For a long time there's been a war for the crown of the best football game on the market. For many, the most obvious choice is the FIFA series, given the sheer number of fully licensed teams and competitions available. However, some move away from EA Sports, and instead swear by Konami's Pro Evolution Soccer series for its greater level of authenticity.
Konami has been involved in football games for a long time, with its roots in the genre running deep. The company first took to the sport in the 1980s, and over the years the company has honed its craft well with shifts into different series. The most important of this was the handover from International Superstar Soccer to Pro Evolution Soccer, and PES has earn itself a deserved reputation for delivering a flexible, realistic approach to soccer built on perfect mechanics.
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Thankfully, those expectations will still be met with Pro Evolution Soccer 2019. The quality of the football on show in the game is extremely high, and players would be forgiven for thinking that some of the plays have been taken directly from a real snippet of the beautiful game. This is particularly true with attacking play, where some of the fluid passing movement feels almost palpable.
A lot of this comes down to the way in which Konami has been able to emulate the flow of soccer. There's a seamless, shifting nature to PES 2019 that rivals have still been unable to emulate, although FIFA does seem to get a little bit closer every year. Because of this, PES has managed to break away from the rigidity of play that often comes from sports simulations, which are often so intrinsically tied to tactical formations over individual play.
Beyond that, little moments within PES 2019 just feel more real, somehow. In many sports games, passes and shots feel magnetic, finding their way to the path of either a teammate or an opponent by some unseen force, but in PES 2019 there's every chance that a failed shot just drifts out of play, much like in real life.
All in all, PES 2019 feels like football, and that's the game's biggest triumph. Smaller additions help make this even better, such as the game's improved visual representation of player fatigue beyond a stamina bar. The character models move nicely too, and lots of care has been put into the world's stars looking and moving like their real world counterparts.
PES 2019 provides gamers with a nice variety of game modes as well. Perhaps the best of the bunch is the title's Master League, which acts as a career mode where the player takes the team of their choice towards league and cup glory, taking control over both the larger management and the intricate gameplay of matches at the same time. Other offline modes are the usual fare, too, but it's Master League that will perhaps attract players the most.
That said, PES 2019 does offer those online multiplayer options, too. MyClub, Konami's answer to FIFA Ultimate Team, is still a little too impenetrable to new players, and not as simple to get into as the FIFA alternative. However, it's much less predatory than its EA Sports rival when it comes to loot box pressing, which is appreciated and needs to count for something - even if the mode is weaker overall.
In general, PES 2019 essentially offers the same kind of gaming experience that its predecessors have, though. Those expecting a large improvement are going to be left a little bemused, as overall this year's entry is more of a tweak than a larger revolution of Pro Evo as a whole. As such, some of those slight problems that niggled players last time around are still there.
There are some bigger issues this year as well. The licensing question in PES has always been a difficult one to address, given the powerhouse that is EA Sports and the official FIFA games. In general it's easy to at least distract from the obvious issue of fake team names like London FC through focusing on the football at hand, but it does feel more incongruous with each passing year.
It's made worse by the fact that PES 2019 loses one of its major licensing power plays this year - the UEFA Champions League licence. This puts it even further behind FIFA when it comes to official licensing, with PES now holding few cards. Although it shouldn't matter, it does - and it's all the more frustrating given how realistic the actual soccer in Pro Evolution Soccer feels.
Those that can overlook the licence issue, though, will find a very fun football game once more, albeit one that perhaps doesn't make enough improvements to feel entirely new in comparison to predecessors. That said, it's still a thrilling soccer sim, and those who enjoy authenticity of play over authenticity of name in their sports games will want to check it out.
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Pro Evolution Soccer 2019 is out now for PC, PS4, and Xbox One. Screen Rant was provided with a PS4 code for the purposes of this review.
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