Rating: 
Summary: Unpolished product with hyper-aggressive copy protection
Review: This refers to version 1.1 (patch 1.1) of the PC version of FIFA 2004. Maybe later versions are better?
First I could not get this game to run at all on my computer. EA's support pointed me in the wrong direction telling me that the my graphics card was not supported although I wrote them that the demo had worked fine.
After many hours of experimenting, surfing and exchanging the disk in the shop where I bought it, I finally found out that the aggressive copy protection used by EA prevented the game from loading on my DVD drive.Thank God I found a hack on the Internet (nocd patch) that allowed me to run the game at all. Next bad surprise: FIFA 2004 had beend advertised to have a controller configuration in patch 1.1. This is ridiculous: You can only configure the KEYBOARD! The default button layout for my joystick is very inconvenient, no fun at all to play like this. I bought another joystick (Saitek P2500) just for this game, but it was not properly supported either. Before you run out to buy the (only?) supported joypad for this game, a Logitech Dual Action Game Pad, read the reviews at Amazon about it: Unfortunately this joypad seems to have serious problems with the analog sticks at the time of this writing. I hope Logitech will fix this. Bottom line: No way out for me. Invested about 50 hours to get this game to work properly for me without success. What a waste of time and money! I hope they will add proper joystick support in patch 1.2. Until then this game is useless if you do not like to control a football/soccer game with the keyboard. It is obvious that this game was rushed out the door instead of giving the development team the time to do their job properly. Shame on the management and marketing of EA!
Rating:
Summary: Not worth it at all
Review: I own 2003 and 2002 and this is a disgrace for a good line of soccer games. The menu is horrid, the gameplay is so slow and way to complex to be any fun. Not very supportive of hardware and had to go to alot of trouble to get it to work. Does not work in DVD drives. No controller custom config. This game is so crapy I would not recomend it to anyone, and im considering writing EA because they usually put out a good product. Waste of 20 bucks
Rating:
Summary: Horrible game
Review: There are many reasons why this game deserves a 1 star. The only reason why I did give this game a 1 star is because it has player names and a numbr of leagues. The graphics are weak, stats do not compare to other EA titles like Madden. Control of the players could have been better.
Rating: 
Summary: the best soccer game ever
Review: let me tell you something. At first i bought the Winning Eleven International Soccer game and its' probably the most realistic soccer game of all time but it is so boring. You can't change the speed of the game. I am so pissed off that i didn't get FIFa soccer 2004 first but it's really the best game.
Rating:
Summary: HOW ISNT THIS THE BEST GAME YET?!?!?!?
Review: I REPEAT DO NOT BUY THIS GAME IF YOUR COMPUTER IS REALLY SLOW!
ALSO IF YOUR COMPUTER ISN'T BUY THIS GAME, DON'T LISTEN TO ANYONE ELSE! THERE JUST MAD THEY CANT HANDLE FIFA 2004!
I admit that some people might say FIFA 2004 made a mistake but they didn't. I tried out Winning 11 (6) and it BLOWS! You don't know how easy it is to score on that (puh) cheap game! In FIFA, they make it an even challenge for beginners with amatuer. I sccored like 15-0 agains't Italy and Korea in FIFA WORLD CUP 2002 and in Winning Eleven I crushed Japan easily like 41-0! Meanwhile I bought FIFA 2004 for PS2 and computer to see if everyone said was true and guess what, They're LYING!. This game's graphics are pushed to the way limits, its not even funny. I tripped a player and he slid and guess what, he had stain all over him! This game is as real as soccer could possibly be. In Career Mode, depending on how well you do is how many people are in the crowd. Since im in K-League( Korean League) I chose Busan Icons and so far im 21-5-2 and my stadium looks PACKED every game but Uslan who is like 8-1-19 they barely have the front rows covered. This game also has background music from different countries. England:4, Japan:1, Germany:1, and some more. They have away and home jerseys you can pick. So you can wear a blue Suwon Blue Wings jersey if your away and White Suwon Bluewings if your home. The players rating are comparable but there must be a mistake on some. They put Song Chong-Gug at a rating of 54. He started and played every minute in World Cup 2002 for Korea and they got all the way to 4th place (Brazil 1 ,Germany 2, Trukey 3, Korea 4) ESPN announcers such as Ty stated, "Song Chong-Gug has played very well in this tournament" Cant anyone fix that. Also they make some players look kind of weird such as Ahn-Jung Hwan (they gave him a ponytail -_-). Theres three modes: Practice Mode, Career Mode (5 year coaching), and a tournament. But I don't get it, everyone says there is no friendly mode but there is. Just go to play now and thats the same thing as a friendly! Its just 8 letter difference! Id say give FIFA the best game of the year. If only they could add North Korea and add more chants to South Korea instead of just taehanminguk which sounds like "taehanmingok" just like in FIFA World Cup 2002. GOOD JOB FIFA, ILL BE WAITING FOR FIFA 2005!
Rating: 
Summary: The worst FIFA game to date
Review: This is undoubtedly the death blow to the FIFA series. Having bought FIFA 98, 2000, and 2002, I was looking forward to this game. I was disappointed. I've played 2000 and 2001 on the PC and the controls were fine on the keyboard. This is not the case here. I can't keep up with the numerous controls and what could have been a *fun* game turns out to be a frustrating piece of junk.
Besides the keyboard controls, the gameplay is sorely lacking. You can't really notice how bad it is until you reach the professional level when it becomes absurd. No matter what I do I can't get a pass into the box unless it's a cross (and then it's almost always too close to the keeper). No matter where you are on the opponent's side of the field there is always a defender right in front of you to block any pass or lob attempt. This brings me to my main gripe. The passing is just plain awful. How many times have I pressed "up" and "s" and my pass ended up at the feet of a defender to my right? Too many. Sprinting is terrible because once you've begun your run you're guaranteed to lose possession. Defending, while not as bad as attacking, is still a pain. The AI will almost always tear through your defense resulting in one or two defenders chasing an attacker as he runs into the box.
Enough of the bad points... FIFA has great graphics compared to its predecessors and the licenses are nice touch. The Career Mode isn't that bad, but it's entirely unnecessary. All that was needed was a simple season mode without all this prestige points nonsense. Don't get this game, buy Pro Evolution/Winning Eleven instead.
Rating:
Summary: Terrible--too FAST actually (see below please)
Review: The graphics are terrible. FIFA 2002 was better. It is very bumpy (not smooth), even on the lower detail/pixel settings, and I have a brand new Pentium 4 with plenty of power, plenty of graphics power, correct driver, etc., AND I have downloaded the patch that was supposed to fix things. Each time I play the game, I have to start a game only to quit on purpose because the graphics mess up and the players are see-through and green. Then I have to change the detail setting to low (I have a powerful system, again, and I should be able to play on high detail), restart another game (low setting means there are no numbers on the players backs during game play and it basically looks like Atari 2600 quality graphics), then I have to quit again, change the settings back to medium (numbers are on players' backs), then start a 3rd game. Even then sometimes the players remain see through. If I made the mistake of starting a game in my career mode file, then if I quit I forfeit 2-0--can't just quit normally, so I have to choose to play the entire game with see through graphics or ruin my career mode. It is unbelievable!!!! I popped in FIFA 2002 for fun to see if I was remember correctly (I did not have 2003), and I was correct, it was much smoother, although without detailed players' faces. The only good thing about the 2004 graphics is the closeups where the players' faces look real. But again, the graphics during play are choppy and too fast, actually (I don't understand those who said it was too slow). It is super fast and unlike in 2002 it does not allow me the option of slowing it down (is this because here my powerful computer is kicking in but having a negative effect for another reason?). I mean, literally, a shot goes about 400 miles per hour for 50 yards if you look at it from a relative standpoint as it would look if it was real life (and the 10 minute clock goes about 5 seconds per every real 1/2 second and the players correspondingly are too fast). Why not slow it down to real seconds and real speed, like Madden 2004 football does? I should be able to put it on 45 minutes per half and have it go the real speed and still have realistic low scores, as, again, Madden 2004 football americano does. There, you can play with real 15 min. quarters and end up with real scores, sometimes 6-3, 12-9, 24-21, etc. and with fairly realistic stats. If this soccer game had 45 min. halves, teams would get about 70 shots off in a game and the score would be 12-10 every time (not real). In sum, my major complaint is the graphics are actually too FAST, if you follow me. Even a lob pass or a clearance goes up and down (the trajectory of the ball) super fast. In 2002 it was smooth and more realistic, amazingly (2002 had its own problems such as being an arcade game, where, again, in 45 min. half mode, which WAS available, you'd have a final score of 25-24 or something like that). 2004 game solves that problem as far as difficulty in scoring (pretty real), but it does it by speeding everything up so it looks unreal, both the players and the clock (what I mean is it is like it is literally on fast forward in a VCR when you're playing). Am I the only one with these problems (the see through player problem described above)??? Please let me know if you have a suggestion. I did, by the way, check my direct X 9.0 settings, other settings, etc., and everything on my computer is working fine (I am NOT one of those people who don't know about computers and have the settings not installed right or something )(oh by the way I did reinstall FIFA 2004 twice and that did not help either). What I'm saying, in sum, is except for details of players' faces when you see them close up, the 2002 graphics were actually better in that they were smoother and slower. I mean literally the new game is too fast, if I may repeat myself. Literally a player can run 40 yards in about 3 seconds in real life, but it is like 25 seconds, literally, that have run off the clock on the game--like the game resorts to the trick of making the games last only 20 total minutes to keep it low scoring, but yet you still get off 10 - 20 shots in a game, so it still unrealistic, just that 75% of "down time" (passing it around and midfield play) chunk of the game that would be in a real game is just missing. This is NOT true in Madden 2004 football americano. Why can EA get the soccer game to play at real speed--the clock would make one second be one second (like you're looking at a real clock, not one on fast forward), and the players and ball would travel at real speed too (slower), and the game could be 90 min. long and still result in realistic scores like 2-1, 3-2, 1-0, etc.??? They have hidden the continued unrealism (too easy to shoot, too often, and score) by simply taking 75% of the TIME away. The game lasts only 20 minutes in real time (10 min. half mode is the max you can play, but they have the clock run on fast forward so it pretends it is a 90 min. game--this does succeed in creating low scoring games--but by cheating with time, not making the play realistic). If the game play stayed exactly the same but the clock ran at real time, a 90 min. game would, again, result in scores like 25-24 (or 25-0 if you're beating up on the computer in amateur or even semi-pro mode, in which it is easy to prevent the computer from even getting off a single shot). As it is with the speeded up time, you HAVE to play not realistic (what I mean is you must push the ball downt he field right away every time--no time to pass it around or simply slow down and stand there for a few seconds as happens in real game--watch real games!!! (and yes I am a player of soccer in real life too). The AI is even worse--they immediately push straight for the goal every time--no time to dribble around or pass around a little because the game is about to be over in 10 minutes!!! I bet if you could take the time to count somehow, there are like 75% less total "touches" of the ball by any player's foot in the game, again it is all based on the speeded up time thing I'm trying to describe) Slow it down, like the Madden game. It is like the Madden programmers are 10 years ahead of the FIFA programmers in sophistication (like FIFA is about the level of Madden in 1995 or so, if you follow me). Does anyone agree with me? Thanks.
Rating:
Summary: Not interesting or fun anymore
Review: This game got much worse with time. When i played fifa 1996 it was really exacting and fun to play. I haven't played fifa soccer for 8 years. I bought this game thinking it would be better then the one I played 8 years ago turns out it got much worse .Bad game play, bad graphics, a lot of international teams like Japan and north korea are missing. I didn't get into the game at all.
Rating:
Summary: Even though not perfect, this game is a lot of fun
Review: I disagree with the most of the reviewers. This game is a jewel on top of the previous releases. And to those of you who would like to hone your managerial skills, there is a "Total Club Manager 2004" around. If you are not satisfied with the uninclusion of some teams you will certainly find 'em in TCM and - the beauty- you can import them to FIFA 2004 and play'em there.
As for the game itself. FIFA 2004 have an exellent graphics, you can change music, and the game play is much more realistic, hten in the previous versions. Sometime the game leave you frustrated - players passing to the wrong directions, loosing the ball for no reason - but this is exactly like watching your team in real life.
Now there is the news: The first release of the FIFA 2004 Creation Centre has been released by EA SPORTS today. You can download it from the Soccer Gaming Downloads Centre or any number of community FIFA websites. Here is the feature list of what the first release contains: Create new players Player creation / editing - name, height, weight, skin colour, generic hair, face type, boots, position, stats Kit editing - jersey number / name Squad number editing Captain selection Change formations More than one patch can be installed Able to export just one team or one league and install that later on different computer without affecting any other team or league
Instructions:
Changes made in Creation Center will automatically carry into FIFA 2004 All changes need to be applied ('Apply' button) to take effect All changes need to be saved ('Save' icon) to be stored - warning: there is no way to restore the initial default once a change is saved 'Reset' will cancel all changes made after the last save
The second release will be available around March and will include the following extra features:
Import/Export Creating new teams/competitions Importing of arts and sound
The first release of the Creation Centre 2004 is only 1.5MB. Plus there is a patch, which can be downloaded from EA.com. This patch resolves some of the issues, plus adding LAN play, which was originally missing. All and all great FOOTBALL game, enjoy it. And for 16.99 you can't go wrong :)
Rating: 
Summary: They promised a Mountain BUT delivered a Hill !
Review: Anticipating for fifa games nowadays is like waiting for your final year results to be announced. You never know what is in store!
But once you see it, you either go "WOW" or "Opppsssss!", and i must say coming back to the game, it is a definite "Opppsssss".
Oppssss because despite all that hype, EA never truly deliver the soccer game that we fans eagerly awaited for. I got mine nearly 2 months now, and i think the game is a beefed-up version of previous FIfa titles. Nothing special that i can see....
Maybe for some of ya all, you will stick with the silly gameplay and funny AI of this game, on the basis of it is as close to soccer you can get. But for me, being a soccer freak my whole life, i just can;t accept that. Instead, i got the REAL experience of soccer which EA claimed they do from the Pro Evolution Soccer(PES) series for the PS2. (Try it you'll love it)
PES is as close, infact at times exactly depicts the beauty of soccer. It's all about gaining total control of your player...and that was sweet. Try doing that with FIFA 2004, and you will go "ooopppssss", there goes the ball!". As for EA, just having good eye candy graphical wise is NOT enough....gameplay too is equally important. I guess until they learn to Balance these factors on an equal basis, EA will never truly deliver the type of soccer game that SHINES.
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