Genre: Sports
Developer: Konami
Publisher: Konami

Over the years, Konami's Pro Evolution team has done a good job of updating the technology in their engine while maintaining the distinct "Winning Eleven" artistic flavor. For this year's edition of the title, improved lighting detail, higher resolution player models, and some realistic clothing that wrinkles and folds as the players move around make for the best looking Pro Evolution Soccer yet.

The characterless crowd noise of previous years' renditions of Pro Evo have been replaced with a variety of new crowd chants. Some sound natural and authentic, others sound still a tad too much like white noise. The in-match commentary by Mark Lawrenson is comically bad, but that doesn't matter because he is paired with Jon Champion, one of the best in the business. As for the music, I haven't played a game with a good licensed soundtrack since Road Rash on the 3DO back in 1994, and the selections in this title certainly don't threaten Road Rash for that distinction.

For this year's edition, positive tweaks include long-ball passes that are much more effective and seem to find teammates more often. On the negative, the logic routine for determining who to pass the ball to in close quarters seems to frequently pick the wrong player. On the balance, this is the best and most balanced Pro Evolution Soccer to date, it plays fabulously. At the same time, sometimes I wish they could stop substituting one imbalance in the engine for a new.

My brother was watching me play this title recently and commented on how it appeared to be the "Forza 2 of football games" given the robustness of the engine and the plethora of fun gameplay modes. What this year's edition of the title does so well is pull together so many disparate items that have been neglected in recent years. The Master League gets a refresh with some new features, the North American/European debut of "Become a Legend" is spectacularly involving, the edit mode is more robust than ever, and the edition of the official Champions League mode is yet more icing on top of the ever-delicious gameplay engine.