FIFA 20 Reviews

“FIFA 20's Volta mode is a stellar new addition, but other tweaks are less impressive.”

FIFA 20 does enough to deliver a strong footballing experience, but not all the changes hit the mark.

FIFA 20 truly is an excellent game. It is  packed with content, featuring loads of teams and leagues from all over the world. It features no less than four different career type modes. You can be a major league (or minor league) player,  a football club manager, or create your own player or team. If professional play isn’t your thing, you can even dig into the surprisingly deep world of Volta Football. There really is something for everyone here for both hardcore and casual fans alike.

Delivering another strong outing, FIFA 20 proves once more that it's a football game truly to be reckoned with. There are issues, but few are serious enough to really mar the overall experience. Ultimately, FIFA 20 is fantastic, its new VOLTA Football mode being a particular joy, while FUT proves endlessly compelling yet again.

Looking back at the frustrating last few years, FIFA 20 is undeniably the biggest step forward the series has taken for a while, particularly in terms of new content.

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If you've enjoyed FIFA in the past, you'll still enjoy it now, but if its brand of football doesn't appeal to you, FIFA 20 isn't going to change your mind.

Right on the heels of eFootball Pro Evolution Soccer 2020 firing a solid shot across the bow of EA’s battle-tested workhorse, it was high time that FIFA 20 had the chance to return volley. Taking aim at Konami’s bare-bones product, the world’s best-selling footie simulator has brought along a bevy of new ways to experience the pitch. Can FIFA’s formulaic gameplay overcome the sheer quality of Pro Evo’s mechanics or is this another case where less is very much more?

FIFA 20 has Volta at the center of its marketing and successfully introduces a mode that has real potential, but it’s not the experience that reinvents the franchise. Some players will fall in love with it from the minute they first play it, while others will feel the novelty quickly wear off. If the player heads into the mode with the expectation that this is the spiritual successor to FIFA Street, they will feel disappointed after going hands-on with the mode. Irrespective of Volta, FIFA 20 does little to inject the series with gripping features to help improve the stagnating single-player experience. Ultimate Team remains popular and returning fans will be happy with the tweaks that have been made to the mode, but the single-player experience is far from being the complete package. Customization to modes like Volta, career mode and Pro Clubs is a step in the right direction, but FIFA 20 does little to flesh out features like press conferences and make them have more of a real impact. Players will quickly realize how similar the interface is to FIFA 19 in several modes and will be yearning for the franchise to receive a complete overhaul. With Sony and Microsoft preparing for next-generation consoles, players can only hope that the FIFA franchise also decides to evolve and significantly revamps the single-player experience next year.

For fun and realistic gameplay, FIFA 20 can't be beat, though the specter of card packs looms large over the game's Ultimate Team mode.

Beneath the fireworks and confetti, FIFA 20’s lacking match fitness.

It’s hard to feel sorry for PSG, but for a team backed by the funds of an oil-rich nation state, that’s become accustomed to winning Ligue 1 by a canter, Neymar and co do find some hilarious ways of getting dumped out of the Champions League every season.

In an annualized title that sees as much use as the FIFA franchise, it's tough to consistently add enough polish, bells, and whistles to make each year a 'must-have'. FIFA 19 introduced enough of a significant jump over its predecessor to become one of those titles, and while FIFA 20's new set piece mechanics and its VOLTA game mode are a pleasant surprise, the game as a whole doesn't feel like it has drastically moved forward enough to count as an absolute necessity. Ultimate Team diehards will enjoy the tweaks to the studio's most-lucrative game mode, while Career Mode loyalists will be in for another year of a familiar product.

FIFA 20 once again proves that when it comes to playing with friends, nobody's got anything on this series. Unfortunately, things aren't so great with everything the game offers.

Without much cosmetic polish to fall back on, FIFA 20 needed to bring something new to the table. Although the core gameplay isn’t mind-blowingly different, it’s still the best football game, and the addition of VOLTA is a whole new way to play.

Volta is a brilliant addition to FIFA and the gameplay is better than ever, but a few own goals hold FIFA 20 back from greatness.

FIFA 20 makes marginal improvements to an already successful formula in its core modes and offers something exciting in Volta.

Obviously, the game is playable. Some people are going to like it more. I've said this and I want to make it clear. However, the gameplay in FIFA does not feel like a simulation of actual soccer. It feels like some weird mix of magically perfect passes and shots and players with zero soccer IQ. For me, that makes FIFA 20 just a step below PES this season. Hopefully, in the future, we get some kind of Frankenstein monster of PES' gameplay and Master League and FIFA's everything else. Now that would be a beautiful game.

Volta is a significant addition to FIFA and while it doesn’t all hit the right notes, it’s a largely enjoyable way to play a wealth of content, including a story mode that’s more concise and engaging than The Journey. Elsewhere, improvements have been made to the core FIFA 20 experience, especially when it comes to defending, but overall controlling the ball feels less consistently fluid. For someone not attracted by the allure of Volta, the stilted pace, coupled with a neglect of offline modes such as Career, make it FIFA 20 an adequate but underwhelming entry into the series.

Career mode gets a much needed upgrade while the gameplay has been tweaked enough to feel like a challenge again. VOLTA Football is incredibly fun and a throwback to FIFA Street. It isn't perfect and career mode still has a lot that can be addressed, but EA listened and made upgrades beyond a roster update.

The beautiful game is back in full session and kicks off with the much-anticipated release of FIFA 20. This year’s edition of the gargantuan soccer franchise is better than ever thanks to the introduction of Volta, a reboot of sorts for the fan-favorite FIFA Street series. It’s not just Volta, either as FIFA 20 makes small strides in reinvigorating both Career Mode and Ultimate Team as well. It’s not a complete reinvention of the formula as it plays similarly to FIFA 19 but it’s a more complete package with some tweaks and additions that make it one of the best installments the series has seen in quite some time.

This year’s FIFA feels a little bit like a transition. The next-gen consoles are coming next year, and the features and effort put into this release make this feel more like a small update on last year. While the tweaks and VOLTA are welcome, it doesn’t feel like a properly new title. That’s not to say FIFA 20 bad at all, it’s still very good, but on the evidence of this game, we’d expect a big overhaul on the engine and modes come next year for next-gen.