PES 2011 is a highly anticipated title for Windows Phone 7, its the first xbox live soccer game for Microsoft’s new mobile platform. PES ( Pro Evolution Soccer ) is a leading soccer game on the console and now has come to the mini screen with xbox live achievements and leader-boards. So how good is the game is it worth the purchase ? check out our review and gameplay video and decide for yourself ..

Lionel Messi graces the logo of PES2011 on Windows Phone 7. There is a splash screen that you have to tap to get to the main menu. You have the option to launch a quick game , unfortunately there is no way to set your favorite team , so you get to play as your team all the time with random opponents, but the exhibition mode should cover this for you. Most of the action will be in the League Cup and UEFA Competition if you want to grab all the achievements the game has to offer. There is no grinding required here, play the various league matches and when you win the tournament you get the achievements, which is great.

There is a training mode , I was excited to see this mode but my excitement was short lived, there is a free training session and penalty shootout training but no set piece training to hone your freekick skills :(. And in the free training session session the opposition will just have the keeper. There is a gallery section where you can see all the trophies that you have unlocked by winning each tournament.

The game does offer you quite a bit of control via the settings menu. Like the difficulty, match time, the camera mode ( near, far, etc ) , sound and music settings etc. The scrolling in the menu is way too sensitive and can be really annoying. Regarding the difficulty I kinda felt the AI controlled team gains speed when the difficulty is increased and they do challenge and take shots more often too. But when you see that some of good players have a hard time catching up to some ordinary players when the difficulty is increased can be annoying. PES 20111 offers gamers 3 mode of control. I stuck to the virtual dpad and buttons as I am used to that layout but you do have one-touch and accelerometer based control , so users have a good variety of choice as far as controls are concerned.

As WP7 only supports turn based multiplayer via xBox at this stage multiplayer is out of the question. But I cant wait for the day when realtime multiplayer will be a reality on WP7 :). Being a mobile game don’t expect character models to look exactly like the player but some time you do get the feeling the character models do look somewhat like the real player. The lack of tricks or simple team-play moves like 1-2 pass , etc are missing which will frustrate many players ( myself included ). It might be just me but a lot of the time I hit the crossbar while taking a shot, but what really frustrated me was the fact that the sidelines are like magnets to the player with the ball, it is ridiculously hard to get the player to turn away when you are running towards the line. The auto switch does not always work well, i wish there were an option to switch it off so I can manually ask to switch players.

All the little irksome things aside the game is still a lot of fun if you like soccer games and with the multiple number of league matches to go through to unlock the achievements the game will give you quite a bit of gameplay.

PES 2011 Gameplay Video

PES 2011 WP7 xBox Live Achievements

1. First ball (5 points): Win a match.
2. National selection (10 points): Win 50 matches in the regular difficulty level or higher.
3. Legend (10 points): Win 50 matches in the top player difficulty level.
4. UEFA Champions league (10 points): Win the UEFA Champions league in the regular difficulty level or higher.
5. UEFA Europa League (10 points): Win the UEFA Europa league in the regular difficulty or higher.
6. English league (10 points): Win the English league in the regular difficulty level or higher.
7. Ligue 1 (10 points): Win the Ligue 1 in the regular difficulty level or higher.
8. Italian league (10 points): Win the Italian league in the regular difficulty level or higher.
9. Dutch league (10 points): Win the Dutch league in the regular difficulty level or higher.
10. Spanish league (10 points): Win the Spanish league in the regular difficulty level or higher.
11. International cup (10 points): Win the international cup in the regular difficulty level or higher.
12. European cup (10 points): Win the European cup in the regular difficulty level or higher.
13. African cup (10 points): Win the African cup in the regular difficulty level or higher.
14. American cup (10 points): Win the American cup in the regular difficulty level or higher.
15. Asia/Oceanian cup (10 points): Win the Asia/Oceanian cup in the regular difficulty level or higher.
16. Konami cup (5 points): Win the Konami cup in the regular difficulty level or higher.
17. League legend (25 points): Win all leagues.
18. Cup legend (20 points): Win all cups.
19. No chance, just skills (5 points): Win with more than 4 goals.

PES 2011 Screenshots

Version Under Review : 1.0

There is a trial version available and the full version is available for $4.99, we are not sure what are the limitations of the trial version.

What do you think of this WP7 Game ?

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