliant on precision.

In terms of first impressions, FIFA20 is just FIFA. The new Volta mode might add some temporary spice into this classic formula, but the base game remains vastly unchanged for the last few games. There is a sense of more realism, although no one has played the game long enough to bear witness to some of FIFA’s iconic and hilarious bugs.

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