Pitched as “FUT distilled”, Draft Mode works as follows: you pay your entry fee (either 7,500 coins or 300 FIFA Points - though this may change by release) and are given five random formations to choose from. On picking yours (4-1-3-2, obviously), you are presented with an empty team-sheet in your chosen shape, where you then go about choosing players for each position from five random selections presented. For example: I choose my striker position and am presented with five gold players, all ranging from around 82-85, and I have to choose the best suited for the current situation, taking into account specific attributes as well as their chemistry with surrounding players. Then I move on to any other position - picking the goalie I am unlucky enough to get some bronzes, meaning my range is limited in the high 60s, though fortunately there are a lot more slots in the subs and reserves to make up for this shortfall.
Women football is marquee new feature of FIFA 16; an addition that realistically should have come a lot sooner – but let’s stick with the positives. It’s here. It’s featured. It’s not half-baked. But it is relegated to the bottom right of the menu, you’ve only got two modes to play (single matches or tournaments) and team selection is national sides only. Somewhat fittingly, women’s football is similar to how men’s football was featured in the original FIFA International Soccer back in 1993. Ah well, baby steps. Play a first person shooter on the hardest difficulty and walk into a small room. You know that feeling when you get dusted with frags from which there is seemingly no escape but to accept the multiple overkill firework show...
What does that all culminate in, in terms of the way FIFA 16 plays? Quite a lot actually. FIFA 15 as we know is based mostly on counter-attack action a bit like basketball and as a result you spend a lot of your time chasing people up and down the pitch. In FIFA 16 the game is played much more in front of you, than behind you. More often than not if your CDM has the ball on half way, he's looking at two banks of four who are set, organized and ready to defend. This creates footballing opportunities which are historically very different to FIFA's past. You'll actually get time to knock the ball around in midfield, manoeuvring the opposition over 5 or 6 passes, instead of in a solitary pace fueled burst. It's methodical, deliberate, and it flows a whole lot more like real football.
Also, FIFA 16 players prefer to be surrounded by other players from the same country, so you'll need to take that into account when setting your lines as well. You can then take your team into matches against either the computer AI or other players online. Additional trading card packs can be purchased using either real-world money or the coins that you earn in-game while playing, although it will take you a while to earn enough coins to buy the premium card packs going the free route. There's also an active trading market in the game, so you can put your cards up for sale or browse the market looking for that missing piece for your team. This mode is certainly fun, but I think that I would have gotten more out of it if I was more familiar with the players of the sport; the vast majority of them were simply a rating number and a nationality to me.
Still, I have a lot of fun with the equivalent mode in the Madden NFL games, so I imagine that those with a greater familiarity with the sport on the international level would enjoy it. It's hard to put together a list of those differences because they feel subtle, and I'm not sure if it's because the game is modeling the women players with lower stats than the men or if it's trying to simulate playing the game on artificial turf. In any case, you'll find that passes tend to be short, the play a bit slower, and aggressive moves such as slide tackles have been removed when you play in this mode.
