UEFA EURO 2008
Producer blog
By Gary Paterson, associate producer
When we first sat down to talk about what it was we wanted to achieve on UEFA Euro 2008 it was clear that we wanted our focus to be on quality and emotion. Quality in that we wanted to continue to enhance the football engine that we had been developing for the previous 3 years, and emotion in that we wanted to capture the feeling and passion of the Euro tournament. In addition to this we wanted to create a gameplay feeling that was clearly different to what had already been released on Xbox 360 & PS3.
To achieve this we looked at what it was about the Euro finals and qualifying games that made them so dramatic. What we found was that a team's tactics often set the tone for the match. Smaller nations often played defensively against the larger nations, getting men behind the ball, trying to stifle their superior opponents. This in itself creates an emotion and a tension throughout the game – will the 'big' team be able to break them down, or can they hold out. So this is one aspect that we have carried through into our game. Each team will alter their tactics pre-game and during game depending on their status and the tournament and match context. The effect is dramatic, emotional and very rewarding. Seeing teams go 5-4-1 when defending a lead or pushing forward in a 4-3-3 to try and get a vital equalizer creates a very fulfilling, unique gameplay experience.
EA Sports UEFA Euro 2012 first trailer
UEFA Euro 2008 does a great job of bringing together the technical preciseness and fun of a real soccer game like no soccer game before it. Being able to control almost all the action, and feeling like scoring a goal is a true accomplishment, comes across immediately. If you're a fan of the beautiful game, or even if you're not, you'll be in for real treat with this game.
Games Asylum writes: "The first thing to ask of any football game is: is it better than Pro Evolution Soccer? The answer in this case, is yes. Euro 2008 plays a slower, more realistic and more cultured version of the game. It relies far more on crossing, sensible defending and picking out the perfect pass, in contrast to Pro Evo's festival of dribbling.
It also plays a far better game online. I experienced hardly any lag, and when I did I found that the entire game slowed down to accommodate it. I never lost a goal or game due to lag, a huge difference to Pro Evo's nasty habit of making the ball disappear and then reappear in your own goal. There's also a wealth of online modes, including playing a Euro 2008 tournament online, playing in a league or just picking a single game. There's also an interesting feature called 'Play for your Country' where you choose your country and your scores both offline and online go into a ranking table to find out which country has the most obsessive citizens."
