It's official: FIFA 23 just scored more World Cups in one year than the England national team has managed in 150. For the first time ever, EA's latest installment features both the men's and women's elite international competitions. The male tournament kicks off in Qatar in November, while New Zealand and Australia host the women's tournament during the summer of 2023. Both will appear in FIFA 23 with authentic stadia, balls, bells, and whistles – but mercifully few vuvuzelas. It's a spectacular curtain call for a series which will transition into EA Sports FC this time next year.
Australian forward Sam Kerr becomes the series' first global female cover star – long overdue, given that it's been almost 30 years since EA first started its collaboration with FIFA – who is set to share the honors with Kylian Mbappe. Even better, women's club teams are included for the first time too. Every side from the Women's Super League (England) and Division 1 Féminine (France) is in FIFA 23, with accurate kits, faces and broadcast overlays. Oh, and on-pitch feel too.
"We're adding a lot of women-specific animations and they definitely make the game feel different," says associate producer Sam Rivera. "We think you'll want to try out the women's teams right away." Indeed, three of the D1F sides have no male equivalent, making Issy, Soyaux, and the fabulously named FC Fleury 91 completely exclusive to that gender. There's more to come too, according to line producer Matt Lafreniere: "We are going to have a lot of exciting things to share around women's football in the coming months, so stay tuned."
Liberal liberos
These inclusions are harmless to the casual player, and progressive to anyone interested in inclusivity and equality – so it was dispiriting to see Kerr's cover reveal trigger a small backlash on certain corners of social media. Those who decry FIFA as "broken" want the company hours spent securing female cover stars instead poured into fixing servers and gameplay mechanics. Such complaints show glaring cognitive dissonance. These matters are handled by different departments within EA – it's akin to yelling at the HMV assistant because your fave band released a duff record. The increased investment in women's football for FIFA 23 is a positive, no question.
We can celebrate this advancement while acknowledging that gameplay enhancements are required and, arguably, long overdue. For now EA is teasing HyperMotion 2, an evolution of last year's animation tech which saw 22 players motion captured at once. This time around two full matches were captured in Xsens suits, including one all-female clash, leading to 6,000 new animations to be dropped into the game – which EA believes will do X, Y, or Z. 12DOVE has put these new features to the test already, and we'll be able share our FIFA 23 hands-on impressions in the next few days.
There are other new innovations to slide under our microscope. Power shots are a risk-reward mechanic which encourage you to try your luck from distance, but can go disastrously wrong if mistimed. Set-pieces have been completely reworked in order for you to specify exactly where you want to strike the ball, almost like a pool or snooker game. Acceleration has been retooled too, so leggy defenders such as Virgil van Dijk still have the means of catching up with rapid strikers, even if it takes them an extra-half second to reach top speed. Rest assured that issues pounded by the meta last season – such as teams dropping deep in Divisional Rivals matches – are also high on our playtest checklist.
Evolutionary pro soccer
Whatever the intention behind these new featuresets and evolutions, the first two months on from FIFA 23's release are likely to see Rivals and weekend league players hammer the engine for short-cuts – as often seems to be the case when a new installment to the series launches. Contrary to social media opinion, EA is aware of this and on standby to tweak as necessary. "Whenever we introduce a new feature we have to be careful," says creative director Kantcho Doskov.
"We want it to be effective, we want people to try it, but we don't want it to be the meta or overpowered. We test throughout the whole year [ahead of release], and are trying our best to balance it. But we know the reality is that when the game goes live, millions play it, and they will find things that we didn't see. If that happens, we have a dedicated team that monitors this feedback on a day-to-day basis, and will act on it quickly via the Live Tuning tool," Doskov adds.
EA Canada has a tendency to work iteratively on the FIFA series. Spending years conceptualizing, engineering, and playtesting new tweaks, features, and improvements before introducing them into a new game. It's why, from the outside looking in, it may feel as if the team is slow to make change – although, as we learned in a visit to the studio offices in Vancouver, the group is talkative and open to constructive criticism.
Does the studio therefore not get demoralized by the often-vocal reaction to announcements on Twitter, Facebook and Insta? "It's a fair question," says Doskov. "I have friends who play FIFA and if the game isn't working as they expect, they call me out on it! I want to have fun playing the game, I want my friends to have fun, we want to make the best game possible [for everyone]. I'm happy to hear all feedback, and we really do try [to evolve] based on it."
The importance of crossplay
One feature we can celebrate now is the implementation of cross-play – it truly is something to be heralded. PS5 and Xbox Series X owners can now face off against one another, with PC Pochettinos added to that pool too. [At long last, the latter version is upgraded to current-gen, after two years on par with last-gen consoles]. PS4 and Xbox One players can also compete against each other across console platforms. Some may lament not being able to connect, say, PS5 and PS4, but this feels a sensible call. "The gameplay is too different," says Rivera. "There are multiple features that are current-gen exclusive, so we cannot just match up [to last-gen]. It would de-sync right away."
Lafreniere adds a little tease ahead of EA Sports FC, however. "We're already exploring expanding our cross-play capabilities in the future, so our players can play and connect with whoever, whenever, and wherever they want." Intriguing.
Changes are coming to Volta, Pro Clubs, and Ultimate Team too – with strong rumors of a new chemistry system which would completely revamp the biggest mode in gaming. Expect official confirmation either way in August. But even that isn't as key as nailing gameplay in FIFA's final season under Vancouver management. Did we mention having an extensive playtest coming soon? Just a couple of times? Okay then. In that case, see you next week to determine whether FIFA 23's World Cup credentials hold up on the pitch, as well as off it.
