Is this supposed to change with the unified sky initiative?
It's sometimes difficult to find out what to expect when flying abroad. A few years ago in Poland, my experience with FIS made me think they sit in a basement room with a big map and a few wooden airplanes that they move around based on the position requests they issue every other minute. From time to time they would spill coffee on their map and get confused. This year they had RADAR coverage but only from about 5000 AGL.
At the Aero show in Friedrichshafen you can play FIS at the German DFS booth with the actual systems and recorded real world data. The DFS employee does the radio for the aircraft involved and you have to process it, fill out the strips, resolve the odd situation, etc. That was very interesting. Here, FIS all have RADAR screens, the same system as the rest of ATC and when you contact them, the first step is to RADAR identify you. Most FIRs now hand out custom squawk codes, mainly to let the IFR ATC know that FIS are taking care of you. As VFR traffic, you can also fly > FL100 (that's were airspace C starts in Germany) which basically means you get FIS from the IFR ATC. Very convenient (very unlikely to encounter unknown traffic) and always granted in my experience.
French ATC/FIS are very good. My only complaint is that handoff between FIS controllers is often poorly done. They give you frequencies you can't receive, or the follow on controller doesn't know about you. Czech FIS are also excellent.