Pros: A great game, with good graphics, audio, commentary, and lots of options.
Cons: Can play three seasons in a row. After those 3, you will have to restart.
The bottom line: This is a great game, well worth the money! Its four years old now but the graphics are still up to date, and the audio and music adds more character.
About a year ago, I decided that I had to go out and buy a decent football game, seeming as I am a big fan of football. I instantly went for something in the fifa series, and 10 minutes later, I came out of the shop with £30 less in my pocket, and fifa 2000 in my hand. I rushed home to play it and was impressed immediately, as I had only had ‘Adidas Power Soccer’ to play on before, and it is not very good at all. Anyway, here are the details about the game:

Fifa 2000 is obviously a football game, which is fairly recent. You have to select a team to play with, and then you can play against other teams from all over the world. There are English clubs, International clubs, International teams, a special team, who has Robbie Williams playing for them and classic teams, which are 42 of the greatest teams in the last century.

~Options in the game:

Friendly match - You can play against a computer or against a friend using this option. you have a selection of over 450 teams in over 15 of the greatest leagues around the world, along with the classic, teams, the international teams, and the special team. you can only have one match at a time in this option. if you want to play for longer, then you may want to start a league or cup.

tournament – in the tournament section, you are able to play a cup, custom cup or a custom league. here are the details about each of them:

~ cup: you can choose between two European cups, which are the EFA trophy and the European Championship. You can also play in the World Cup. for these options, you are able to duke it out with the best of the rest. I recommend the World Cup, as you get to play the best teams from around the globe, such as Brazil.

~ custom cup: here you can create your own cup tournament, and choose the teams which will take part. you are able to select teams from any of fifa 2000’s supported leagues, as well as a selection of international sides. the other option you have here is to choose whether you want to play a Round Robin League and knockout stage, or a simple knockout Cup competition. I recommend the knockout Cup competition.

~ Custom League: For this option, you are able to create your own league structure and choose your own teams that will compete in the league. This means that you can make it hard for yourself by making the league full with the best teams, or make it easy by making yourself the best team, and filling the league with the worst teams in the game. (Be careful though, the worst teams are not that bad).

SEASON – In season mode, you can choose a team from any of 14 international leagues, and take control to lead them through multiple seasons, (with a maximum of 3 I think). You play every game in a full season, and if you do well, you are often invited to the European Cup, as well as other Cup matches. In season mode, you are also able to buy more players for your team, but you have a budget. Each team has a different budget, so don’t expect to buy the worlds best players with Southampton FC.

TRAINING – This is an excellent feature in the game. Here, you can use a selection of training drills to practice your ball skills. You can practice things such as penalties and free kicks with different players, so you may be able to guide your free kicks into the top corner of the net like David Beckham.

TEAM MANAGEMENT – You can control every aspect of your teams performance with this. You are allowed to change details such as formation, free kick takers, substitutes and who will play in each game. You are also able to control which players you want to buy from other teams here. Any team changes in a league or cup are automatically saved when that league or cup is saved.

COMMENTARY:

~ Pre-match – Before the match starts and the players run out on the pitch, you are taken to the stadium, and shown the team sheets. During this time, Gary Linekar gives his views on the teams, and he predicts what the game will be like. You are able to skip all of this though, just by pressing the start button.

~ During the game – There is commentary from Mark Lawrenceson and John Motson throughout each game. The commentary in the game is pretty good. There are not stupid comments, and most things they say are accurate. They make comments when there is a free kick, goal kick, when someone scores etc. but they never seem to get very excited. Oh well, it must just be boring to watch me play. This commentary, like I’ve said, is excellent, and it adds life to the game.

NAMES OF PLAYERS:

There is one advantage with the Fifa series, and that is that the players names are their real names. Unlike other games, Fifa spells peoples names, such as Beckham properly, and not like becanam. This is because they are licensed to do this, and it makes the game a lot better, as you know which players are in your team, and which players have scored for you etc.

IN GAME MENUS:

While playing the game, you are allowed to do a whole list of things:

~ Instant replay – You can replay a move, or a piece of the game which you have recently played. You are able to change the camera angle, zoom in our out, and play it in slow motion. This is an excellent feature.

~ Camera – You can choose which camera you view the game from. This means that you can view it from the sideline, from one half of the pitch, or higher in the air. I just tend to leave it on the camera angle which it immediately goes to, as it is the easiest to play from.

~ Team management – Here you can change the formation, free kick takers, or make substitutes. This is very useful.

~ Side select – You can change what side you are playing for. This means that if you are playing for England at the beginning, but then you want to play the opposing team instead, you can. You can also use this function to cheat, because if you are losing, you can take control of their team and make them score an own goal – easy.

~ See the summary of the match – This means that you can see who has been booked (given a red or a yellow card), see the score sheet, and get the general facts about the match. This includes being able to see who has had the most shots on goal, corners, or possession.

~ Restart match - You can restart your current match.
~ Quit match – You are able to leave that match and go back to the start screen if you are playing a friendly, or back to the league or cup tables if you are playing a league or a cup.

SAVING YOUR GAME:

To save a game, you have to have a memory card. These are quite cheap, going at about £9.99 for the official ones, and £4.99 for the ones made by other manufacturers. When you save, it takes up between 2 and 14 memory blocks – a 1mb-memory card has 15 blocks.
If you already have too many games saved on it, you can overwrite them by scrolling through and selecting the one which you wish to overwrite. To load the game, you have to go to the games load menu, and select the game you wish to continue with, which you have already saved.

AUDIO:

The audio is brilliant, as there is a lot of music from Robbie Williams, which is why he has been included in the game. He sings ‘It’s Only Us’, which is played at he beginning of the game, and at half times etc. There is constantly music playing. When you are at a start screen, or when you pause the game, music starts playing. I think that this is excellent, as most of the music is excellent, and it really adds life to the game.
There is also a lot of audio from the commentators. They give pre-match predictions, and they are continuously commentating through each game. This makes the game much better.
As well as the music during intervals, and speech from the commentators, there is a considerable amount of sound effects. The crowd cheer and you can hear the kicking and heading of the football. This also makes the game that much better.

GRAPHICS:

The graphics are quite good. The players
are in quite good detail, and so is the pitch. You are even able to see all of the banners around the edge of the pitch, and the scenery in the background. The crowd is really just a lot of blobs, but it would be pointless to do each person in the crowd in detail anyway, and it doesn’t really make any difference. Overall, the graphics are good, and accurate.

CONTROLS:

~ X button– To pass. This is a pass along the ground to a teammate. The square button executes a high ball.
~ Run – To run fast, you have to rapidly
tap the triangle button.
~ Tackle – The O button allow your player to tackle an opponent while standing up. The square button executes a sliding tackle, and the R1 button executes a dangerous tackle which totally takes a player out, and usually leaves you with a booking.
~ Shooting at goal – You can shoot by pressing O. You can use after touch, by pressing L2 AND R2, which makes the ball swerve left and right.
~ Keepers ball – When the keeper has the ball, you can press X or O to make him kick the ball, or square to make him throw the ball to one of your players.
~ Throw-ins – Press x to throw the ball to one of your players, or square for a long throw.
~ Corner kicks – Press the O button and hold it to increase the power, then release it to kick the ball. You can also change the direction of the kick by using the directional buttons, and make it curl using the R1 and L1 buttons.
~ Special moves – If you press R2, then the player spins around and avoids a tackle. If you hold it however, he flicks it over his head as well as the challenging players head. You can also press L2 with makes the player jump and avoid a tackle.

CONCLUSION:

Fifa 2000 is an excellent game. There are so many teams to play with, and so many Tournaments and leagues you can play. This means that the game lasts a long time, and it is well worth the money. It is not a game in which you will often find yourself 15-0 up, unless you are in the easy mode, and often goals are scarce. The audio and the graphics are excellent. Everything is in quite good detail, and the whole game is packed with music from different artists.
As you can see, there are so many good points about the game, and I believe that it was well worth my money. It is quite recent, and therefore most of the players play for the right teams.
Fifa 2000 is not slow and boring, but very fast. You can perform quite good skills and runs, and some of the touches and passes are excellent. You can perform some extraordinary special moves, which improve the game a lot. These make the game more worth buying.

I brought Fifa 2000 for £29.99, and I thought that this was a good price. I am not sure if you can get it any cheaper now, but I haven’t really looked. If it is still £29.99 though, I think that you should give it a miss, and go for the most recent one in the series, Fifa 2004 on Playstation 2. This is priced at £39.99, and it is also very good.

I hope this was of some help to you :)

HAPPY GAMING!!!