PES2012 - A Konami game

Ok, so it’s the silly season when it comes to games releases, with numerous AAA titles coming out and hoping to be amongst the “Champions League” elect is this year’s incarnation of PES. Does it manage to break into upper echelons of game franchises with the Call of Duty’s, Gears of War & Final Fantasy or does it stay just out of the limelight? Read on:

First of all, I’m going to add a new feature to my review for PES, and that is to include a section for what my impressions are after the first hour of playing, as that hour can often make or break peoples opinion on a game. The first thing I did was go straight into the Edit mode (Sad I know) and check out all the latest squads and I must admit, I was a bit disheartened at the fact that Joey Barton was still at Newcastle, Sergio Aguero was not at Man City, as well as a couple of other transfers. I will put it down to this being a review copy of the game and I hope retail versions have these included. Granted, I know you can do these transfers yourself, but that’s not the point. Bad Konami, bad! ***EDIT*** There is a transfer update for this coming on 11th October, so I’ll let you off, Konami!!

Next thing I did was sign up for the myPES app that is on Facebook, and linked it to my account (for reasons I will go into a bit later) and after that I decided to plump for a bit of “Football life” and jumped into the “Become a legend” mode and it is essentially the same as PES2011, which is no bad thing, however this time, you have an agent and you get little non interactive cut scenes of you and your agent, as well as you being unveiled to the press for your new club etc., and it just makes it a little bit more in depth, which considering this is basically a story mode, is a good thing! A couple of games of this took me to the 1 hour mark and I have to say, my overall impressions are very good so far!




Graphically, PES looks really really nice. Granted it is not on the gorgeous FIFA level of visuals, however the adage “It’s not what you got, it’s what you do with it that counts” is called into play and PES doesn’t disappoint on this front. The stadium’s look great and you can recognise the world famous stadiums like the San Siro, Wembley and even the brand spanking new Juventus stadium: The Il Nuovo Stadio Della Juventus as well as 14 other licensed grounds and 13 non licensed ones – which all look unique so there’s plenty to look at. The players look realistic so you can easily identify your favourite players etc. which is the least you would expect from any football game nowadays

The cut scenes have the unique PES look about them and they fit in well, whenever they are on screen. Granted they are non-interactive which would have been nice (To answer questions that the press could ask during press conferences etc.) but I can’t have it all my own way!

The main menu is presented in the same way as PES2011 which is a good thing; because I think it worked well last time so another little thumbs up from me!

One thing that PES2011 was lacking in my view, was the fact that everything apart from the match going on, was a bit static (Cameramen where just a few pixels that never moved, camera booms never moved etc.) but in PES2012, Konami must of heard me moaning because this time, you can see people moving behind the goal, camera booms moving, managers on the touchline etc., to make the game a bit more…. Lifelike for want of a better word, and although it’s a simple thing, to me it makes a difference! Also, it’s always nice to see players sing their national anthem and for it to be present here is a nice touch!

In terms of sound, there’s not really much to be said on this issue, as it’s basically the same as PES last year, which isn’t a bad thing. On Commentary duties again, are Jon Champion and good ol Jim Beglin, to shout “He’s miles behind the last defender” again, when your dead in line with the defender. Or is he? From the amount of games I’ve played, he seems to have calmed down with his laughable commentary and seems to do a good job this time, as well as Jon Champion so well done Konami, you have improved the commentary standards




Next up we come to one of the most important part of any game, and that’s the game modes. PES2012 has lots (and I mean lots) of things to see and do (I will save the 2 main ones till the end of this section):

Quick Match: This is where you go if you just want a one off match with your mates or a one off game online without having to go through the online menu’s etc. There is also a function where you can select 2 teams and watch them battle it out against each other with you watching – Not quite sure how popular that aspect will be, but it’s there anyway!

Uefa Champions League: No prizes for guessing that this is where you can play through a full Champions League tournament from group stages to final, or if you are so inclined, just a 1 off exhibition match

Copa Santander Libertadores: As you will have figured out, this is the Champions League for South American teams and you can do either a full tournament or an exhibition match.

League/Cup: This is where you go, if you want to do a League or Cup either single player or multiplayer (online and local) and there are all manner of leagues/cups you can do, ranging from the Spanish league to the English Premier league etc.

Community: Here is where you can create your own online social club, where you can create cups/leagues between online friends (up to 32 of them) and there is also an achievement linked to joining an online community.

Training: You can either do free training as in PES2011, or you can opt for the new training challenges which make a welcome return after far too long away! The challenges on offer are Penalties, Free Kicks, Dribbling, Attack and also Defence. The aim here is to reach a gold/silver/bronze target, which can be a points total or a total time and there are 3 levels of challenge, 1 star, 2 star and 3 star. As you can imagine, each level is a lot harder than the one previous and is quite fun and you can easily waste a few hours just playing these little mini games.

Edit: As the name suggests, this is where you go to edit a multitude of things, such as stadiums, teams, league structure etc.

Extra Content: This is where you go to spend your PES points that you get awarded after every game. The things on offer here vary from extra styles of ball, more hairstyles for your player, classic teams, classic players, and even game mode enhancements.

Gallery: Here you can view your PES stats such as playtime etc, view any saved replays or view the credits



And now the 2 core modes:

Football Life: Within football life there are 3 modes – “Master League”, “Become a Legend” and “Club Boss”.

Master league: This is part of PES history and for those who don’t know, you choose a club and you start with a collection of default players (These will be the same whichever club) and are average at best and you have to run the club, signing players, managing budgets etc. with the sole aim of turning your club into the top club side in the world.

Become a Legend: This is the PES version of FIFA’s “Be a Pro” mode where you create a player, choose a position you want to play, and then away you go on a (hopefully) trophy laden career! As mentioned earlier in the review, you get cut scenes with your agent where he tells you how you are doing etc, and you also get random “missions” set by your manager at various points (i.e. Achieve a rating of 6.5 or more in the next match) normally, with outcomes depending on if you pass or fail. You also get objectives for each match (these can be from helping out the defence or supplying a certain player with lots of passes/crosses etc.) and these give you reason to play well, rather than just grabbing the ball and running for the goal, shooting on sight! The better you do, better clubs will start sending scouts to see you and who knows, maybe Old Trafford beckons you, or the Nou Camp!

Club Boss: This is a totally new addition to PES and it is a game mode that lets you be the chairman of a football club! Your aim is to become the top chairman in club football, and you do this by putting your own (virtual) personal funds into the club, to aid with transfers, marketing etc. and you can even give your manager a wish list of players you would like to see at the club and he will try to buy them. If you are a hands on chairman, you can give orders as to who plays and who doesn’t but the manager won’t always listen to you. Personally, I think this is a great addition to PES and I have enjoyed my time playing this mode!

Online: This is where a lot of people will be going and there are various modes online you can do.

Quick Match: This is either a 1v1 or 2v2 ranked online match or just an unranked match

Match Lobby: You can create a lobby for your online friends and either play against each other or co-op online against the AI

Master League Online: This is one of the main online modes. It is essentially the same as Master League, however all your opponents are other humans. Signing players is different in this mode too: A players price is dependent on how many people have them, so if 10m people have Messi, he will cost you more to buy than if just 5m people had him and the price can and will fluctuate so it’s always worth keeping an eye on it for the right time to strike. You also have to pay the players extra, each game you play them due to their contract. If you signed up to the Facebook app myPES and linked it to your gamertag, every master league game you win, you earn extra money as a “myPES” bonus which certainly comes in handy when you’re trying to save up for top players.

Legends: Had a good career in “Become a Legend”? Well take your player online and play alongside other legends against either another team of legends or an AI controlled team. Teamwork is key!

Competition: A unique feature of the competition mode is that you get an hour from the start of the tournament to play as many games as you want, however at the end of the hour it will take your 3 best consecutive results and if your good enough put you through to the next round (So if you played 8 games and had W-W-L-L-L-W-D-D it would take the W-W-L as your best 3 game run) I think this is a very inventive way of doing things and I think is a great piece of innovation from Konami!

Community: Think your community of players are good? Pit your skills against other communities in this section

Final Highlights: If you ever wanted to see how good people are, who get to the final of the online cups etc. you can view highlights of various final matches.

A couple of features of "online" that I have to mention and applaud is the “Fair Play” rating. Each game online, you can choose to give your opponent “Fair Play” which is an indicator to other online users how that person is. Also, if someone has a disconnect rate of 70% or higher over their last 10 games, they will find their online experience restricted in that they will be placed in games with other players that also have a high disconnect rate, or they can be deleted from the online rankings and even banned from online competitions. Well done Konami for taking a stand on this!



In terms of gameplay, PES2012 feels more fluid than last year, due to the fact they have made players ball control a bit more realistic so that you can turn with the ball a lot quicker instead of having the turning circle of an oil tanker, and also shooting has been improved so now more shots will go on target from better players rather than it seeming like most of the shots fly out for goal kicks (PES2011, I’m looking at you!) and it makes for a better experience! Passing seems different, with power now being important instead of just pressing the button while pointing in the direction you want, and it going to your player. If you don’t have enough power on your pass, it will get cut out, simple as that.

Konami have tried to innovate again, by giving you control over your teammates runs. This is done by using the right thumbstick to choose the player you want, and then pressing the direction on the right thumbstick, that you want them to make the run, ready for you to pass it to him. It can take a bit of getting used to, but I see it being a useful feature as one thing I used to grumble about PES2011 was how my AI team never made runs ahead of me when I had the ball.

A slight disappointment which I have found so far, is that some of the refereeing decisions are totally laughable with free kicks being given for an opponent seemingly falling over your shoelaces etc. and the ref seems to have his whistle permanently in his mouth which can lead to a very stop/start game! Again I put this down to it being a pre-release version so hopefully will be ironed out in the retail version

Overall in terms of gameplay, it is a big improvement on last year and I look forward to spending 300+ hours on it like I did with PES2011


Achievements in PES2012 are actually easier to come by this year, with previous versions being a total grind (Play in every stadium, Beat every team in xxxx league, Win xxx games online etc.) but this year they are all achievable with no massive amounts of grinding required. Some are simple (Watch a highlight online, win a match as club boss) and others may take time (Become the number one club boss) but certainly no grinding. For me this is a good thing because I feel previous PES games had achievements that only hard-core PES fans would be able to achieve. In terms of being able to max the gamerscore, PES2012 delivers and most people should be able to max this without any problems.

In summary, I think that PES2012 offers more innovations and improvements over PES2011, to such an extent that I can see PES beating FIFA in this year’s duel between the two, and for anyone who is a PES fan this is a must buy.

I would give PES2012 a 9 out of 10 and a must buy for any football fan as it delivers more in terms of new things, than what FIFA does and it really pays off!

A cracking review of a great game mate.

I am really enjoying playing this and its my fave football game ever released so far!

Good review mate, I was hoping this is a lot better than last years effort, and this years FIFA, and by the sound of it is. Not sure if I'll get straight off though. FIFA is just too defensive minded for my tastes

One thing i like the sound of is people being penalised from disconnecting. This is a hate im sure alot of gamers have. A friend of mine used to play football games online, and purposely let other the oppsoition stay very close to his score to keep them in the game - But sometimes you get unlucky and end up losing. To me this isnt the way gaming should be... Great review, but as its a football game i will probably pick it up when it goes into Blockbusters 4 for 20 deal....

nice work on the review mate. rep given

I like the sounds of the interviews with players etc they really are making the differences now between themsleves and fifa.

I tend to buy pes games when they are on the cheap dont know why always have.
I will probably pick this up at some point though

Nice review mate, definitely getting this at some point. It looks like being the best one since PES 5, best footy game ever in my opinion.

Good to see online quitters being punished as well. One of the most annoying things about gaming on Live is winning in PES or Fifa and your opponent quitting at the last minute. I won't quit even if I'm being hammered 4-0!

Nice work!!!

I'm glad that Pes is good again. We need other options than EA sports.