For the most part, it succeeds admirably. As soon as you start you're impressed with the fidelity of its presentation. Start, menu and loading screens are indistinguishable from those in FIFA 12. It's the same slick yet unostentatious interface that so many are familiar with. You'll be forgiven for thinking it's the same game.
But menus, however pretty and sumptuous, are superficial; it's the gameplay that really showcases what the Vita can and can't do. One of its major successes is preserving FIFA's core gameplay undiluted – moving, passing, shooting, all remain unaltered. So if you're putting down a console controller for the Vita, you'll be able to continue playing without the need of an adjustment period.
In-game visuals are fairly impressive throughout, with player likenesses remaining strong and stadiums looking impressive. Occasionally the frame-rate drops, but it never gets so bad as to ruin the game or detract from the overall high-quality experience.
This impressive continuity, however, doesn't extend to all aspects of the gameplay. When FIFA 12 was released at the end of last year, a lot attention was rightly focussed on its triumvirate of new innovations – tactical defending, the player impact engine, and precision dribbling. Defending remains unchanged – you'll still be containing the opposition through a hectoring mix of applied pressure and jockeying with the intention of forcing mistakes. Similarly, players collide quite convincingly depending on their relative orientation and speed. There's still the occasional bizarre tangling of players, but it never ruins the illusion. Precision dribbling, however, seems to have suffered in the move to Vita. Players don't seem to have the same degree of close control. It's not a major fault; it just niggles slightly if you've made it a big part of your game in FIFA 12. It also serves as a reminder that while this looks and, for the most part, plays like FIFA, it's not the same game.
And nor should be. Commendably, FIFA Vita isn't a slavish reproduction of its acclaimed console cousin; the game takes full advantage of the unique hardware at its disposal, using both the front touchscreen and the rear touchpad, with varying degrees of success. Using the touchscreen to pass and switch between players simply does not work as a viable alternate control scheme. While basic passing between players is possible, anything more ambitious or attacking is too tricky to pull-off, even for the most digitally dextrous. Try it, and you're liable to lose possession and drop your brand-new Vita. Furthermore, once you start tapping the screen, you're no longer able to see the overall field of play. Yes, it might be touted as a 'casual' control scheme – catering for those weaned on mobile devices – but if used against someone using a traditional control scheme it puts you at too great disadvantage.
In contrast, the use of the rear touchpad for shooting is inspired. The conceit is rather elegant: given their comparable dimensions, the touchpad represents the goal. To shoot, simply tap on the pad where you want to aim your shot. The longer you hold down, the harder the strike. It's simple, and once you get your head around using the touchpad within a game, from a side-on perspective, it's a really fun addition to FIFA, and it makes it a much more accessible game.
One of the most frustrating yet realistic aspects of FIFA is how difficult it is to score; when through on goal most players still revert to the 'hit-and-hope' strategy. Once mastered, the rear touchpad shooting mechanic turns everyone into Paul Scholes – you'll be regularly smashing in shots from the edge of the box into the top corner. This is both a good and a bad thing, of course, depending on what you want from a FIFA game.
And if the touchscreen controls put you at an unfair disadvantage, using touchpad shooting confers an insane advantage if playing against someone who has it disabled. While this would imbalance a game between two equally-skilled players, it could also be used to provide a handicap if one player is much stronger than his or her opponent.
The best thing to say about FIFA Vita's touchscreen controls is that they are entirely optional. If you want a more realistic football sim, then you can still have that experience – just turn them off. Yet they're there if you want to experiment, level the playing field, and have a match where the spectacular is well within reach.
For those wanting something a little bit more in-depth from FIFA Vita, it also includes Career Mode, in which you can play an entire season as a single player, a manager, or a player manager. The interface, again, is entirely in keeping with FIFA 12, and loading/advance times are mercifully short, actually making the mode enjoyable on the Vita. Other FIFA standards – Be A Pro, Virtual Pro – are also present, but fans of Ultimate Team will disappointed by its absence. But you can't have everything, and there's certainly enough crammed into FIFA Vita to make it a must-have launch title.
Online multiplayer is also present. While at times online matches suffered from some minor lag issues, it never really affected gameplay, though it made timing slide tackles a little precarious.