It is precisely about engagement and spending.
I haven't played this year because I cannot allocate enough time to be competitive without spending.
Last time I played I was playing unhealthy amounts of squad battles for objectives, played rush for objectives, played rivals for upgraded rewards each week, played weekend league every week and I got rewarded with junk constantly, it is probably the main driver behind me not wanting to buy the game anymore.
I made a thread around laliga tots about how the game was making me fell depressed after opening hundreds and hundreds of packs and doing hundreds of sbc and getting 1 real Madrid tots which was useless because I got vini jr during toty and that's who I got from tots.
I'm not banging my head off that wall again, il leave the store to the whales.
I think what you described actually explains the system very well.
What happened to you is not really about football anymore, it’s about the engagement loop the mode creates. The structure of Ultimate Team connects several things together: time investment, random rewards, progression resets through promos, and the constant introduction of stronger cards.
When those systems interact, the player ends up in a cycle where you feel like you need to keep playing more games, open more packs, complete more SBCs and chase the next upgrade just to stay competitive.
At some point it stops feeling like normal progression and starts feeling like work or pressure.
The fact that you recognized it and stepped away is actually a very healthy decision. Many players stay stuck in that loop without realizing why they feel frustrated or exhausted.
Your experience is a good example of why it’s important for people to understand how these systems work, so they can decide how much time and energy they really want to invest.
