I have played many of the soccer games over the years, including the FIFA franchise from EA. I will be honest and say this is the first time I’ve ever played a sports genre game on the DS. Honestly, I went into this game thinking I was not going like it.  I played soccer as a child and have always liked the game, even if in the US it may not be the most popular sport. With Baseball being the nation’s pastime and the NFL and NBA following closely behind, soccer has always been pushed to the side.

The first thing I noticed with the game is the team selection. Granted, it had a lot of the foreign leagues and teams, yet the USA was not included for the most part. We were represented with a national team but most of the recognizable players were left out. The MLS, which I do follow, was not mentioned at all within the game. I know this has to do with money being thrown around and it’s unfortunate as I didn’t recognize or know most of the foreign teams, and to me for a moment it took away from the game. All the strategic maneuvering that you can accomplish between picking which players will play a certain game, to the formations you want to use against a certain opponent you can really get wrapped up in the game.

As I mentioned, I went into this review thinking that there was no way I would enjoy this game.  Even at the beginning, after playing the game I was still not impressed. Maybe it had something to do with the fact the first four or fives games I lost, and I couldn’t seem to wrap my head around the controls, but once again, over time it seem to be more enjoyable.