The new EA Sports FC 24 is now available in early access. But what is really new, other than the name? MeinMMO author Max Handwerk was able to take a first look.
When the farewell to the “FIFA” name and the change to EA Sports FC was decided and published, tension arose. Maybe more would change about the game than just the title? What would the change mean? Is there a big revolution in the series, which so often publishes such similar titles?
Well: EA Sports FC is still FIFA. This was clearly noticeable in the first few hours that I was able to spend with the game. There are certainly changes, such as new animations, new camera settings, more realism in the representation, in the movements, in the ball physics.
Also noticeable, for example, are cutscenes that now run in the loading screens, for example at halftime and after the match. Or dynamic graphics that are displayed on the playing field. The menu has also been completely redesigned. You can already tell in the details that new things are being used here,
But when you jump into a match, the foundation, the basic structure of the game, feels familiar. You know the modes, you know the matches. Anyone who has played FIFA will also be able to find their way around EA Sports FC 24 straight away.
The really big revolution – that won’t happen. For comparison: the full jump to NextGen, which was carried out with FIFA 22 and HyperMotion, felt bigger at the time than the jump from FIFA to EA Sports FC.
But at least for me, three things stand out that separate EA Sports FC from its predecessor.
EA Sports FC 24 shows its gameplay in a deep dive
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The integration of female players in FUT
This is probably the biggest change EA Sports FC 24 has to offer – and one that’s immediately noticeable when you open FUT mode. Current players as well as new hero and icon cards from women’s football are now available in FUT and are also included in the packs.
At first glance, the new cards perform well on the pitch. Some of the ladies have very high ratings and a loan version of Alexandra Popp is probably the best striker card I have sent onto the pitch in EA Sports FC 24 so far. In my experience so far, the women’s cards work pretty well, especially on the offensive. The cards should provide variety when it comes to team building or in drafts.
It’s certainly an adjustment, and some players who see the FIFA and now the EAFC series as a realistic football simulator have already criticized the mixed male and female teams in FUT.
The counter-argument to this would be that FUT in particular has been a fantasy mode for years, in which stadiums look like something out of a comic and in which players get special cards that only have a very limited connection to their real-life counterparts. Towards the end of FIFA 23, Petr Cech, an iconic goalkeeper, was suddenly one of the most feared strikers.
The gameplay on offense
In general, EA Sports FC 24 feels similar to its predecessor, but there are some detailed improvements that should be exciting. At the forefront are the new precision passes and corresponding running routes that your players can take.
In the first few matches I saw offensive moves in EAFC that I hadn’t seen in FIFA. If you use the precision passes, the offensive game feels less supported and more manual and actually more realistic.
Especially in conjunction with the Dynamic Run feature, which was introduced a few years ago, you can carry out clever offensive actions that get you behind the opposing defense at lightning speed. By the way: The new precision shots also reward manual aiming and firing shots. Overall, the game just seems more versatile on offense.
It also helps that the gameplay is a little slower and more realistic at the start than at the end in FIFA 23. Whether it stays that way or changes through patches and increased values in Ultimate Team remains to be seen.
Evolutions in Ultimate Team
Evolutions in FUT are a new feature, but one with a lot of potential. It gives you the opportunity to upgrade players from your club, potentially adapting them to the power curve, which in Ultimate Team is usually determined by special cards.
Even the first evolutions make it theoretically possible to transform a bronze card into a usable gold card that can keep up well in the first few weeks. EA Sports has already announced that further evolutions will follow.
This could be a pretty cool feature, especially for fans of clubs that may not be in the top 5 in their respective leagues. It depends on what kind of evolutions will ultimately be available – but in the best case scenario, it would be conceivable that you can use your favorite players for a long time instead of having to say goodbye to them at some point in the shallows of the club because they simply can’t keep up anymore .
But: How the feature develops remains to be seen and will become apparent over the course of the first few weeks in EA Sports FC 24.
Conclusion
Overall, a similar conclusion can be drawn for EA Sports FC 24 as for previous FIFA releases – a step forward, but without a major revolution. It feels less like a completely new game than an upgrade from the previous version. Just as we were used to from FIFA.
Nevertheless, the game brings a few interesting innovations that you should keep an eye on. You can find an overview of all information about EA Sports FC 24 here.