Fifa 12

In The Telegraph

Here's how the annual sports game cycle tends to work: A new title is announced, along with its 12,000 improvements or whatever arbitrary number they stick on it, along with a list of buzzword-heavy new features (super real-world tackle machine engine plus or something), then the game comes out, us reviewers call it "the best approximation of [insert sporting event here] ever" and the crowd goes wild.

But as the months pass by, the astute game playing audience starts to notice the cracks. Problems that aren't apparent in the short-term become ever more glaring. That's what happened with FIFA 11 to a certain extent. It was, is and always will be a fabulous football game, but the drawbacks were there. Animation could often be clumsy when two players came together, physical battles felt unnatural and players could easily exploit defending by just holding down a button and watching your player gravitate into a challenge and waltz off with the ball. Career mode wasn't much cop either.

To their eternal credit, however, the FIFA team are a perfectionist bunch, and no-one is more frustrated at these foibles than them. So they listen, refine and do their best to fix the flaws that you notice, and a whole bunch you don't. That's why FIFA should retain its crown as the best approximation of football ever. Oh, shoot, now I've gone and done it..

Sitting down to a final hands-on before the big release, it's immediately apparent that FIFA 12 is the most revamped version of the game in a good few years. EA's assertion that FIFA 12 is "revolution not evolution" might be stretching the point, as it's still a largely familiar kickabout. Just as it should be.