Lets start off by being quite superficial. PES 2014 looks fantastic, and is a significant improvement on previous instalments. The stadium I played in were highly-detailed, atmospheric, and the crowd didnt feel like an afterthought they display custom banners and signs, and will slowly filter to the car park if the home team takes a beating.
But by far the most eye-catching aspect of PES 2014 is the players. The benefits of the new Fox Engine are evident and very, very impressive. Skin textures look incredible in replays and post-goal celebrations, you can see pores, veins bulging beneath the skin, and sweat dripping from the brows of your more industrious players. And the likenesses of marquee players such as Balotelli, Ozil, and Schweinsteiger are genuinely uncanny. The preview build I spent time with was limited to Bayern Munich, Santos, and the German and Italian national teams, so I'm unsure how many players will have this level of detail.
During a game, when the camera pulls out to the default television angle, much of this detail is inevitably obscured, but during goal celebrations and action-replays youll marvel at its high-level realism, from the improved grass texture to the way fabric billows when players run. Its not quite next-gen, but its arguably the best-looking football game the current generation of consoles has produced so far.
