The perspective name change had been expected for months after the New York Times, among others, reported on EA’s future plans. In a statement, EA eases series veterans’ worries about too much change: “Everything you love about our games will be part of ‘EA Sports FC,'” it says. Modes, leagues, tournaments and clubs will “be there,” EA writes further.

“EA Sports FC” without World Cup?

In fact, without the blessing of the world soccer association FIFA, Electronic Arts could lose at least the licenses to the FIFA World Cup. The next one will take place at the end of this year, so it will still be part of the upcoming “FIFA 23” – EA always provides the names of the sports games with the following year. For later World Cups, EA could then come away empty-handed. EA has been publishing games under the “FIFA” banner for almost thirty years; the first title to appear was “FIFA International Soccer” for the Sega Mega Drive in 1993.

The new platform, independent of FIFA, offers opportunities for innovation, EA further writes. In plain language that means: In the future EA can make what FIFA did not want to carry so far. The video game magazine Video games chronicle published details of an internal meeting in February, which provide a foretaste of these plans. In the past, for example, the betting soccer association had prevented EA from allowing game modes other than “11 vs. 11” in its soccer games.

In addition, FIFA is resisting “broader digital ecosystems” and preventing the deeper involvement of certain brands, EA CEO Wilson said in the internal meeting, according to the report. According to Wilson, EA would like to see Nike, for example, featured more prominently in its video games, but FIFA has so far blocked that because of its partnership with Adidas.

Game highlights and NFTs

The New York Times also shed light on the drifting apart of Electronic Arts and FIFA months ago. According to it, FIFA had prevented the US publisher, among other things, from incorporating highlights from real games into its soccer game series and integrating additional game modes. In addition, EA would like to have more freedom in making money: The US company is planning to integrate NFTs into its popular soccer series, for example.

There is nothing to be seen of such concrete ideas in EA’s communication. Instead, the company ascribes to itself values such as “authenticity” and even “fearlessness”, which should also be represented in the upcoming “EA Sports FC” titles. Details are to follow in the summer of 2023; EA still has to beat the advertising drum for “FIFA 23” this year.

For EA, it should also be directly about money: FIFA is said to have demanded $250 million per year for licensing Electronic Arts. Too much for Wilson, who is said to have reduced the value of the license to “four letters on the front of the package” in the leaked internal meeting.