I don't give a toss about it. I spent the afternoon of Sunday, 9 July, 2006 in Berlin sleeping and playing the PlayStation. In the evening, I went out and won the World Cup."

While not nearly a relevant title in the sports genre these days, Fifa 2006 was one of the finest in the franchise. Back in the days prior to monetization, and minimal yearly efforts put into the annual update, we got games that went their hardest at being the best they could be. The mid 2000's was a glory period for the world of gaming and sports. Innovation, experimentation, and a desire the be better was clearly there. Fifa '06 is a relic of that antiquated design philosophy, and while better soccer(futbol) games exist, it was a tremendously fun time for me in those days. I spent more hours than I can even properly explain building an icnoic team from the bottom of the gutter. I wanted to make a champion out of the underdog, and by god I did it. It might not have been pretty, hell most of the time is was a proper scrap to the end of the second half. I cherish those days greatly with a fond reverence of the creativity they drew from me. It may just be an old soccer game to some of you, but to me, this was adventure I sought to conquer and make my own. The best of what the genre can be when it really aims for it.

We hereby award: The Silver Seal of Merit

The general trend of the FIFA games on the 360 is for them to improve each year up until they are exactly the same game every release. This one bucks the trend a bit as it is a little better then 07. After the absolutely horrendous Road to the World Cup 06, here we can actually play in a world cup. But that's about it. You can do qualifying for all 6 regions, and then play in the big tournament itself. There is also a challenge mode, which gives you some difficult tasks to complete, and an achievement after completing all of them. The challenges are actually kind of interesting and based on real footy events. However, it's still sorely lacking in features compared to the later games. The gameplay is also slightly better than 07, but only just. One of the weirdest things about it is how quickly the ball moves. It's difficult to plan attacking or defensive moves because the ball moves so quickly, and that's on normal mode, there is a fast mode too! Tackling is very boring too, hold the B button for long enough and your player will steal the ball, no matter the position. This is slightly better than the ping pong of the 07 game but we have gone from one extreme to another. The one positive I can say is that at least it's interesting to see the changes in each game, and these early titles really stand out (in a bad way) for how differently each one plays.