When I woke up this morning I was in a state of immediate excitement. I felt a lot like how a kid feels on Christmas eve (or a Hanukkah night for Jews like myself) - giddy, wide eyed and energetic. 

Unfortunately, Rutgers' mail office is evil incarnate and kept me from playing FIFA '12 until my friend came back from Target with his own copy. My next hour was consumed by FIFA and it was well worth it, despite my shortcomings for all but the last game of that playing time.

Disappointing to me was the fact that many MLS teams were two and a half stars, not the three stars that preview videos had shown. Still, the Union and other MLS teams are clearly better than they were in FIFA '11.

I've yet to tinker with using the Legacy Defending options that allows a user to go back to FIFA '11 defending, mostly because I think the new 'advanced' controls for defending are great, though tough to get a hang of. Offense is also tougher, with defenders making last ditch tackles or blocks more often. Dribbling with players with great ball control is a lot of fun, however.

All-in-all I think it's a great game so far, worthy of a $60 purchase. What's your take?

EA Sports appears to finally be taking MLS seriously, and teams like the Philadelphia Union have benefited from the additional attention to detail that is seen in FIFA '12.

A Youtube user by the name of GetDougdOn has posted a video of nearly every league and the teams within those leagues. MLS appears to have had a facelift after EA came under criticism from fans of the league over the seemingly poor execution on player and team ratings in FIFA '11. Nearly every MLS team is a three star club in this version of the game, an 'honor' bestowed upon only a few last season.

The Union are a three star team themselves, sporting two 70-plus overall rating players and almost the entire team over 60. Here's the reported list of Union players and their overalls, while the default starting line up can be seen in the picture above.

Union Player Ratings (via McRob of BigSoccer):
72 - Faryd Mondragon
71 - Sebastien Le Toux
69 - Freddy Adu
69 - Veljko Paunovic
69 - Carlos Valdes
66 - Danny Mwanga
66 - Roger Torres
65 - Danny Califf
65 - Sheanon Williams
64 - Brian Carroll
64 - Justin Mapp
63 - Keon Daniel
63 - Stefani Miglioranzi
63 - Juan Diego Gonzalez
62 - Kyle Nakazawa
61 - Jack McInerney
61 - Zac MacMath
61 - Gabriel Farfan
61 - Michael Farfan
60 - Levi Houapeu
59 - Amobi Okugo
58 - Thorne Holder
55 - Ryan Richter