Winning Eleven Pro Evolution Soccer 2007 review

The joy when Konami first announced World Soccer Winning Eleven9 was coming to PSP was fairly short-lived once the game hit shelves in January 2006. After only a few minutes of banging the ball about on the small-screen pitch a fair few problems became obvious. For a start, even the furthest back camera angle was too close to the players.

Then there was a strange motion blur when sprinting or turning quickly. And, most disappointing of all, there was no Master League. What was Konami thinking? It was, well, OK - but felt soulless in comparison tosoccer the way we love it.

And so Konami went back to the drawing board. For WEPES 2007, they've sent the cameraman back a few steps to give you a wider view of the action and the shadowy motion blur silhouettes have vanished. But there's still no... nah, only kidding, Master League has made it in as well. Yeah!

With all the changes, itfeels much better than last time out. Aside from the horrible PSP nubbin trying its hardest to spoil things, controlling your players is more responsive than before, so taking off on mazy runs and leaving the opposition in your wake is less of a chore and more of a highlight, just like it should be.

Shots from distance look a lot classier as the wider viewpoint allows for a more focused sight of your target, plus goalmouth scrambles are as random and exciting as on PlayStation 2. The only features PSP lacks are the online mode (it's just Wi-Fi as usual) and the random selection match generator.

This is more than made up for by the fully-functioning Master League, mind you. Everything is in there that you'd expect, although the cross-platform dream of continuing your PS2 journey over to PSP - and vice-versa - has been left out.

No matter, there's still the player development, transfer system and pre-match tinkering to get to grips with. This means you can maintain an assault on the European Masters Cup below your desk when you should be doing the accounts and the like. Honestly, Konami could single-handedly cripple work productivity across the country with this feature.