EA FC 25, unplayable game.
Hey EA,
I thought I should drop here a post before leaving the game, I think it's the only place where you actually read users feedback.
I really loved Fifa series, I grew up on every release of your game, it makes me so sad to give it up but you make me no choice. the game is unplayable.
Let's break it down to few topics (I am only talking about UT)
Current Meta
1. Defense - Playing high and aggressive defense with VVD and Saliba where they auto tackle everything.
The defense AI is so strong to the point where players don't need to control the players, they are perfectly aligned and squeezed on a square of 20 meters.
2. Defense - Auto offside trap. overpowered tactics feature where again, the user doesn't needs to do anything, just set it up.
3. Attack (is it even exists) - Trivella, Finesse, L1 sprint boost, power shots.
The current meta doesn't have any skill gap between players. bad players rewarded by abusing mechanics of the game and doesn't play a real football.
Do you even aim to be a real football simulator?
- How can it be that Trivella is so commonly used on your game where in real life, you rarely see this shot across all seasons across all top leagues?
- Finesse shots from 20 meters??? where the last time you saw someone score from 20 meters to the far post where the keeper just stand there without doing nothing?
- L1 sprint boost? where the last time you saw someone dribble around the 16 box like a mosquito from side to side till he find a hole to sprint through defenders?
- Corners with VVD
Those attacking mechanics should be used but they should be rare, people should attack with a proper football passing like in real life.
Why do you have OP defensive AI? are you a really e-sports game?
Why you need to help people with defense? as a player on elite division and high WL rank, I don't need your help. I spend a lot of time mastering defense switch, reading the game, tracking runs. You should reward me! not a player that just join and got VVD from pack and using VVD to run everywhere on the pitch.
Why defenders always catch up attackers no matter what is the attacker pace. VVD literally catch every run.
Why Tekkez on FC Pro win games by simply doing a fast corner to VVD? is this a skill gap? is there anything his opponent can do to prevent this?
Do you even listen to the community?
I am working for a tech company, I am managing R&D of a product that servers million of users.
We have a team that talks with group of users daily, not through forms or "Please submit us a feedback", talking with them directly, asking for their feedback, for their opinions on the product.
Do you even do this? how you let Reddit, Twitter, Youtube have so much negative content from the top Fifa creators?
Is there any manager on EA that put any effort on quality and user feedback? have you ever thought to create a group of VIP beta testers to get immediate feedback on your game?
Why you don't pay a ticket to Inception FC, Jamboo, Nick RTFM and tell them "Come to Toronto, let's fix the product".
Nothing lasts forever
I get it, you earn a lot of money, you don't have competition, people are still buying points.
Let me be clear, and I am talking for every EA employee reading this, if that's your roadmap, keep this current product just because it keeps selling, YOU ARE WRONG.
As soon as there will be a decent competitor that will copy paste your UT mode, with your current gameplay, you are out.
Instead of giving us a great product, you are showing all the world "Look, there is a brilliant opportunity here to develop a better game" and guess what? nothing lasts forever.
Just look at Intel, the world leading company for processors, controlled every piece of the market till 10 years ago, now they can't afford a coffee on their offices.
Does the patches even do something?
I never seen anything like this before. It's pretty clear for me as software developer and especially as a manager. YOU DON'T QA YOUR PRODUCT.
You are declaring a product for EA FC 25: Rush, skill moves, new animations, FC IQ etc. You are pushing your developers to finish it before September so you can have a beta but you don't have the time to check it, right? You just do sanity tests that it's not crashing, all the monitoring works but the simple tweaks to check the gameplay you leave to the users so they can do the QA for you for 100$. AM I RIGHT?
Well, I guess you develop a bit too fast because the game is on a point where the patches doesn't do anything. ANYTHING.
The funny thing is, I thought that the last state of FC 24 was OK, not great but OK. I was looking forward to 25 with the mindset of "Okay, it will be the same as 24 with a bit of tweaks" but I was wrong, so damn wrong. What you did with the gameplay is a shame, such a shame that I can't play anymore. such a shame that I am investing so much time writing this as the last hope you can fix the game.
What I think you should do next?
On my company we worked really hard to deliver features without pay attention to quality. we saw that a lot of users are leaving because of quality so we put a lot of effort into this, to a place we stopped working on features and just stabilize the system and make it better.
If you are an EA employee reading this, you should demand that from your management. you deserved to work on environment where you are PROUD of your product and code.
Your main focus should be quality.
FC 26? I don't want any new feature. I don't care. why should I care if I can't play the game?
If you release 26 by saying "we keep the same game but we fix performance, FPS, engine, reduce animations, reduce defensive AI, reduce input delay" I will be the first to pre-order it.
You should stop being so attached to your BI data if you keeping earn money and selling pack or not. You can't try to keep players on the game by keep releasing promos or reduce the price of the game by 60% where the gameplay is in such a bad place.
My friend just bought the game and he message me "man, this is the worst Fifa I have ever played".
Final words
I am really sad to leave the game but it is what it is. you can't continue to play something that doesn't gives you joy.
I just hope someone on EA will read this and understand the huge mistakes you are currently doing.
I personally will love to give a genuine feedback on the game, I really think you should open a Discord channel with gamers to have an instant feedback.
Let's hope for a better Fifa days.
Cheers. ⚽
