2016 is a fantastic year for football fans. Both FIFA 17 and Pro Evolution Soccer 2017 have been critically praised for their respective gameplay improvements and it’s almost shocking that there are two really great titles and more variety and options for consumers this time around. FIFA 17 really amped up the experience by offering a full fledged campaign taking you through the life of upcoming football star Alex Hunter and on other hand PES 17 bought in several improvements in the on-field mechanics such as better attacking and defense options. So this brings us to the overarching question among fans…which game looks better?
FIFA 17 marks the first entry in the long running franchise to use the Frostbite engine. The engine is known for breathtaking physical based lighting, realistic skin tones and enhanced animations. On the other hand, PES 17 runs on the FOX engine, a set of tools and framework known for realistic lighting and fluid gameplay. Both engines run their respective games at 60 frames per second, which to be honest is expected in sports games.
So yes, there are quite a number of differences between the two titles and it’s interesting to note that the implementation of lighting is quite different in each of them. FIFA 17’s lighting looks richer and pops out more compared to the slightly dull look of PES 17. The skin tone of players also look quite realistic in FIFA 17 with high quality skin shaders and honestly, it looks head and shoulders above the ones found in PES 17. However, the implementation of tress effects in PES 17 is rather remarkable and is eerily close to the real thing.
Another area where PES 17 takes the lead is the ultra realistic replays. We are not saying that replays in FIFA 17 look bad but the ones found in PES 17 are breathtakingly amazing. The cloth materials used in FIFA 17 seem to be of a better quality and this is perhaps down to Frostbite’s superior physical based rendering quality. However both games struggle with capturing realistic or similar player faces, something that is expected in a game that has hundreds of different players. As far as animations goes, both games seem fairly similar in that department and general inconsistencies can be observed every now and then.
The on-field action runs at a locked 60 frames per second on both resulting into a very smooth and fluid football experience. In the end both titles are fairly decent performers in the graphics department, however FIFA 17 takes the lead here with better visual fidelity overall. PES 17 looks pretty amazing at times, but the somewhat inferior skin shader quality and generally dull look and feel drags down its visuals compared to FIFA 17.
