➤ Close your bags, let's go to Brazil! 🎮

The official license of the 2014 FIFA World Cup, as we know, was awarded to Electronic Arts for its 2014 FIFA World Cup Brazil. Released on April 17 on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, the game will attempt to justify the additional outlay from part of the fans of the football series through the introduction of some interesting features, such as greater care in the construction of the stadiums and fans, improved animations for the players, a great attention to the presentation of the scenarios and the addition of specially designed modes for this new experience. Konami could not stand still and watch, this is clear, and so he tried to anticipate by releasing World Challenge, a DLC for Pro Evolution Soccer 2014 which is sold at a price of 9,99 euros and which adds to the base game precisely the opportunity to try your hand at the World Cup, albeit unofficially. We tried the package these days, so here are our impressions.

World Challenge adds a new mode to PES2014, but the content doesn't justify the price of the DLC

A solid foundation

Created over a period of four years and powered by a new graphics engine, a modified version of the now famous FOX Engine, Pro Evolution Soccer 2014 puts on the plate a renewed experience in its main elements, which almost completely renounces the "rails" "that have always characterized the Konami franchise in favor of a freer approach, which takes into account the weight and balance of each individual player to offer a realistic and engaging rendering of dribbling and tackling, as well as new methods for managing passes and throws.

In the same way, one of the features introduced in the previous edition, the Player ID, is optimized, which takes some of the most important players in the world and faithfully reproduces their maneuvers on the field, but in this case without exaggerating and therefore providing an excessive advantage. when checking the samples. All these changes have a price, in this case a less brilliant ball physics than usual, with the ball being lighter and therefore making the impacts less convincing. Not a small defect, it is clear, indeed a factor that heavily affects the enjoyment of the experience, even more so in the eyes of those who have remained linked to the series over the years precisely because of this peculiarity. Furthermore, one cannot help but notice the inconsistency of a technical sector that in standard action boasts good performance but suffers from ridiculously low frame rates when switching to predetermined sequences (celebrations, team entry, replay), this is a problem. that the developers have not yet solved several months after the game's release in stores.

La grande sfida

Once purchased, downloaded and installed, the World Challenge DLC modifies the Pro Evolution Soccer 2014 home screen, adding a new mode called "World Challenge". It is possible to face it in a traditional way, thus managing the entire team, or in the role of a single player, whether it is an existing player, one created for the occasion or the one we have shaped through the "Become a Myth".

In both cases, the competition starts from the preliminary stages, i.e. from the qualifying rounds, leaving open the question of the summons and thus allowing us to try the best talents that our nation has to offer before determining which formation we will bring to Brazil. and who will face the other teams to win the coveted cup. Beyond the only element officially reproduced in the DLC, the Adidas "Brazuca" ball, World Challenge does not make substantial changes to the structure and gameplay that we already know well, and which boast in the 2014 edition various adjustments capable of increasing or decreasing the degree of realism of the matches, especially as regards the system of passages, filtering and not, but also of the finalizations. A change in the behavioral routines of artificial intelligence is tangible, a sort of "enthusiasm" that loads the team when the result is released, pumping up the characteristics of individual players, and in the same way some variations are visible in the appearance of the most representative characters of each team. Having said that, the reality of things sees this DLC as a simple customization of modes already present in the initial offer, which is also testified by the very low weight of the download. A few lines of code, in short, to activate certain functions and put your hand to the editor: elements that do not justify the premium nature of the package, which could very well have been distributed for free, however, going to be integrated with a view to post-launch support that so far it had made users miss very little.