EA Sports and Digital Bridges have teamed up to bring FIFA 2005 to mobile gamers everywhere and as if there's not enough football around us all the time now we can play it on the move. I'm a huge footie fan and I've often bought FIFA games for consoles so I was intrigued to see what they could do with it on a small screen with far less buttons to use comfortably.
There are plenty of options on this game. you get to choose whether you want to play in a Friendly, a tournament, Training or a Shoot Out. I opted for training at first to get to grips with the keys and I found
them ok but not great. At times it can be rather cumbersome trying to reach the right button however there's very little they could do to overcome this as there are so many variants in the main FIFA game that narrowing it down at all must have been difficult enough. Basically you can control your player with the usual directional buttons (2 for up, 8 for down etc etc) or dependent on mobile phone you will be able to use
your directional pad. The problem really comes in with having to shoot and pass which obviously is an essential aspect of any football game!
It takes a little while to get used to the keys and also to how much you should hold down the power bar etc when shooting but with time and practice this does get easier.Within the other options there is plenty to keep the gamer interested. In Tournament mode you can choose your starting line up (with all real players names included), state your formation and strategy and basically do most of the things you can in the bigger version of this game. There are a wealth of teams to choose from for both yourself and your opposition and in Friendlies you can enjoy getting to grips with how to best kick your opponents ass in the tournament. In the shooting section you can play penalties against the AI and this again is good practice although to be fair at times its a little hit and miss whether the keeper will save them.
Overall this is a brilliant title for any football fan but it does take a little bit of time to master. It is a pretty good attempt at bringing FIFA 2005 to mobile gaming and most football fans are going to enjoy it. Don't go expecting it to be a replacement for FIFA on other platforms, it isn't but it definitely is a fine game to play on the move.