By FIFA 99, after all the success of both FIFA 98 and World Cup 98, the ascendancy of EA’s FIFA series in the world of football games was becoming clear, There were still a range of rivals at that point, though, and it was not yet completely secure. What direction it went in next mattered. Even if it was barely any direction at all.
What’s new in FIFA 99?
The back of the box gives a list of features with “NEW” next to some. These include a European Super League, which bears no resemblance to a real competition, and semi-automatic goalkeepers. That’s what I was planning on calling the feature but I guess it’s also the official name. While defending you can now hold a button to have your goalkeeper charge madly out, ready to flatten anyone in their path, Ederson-style. This is one more feature that is still in FIFA today. The box also cites a faster framerate and support for the DualShock controller. The controller vibrating whenever a heavy tackle is made does help them to feel even more robust and make some back-and-forth with the ball a bit more exciting. Not mentioned but also newly present is a button to dive. Look at all of that list in total, and it’s obvious that FIFA 99 is not a game with revolutionary changes in mind.
What’s gone?
The whole Road to the World Cup mode that defined FIFA 98 is, obviously, no more. Indoor mode has also bitten the dust. And we wave goodbye to the Malaysian league.
What’s stayed?
Again, most of the game and its presentation doesn’t change much. Most surprisingly to me, the full range of team and player editing facilities, which I always associated with FIFA 98 alone, are still there.
Who is on the cover?
Dennis Bergkamp (Arsenal, F), in a picture which splits the difference between action photo and EA Sports white background in a slightly more subtle way than the vertical divide on FIFA 98’s cover. A shame about the ugly fussiness of the giant EA Sports overlay making it worse overall. Choosing another big star from the Premier League is a slightly UK-leaning decision, but not as much as if it had been another England player (probably Michael Owen?).
What’s on the soundtrack?
Once again a pop song serves as the main theme and there isn’t too much else of note. After “Song 2” and “Tubthumping”, there is no semi-novelty rock hit to match but instead a reach for slightly more cool with Fatboy Slim’s “The Rockerfeller Skank”. It’s not that big of a change — we’re still at the lairy end of the pop music continuum.
Who is the best player in the game?
Courtesy of YouTuber Shade doing the work adding up the individual attribute ratings, I can tell you that the overall highest rated player is Spain and Real Madrid striker Raul. He finished equal 21st in 1998’s Ballon D’Or award for the world’s best player, but it still makes a lot more sense than FIFA 97’s stats. There are two things to draw from it. First, no one really cared about this question still. Second, it’s still interesting that it wasn’t Ronaldo any more, because he just wasn’t in the game any more, Jacques Villeneuve-style. The mysterious G. Silva takes his place at Inter. That’s the exception that proves the rule of how EA were cementing FIFA’s place by hoovering up licences and depriving others of them. International Superstar Soccer 98 is a much better football game than FIFA 99 on a lot of levels. But FIFA 99 has almost all of the teams and players updated for a new season — whoever you care about, they are almost certainly there. ISS 98 doesn’t. Konami sailed a bit closer to the wind this time on player names (ISS 98‘s England team includes the likes of G. Li Zaux to correspond to reality’s, and FIFA 99‘s, Graeme Le Saux) but there was still much less reason to update if you already had International Superstar Soccer 64.
Who is the worst player in the game?
Again, we can’t answer this without someone putting in enormous effort, but we can take a guess at where contenders might play from looking at the worst teams. Those include 1860 Munich and about half of the clubs in the newly added Portugese league.
What do the players look like?
The box trumpets new lighting and player texturing, but we’re at the point where the limitations of the PlayStation prevent anything from really looking much better than before. Despite that being the better-selling version, the menus in particular still look designed with the PC in mind, and the PC was where improvements were focused. One slight positive change is that players now have different heights, although it’s not that obvious given the general weaknesses.
How does it play?
FIFA 99 again feels slightly more like a modern FIFA, which got me in trouble when I started reflexively using L1 to switch players and found that it instead produced a vicious tackle. Still, any positive result gained after having two of my players sent off could only be more satisfying.
The differences are fairly marginal, which means that at its core it still plays a good game of football. It’s faster than FIFA 98, with the old treacle effect as players’ animations catch up with your actions being even more completely removed. That speed is unevenly distributed, though, with dribbling being overpowered as a method of attack as a result. There are some more opportunities to do things which weren’t possible in FIFA 98 — crosses actually feel worthwhile, for instance — but it quickly seems pointless when you can just run straight through the opposition instead. The feeling of every match playing much the same is still a long way from being fixed, too.
How does it score on the sepp-blatter-rain-of-banknotes.gif greed index?
FIFA 99 is the most obvious case of a yearly update on the same game since FIFA 96 on the Mega Drive, has less to offer in many aspects than its predecessor, and came mere months after World Cup 98. FIFA 99 gets 0.8 sepp-blatter-rain-of-banknotes.gifs.
If FIFA 99 was a football team at the time, who would it be?
Aston Villa – still chugging along happily at the top end of midtable, but the big revolutions were happening elsewhere.
